SCAN in TIFF Files Trying to Overwrite CREATE Date Using File Name

[KevnDale]

I did research and thought this
exiftool -n '-alldates<filename' /FILEPATH

Would overwrite the created date with the file name year. These are scanned in files so I utilized YYYY_Description for most files as I wasnt able to determine an exact month/day. Some do have YYYYMMDD but those are in the minority. When I run the script it says "Updated 1 file" in my test directory but it also creates a duplicate with a .original at the end but the created date isnt changed for either one.

I've reached the end of googling and I am sure it is a simple fix but I cant figure it out.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Phil Harvey]

When a file is modified, the original file is preserved with "_original" added to the name unless the -overwrite_original option is used.

The AllDates tag writes CreateDate, ModifyDate and DateTimeOriginal.  You may want to change other dates in the video.  See FAQ 3 for help with this.

ExifTool will only set a date from a file name if it contains year (4 digits) and month,day,hour,minute,second (2 digits each).  For partial dates, you can do this (to set CreateDate for example):

exiftool '-createdate<${filename}:00:00 00:00:00' DIR

Note that you can't use the -n option because that would defeat the date/time format parsing.

- Phil

[KevnDale]

Thank you so I attempted your code and I got:
Warning: No writable tags set from filename
1 image file unchained..


Is this because it is a scan/tiff file?

[StarGeek]

Is this because it is a scan/tiff file?

No, exiftool can write to tiff files.

Make sure you are not including the -n (--printConv) option, as that will mess things up.

Are there any numbers in the filename other than the year, month and date?  That will also cause problems.

[StarGeek]

exiftool '-createdate<${filename}:00:00 00:00:00' DIR

That fails because of 00 month and 00 day.  And if there was a copy number as part of the filename, that would also cause problems.

Dang it, I had a command that worked for if it was only Year, YearMonth, or YearMonthDay, but I can't find it atm.

[KevnDale]

No other numbers in this test file (some do in my larger file selection)

It is YYYY_Description (No #s), I can remove them from the batch if it causes confusion.

[StarGeek]

I can remove them from the batch if it causes confusion.

No need, this command should work.

Not my post I was looking for, but found this post from Phil.  It just needed a little tweak for this situation.

Try this
exiftool -overwrite_original '-AllDates<${filename; my @a=(m/(\d{4})(\d\d)?(\d\d)?/); $a[1] or $a[1]='01';$a[2] or $a[2]='01';$_="$a[0]:$a[1]:$a[2] 00:00:00"}' /path/to/files/

Example output, I had to change the quotes to work on Windows

Code Select Expand

C:\>exiftool -echo "Clear AllDates" -P -overwrite_original -alldates= Y:\!temp\x\y
Clear AllDates
    1 directories scanned
    3 image files updated

C:\>exiftool -overwrite_original "-AllDates<${filename; my @a=(m/(\d{4})(\d\d)?(\d\d)?/); $a[1] or $a[1]='01';$a[2] or $a[2]='01';$_=\"$a[0]:$a[1]:$a[2] 00:00:00\"}" Y:\!temp\x\y
    1 directories scanned
    3 image files updated

C:\>exiftool -G1 -a -s -AllDates Y:\!temp\x\y
======== Y:/!temp/x/y/2020 Description 01.tif
[ExifIFD]       DateTimeOriginal                : 2020:01:01 00:00:00
[ExifIFD]       CreateDate                      : 2020:01:01 00:00:00
[IFD0]          ModifyDate                      : 2020:01:01 00:00:00
======== Y:/!temp/x/y/202005 Description 02.tif
[ExifIFD]       DateTimeOriginal                : 2020:05:01 00:00:00
[ExifIFD]       CreateDate                      : 2020:05:01 00:00:00
[IFD0]          ModifyDate                      : 2020:05:01 00:00:00
======== Y:/!temp/x/y/20200515 Description 03.tif
[ExifIFD]       DateTimeOriginal                : 2020:05:15 00:00:00
[ExifIFD]       CreateDate                      : 2020:05:15 00:00:00
[IFD0]          ModifyDate                      : 2020:05:15 00:00:00
    1 directories scanned
    3 image files read

[KevnDale]

You are a legend! Worked like a champ! Month and day came over when i populated. Awesome thank you so much!!

[Phil Harvey]

That fails because of 00 month and 00 day.

Oh, right.  Thanks for figuring this out.

- Phil