Exiftool not showing/ reading the tag that represents Creation date of image

[Girija]

We are using exiftool to  retrieve  certain tag values.
We have defined one custom shortcut in our  config file as :
                                   CustCreateDate => ['xmp:CreateDate','iptc:DateCreated']
To read xmp:CreateDate tag or iptc:DateCreated tag.
Now ,on extracting the xmp:CreateDate tag or iptc:DateCreated tag using the following command:

            exiftool –xmp:CreateDate <imagename>
                                     or
             exiftool –iptc:DateCreated <imagename>
it does not extract any data against this attribute. But  on adding any another XMP tag value in the image by using Adobe Photoshop CS5 ver 12 and then using the same command exiftool extracts this  tags with their values.
Please advise to extract the file data for image creation date.

[Phil Harvey]

It sounds like the tags don't exist.  ExifTool only extracts the information in the file.  Add the -f option to the command if you want exiftool to output non-existant tags.

- Phil

[Girija]

Hi Phil, thanks for your reply. When we view the image on Adobe Photoshop CS5 ver 12, it shows
<xmp:CreateDate>2012-10-12T13:02:46+05:30</xmp:CreateDate>

but on trying to read this image attribute using exiftool with the below options it reads nothing:
EXIF:CreateDate
XMP-xmp:CreateDate
CreateDate
IPTC:DigitalCreationDate
IPTC:DateCreated
XMP-photoshop:DateCreated
EXIF:DateTimeOriginal

-f option yields the same result as was without it.

[Phil Harvey]

Perhaps this tag is being hidden by another tag of the same name?  This is FAQ number 3.  What does this command return?:

exiftool -xmp:all -a -s FILE

- Phil

[Girija]

Hi Phil, thanks for your reply.

We  have tried the following command :

        exiftool -xmp:all -a -s FILE

but this command does not return any result related to xmp:CreateDate tag.This command returns the following output

XMPToolkit                        : Adobe XMP Core 5.0-c061 64.140949, 2010/12/07-10:57:01
CreatorTool                      : Adobe Photoshop CS5.1 Macintosh
InstanceID                       : xmp.iid:B02DDF040A1D11E2BE8EE76B0826012A
DocumentID                     : xmp.did:B02DDF050A1D11E2BE8EE76B0826012A
DerivedFromInstanceID   : xmp.iid:B02DDF020A1D11E2BE8EE76B0826012A
DerivedFromDocumentID : xmp.did:B02DDF030A1D11E2BE8EE76B0826012A
Also ,the image contains 'Created Date' field which can be viewed from Adobe Photoshop but that field is not extractable or viewable from exiftool command line.

[Phil Harvey]

I think the confusion may simply be that ExifTool is using a different label for the tags from what Photoshop is using.  The only date/time tag Exiftool doesn't extract is the filesystem creation date of the file (which isn't part of the file metadata anyway), but I don't think that Photoshop would be displaying this.

- Phil

[Phil Harvey]

I got the sample, thanks.

There is no IPTC in this image, and only minimal XMP.  The XMP doesn't contain date/time information.  In fact, there is no date/time information at all in the metadata of this file.  The only date/time information is the in the filesystem:

Code Select Expand

> exiftool ~/Desktop/image/brown.jpg -a -G1 -time:all
[System]        File Modification Date/Time     : 2012:10:11 21:54:30-04:00
[System]        File Access Date/Time           : 2012:10:11 21:54:30-04:00


ExifTool extracts the above filesystem modification and access date/times, but not the filesystem creation time, which could be what Photoshop is displaying.

- Phil