How update your metadata file version or how to incorporate all tags at once

[Manuel G.]

Question for phil Harvey.:

I am not a photographer, I have photos of my 49 years of existence. I accumulate hundreds of photos from the last 35 years, many of them, I had them in negative, and I digitized them many years ago when it began to be possible and I continued taking photos. now I do much less.

As you know, the versions of Exif and other types of metadata files IPTC, XMP, ICC_Profile, etc., have been evolving, to contain more metadata. For example, Exiff has evolved from version 2.1 of 1998 to version 2.32 of May 2019. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exif

My purpose, like many of you, is to have the photographs well documented, to have them in order and easily located.

To do this, first of all, is to get something that I have been trying to get an answer for 8 years and is how to update the Exiff file to the latest version.

I think I have learned that the Exif file, not necessarily, has to contain all the fields, of a version of Exif. so you may have only one of hundreds of tags, which can be filled in or left blank. But for me and for anyone who views the metadata, it is more clarifying to have all the tags, even if they are not filled out, and to indicate the version number of Exiff, that the image is using.
Because in addition, if we put the Exiff version, we can have a clue, why a program does not read, certain Exiff or certain tags.

Phil, currently Exiftool, allows deleting all or part of the metadata, with a series of instructions. Would it be possible to do the reverse operation? Being able to select the version, which you want to implement In addition, if a field is already filled in, keep the value of that field.

This version upgrade issue, I extend it to the rest of existing metadata types, be it IPTC, XMP, ICC_Profile and other metadata types.

More extensive documentation on metadata versions

https://exiftool.org/TagNames/EXIF.html
https://exiftool.org/TagNames
- http://cipa.jp/std/documents/download_e.html?DC-008-Translation-2019-E
- http://www.vieas.com/en/exif23.html

[Phil Harvey]

Exif versions are backward compatible, so there is no problem having files containing old versions of Exif.  Differences in recent versions of the Exif specification generally don't apply to scanned photographs/slides anyway.

Being able to select the version, which you want to implement In addition, if a field is already filled in, keep the value of that field[/b].

Yes, this is possible, and there are various ways to accomplish this.

- Phil

[Manuel G.]

Exif versions are backward compatible, so there is no problem having files containing old versions of Exif.  Differences in recent versions of the Exif specification generally don't apply to scanned photographs/slides anyway.

Being able to select the version, which you want to implement In addition, if a field is already filled in, keep the value of that field[/b].

Yes, this is possible, and there are various ways to accomplish this.

- Phil

I know that Exif versions are backward compatible, but the question is how to process all the photos, to update them to Exif 2.32.  Could you give me some hints on how to do it. I'm pretty lost.


I didn´t understand much, this unser "Differences in recent versions of the Exif specification generally don't apply to scanned photographs/slides anyway."   

If understood you correctly, is that a scanned photograph has practically no tags, because it is captured by a machine that transforms from an analog medium to a digital one, and that, does not generate an Exiff full of tags, as a current camera would?




- Manuel G.

[StarGeek]

I didn´t understand much, this unser "Differences in recent versions of the Exif specification generally don't apply to scanned photographs/slides anyway."   

Exif 2.32 only added three new tags, which really don't apply to a scanned photograph.  Those tags are CompositeImage, CompositeImageCount, and CompositeImageExposureTimes.  Just my opinion, they're pretty useless tags, though I'm sure that someone had enough of a need for them to be added.

If you're really insistent on doing this, you could run this command
exiftool -CompositeImage="Not a Composite Image" /path/to/files

[Phil Harvey]

Hi Manuel,

I know that Exif versions are backward compatible, but the question is how to process all the photos, to update them to Exif 2.32.  Could you give me some hints on how to do it. I'm pretty lost.

exiftool -exifversion=0232 DIR

- Phil

[Manuel G.]

I didn´t understand much, this unser "Differences in recent versions of the Exif specification generally don't apply to scanned photographs/slides anyway."   

Exif 2.32 only added three new tags, which really don't apply to a scanned photograph.  Those tags are CompositeImage, CompositeImageCount, and CompositeImageExposureTimes.  Just my opinion, they're pretty useless tags, though I'm sure that someone had enough of a need for them to be added.

If you're really insistent on doing this, you could run this command
exiftool -CompositeImage="Not a Composite Image" /path/to/files

Thanks a lot.