Error 0x88982F52: There is too much metadata to be written to the bitmap

[matichukfamily]

I'm not really and exiftool user, just John Q Public that is trying to add tags to favorite photos (and with a spouse that takes A LOT of photos).
While trying to add tags using File Explorer (in Windows 10), on a few files I get the message "Error 0x88982F52: There is too much metadata to be written to the bitmap".  I downloaded the exiftool and think I correctly tried to add a comment with a "file updated" message in response.  However, when investigating the file with File Explorer, the comment was not added.
Any help or experience or thoughts?

[matichukfamily]

FYI, I tried to add a comment with the following command line based on the examples in the exiftool help:
exiftool -Comment="This is a new comment" a.jpg

[matichukfamily]

I found something that "resolved" the issue after several attempts.  Attempts that did NOT work included: adding comment with exiftool, making a copy of the file, copying the file to a different storage device.
What did "resolve" the error was to edit the picture, cropping just a few pixels from one side and saving it as a new file.  Adding tags and a rating worked fine on the new file.

I would be curious if someone can explain that. 
I found very few references to this error on the internet, but some seemed to reference a limitation on the JPEG block size.

[StarGeek]

I downloaded the exiftool and think I correctly tried to add a comment with a "file updated" message in response.  However, when investigating the file with File Explorer, the comment was not added.

Windows doesn't read the Comment tag in jpegs.  It's a pretty fragile and useless tag and gets overwritten frequently by various software.  To get something to show up in the Windows property "Comment", you need to write to either EXIF:UserComment, XMP:UserComment, or EXIF:XPComment.  See this post for the full list of tags<->Windows properties relationships.

Take note of the fact that these tags have very little support in software other than Windows.  A better place to put information would be in something like the XMP:Description tag, which Windows inappropriately calls "Title".

It's up to you if you want to continue "fixing" your jpegs that way, but understand that when you resave a jpeg like that, it degrades the image quality.

I would suggest trying a this to fix the jpgs.  Install irfanview and install the plugin pack.  The plugin pack contains a plugin for lossless jpeg functions.  Load up an offending jpeg and select Options Menu -> Jpeg Lossless rotation.  You can then set it like this example and it will rewrite the jpeg without losing any data.  Hopefully, after that, Windows will be able to read/write the file correctly. 


If it works, you can then do this to all your jpegs in bulk by hitting the File Menu -> Thumbnails to select all the images you want to process.

[matichukfamily]

Thank you for that suggestion.  I had tried IrfanView, but did not have the plugin.
Fortunately, so far I have only seen this phenomenon on less than five files out of several thousands.
I will keep your IrfanView suggestion in mind if I see it again.

[StarGeek]

I hate reviving old threads, but this would be an exception, as it fixes the original issue.

The problem in this case is most likely the ThumbnailImage is too large for Windows.  The easiest solution is to remove it.

exiftool -ThumbnailImage= /path/to/files/

[Cactus26]

Although it's been a year since the last post, I would like to say that this thread has helped me a lot. It seems to occur frequently in Windows, especially with smartphone photos. By the way, I came across this thread via a general Google search, I hadn't searched the ExifTool forum directly.

I will add an option in my PHOR application when writing back the metadata to automatically remove the thumbnail image in the case this error occurs.

Thank you!
Juergen

[Halteres]

I recently started having this issue. My photos come via Google Photos, and I think it adds metadata to empty EXIF fields.  Also, the mobile phone camera software writes data to the EXIF fields. I resolved it by opening the file in Microsoft Paint, and then immediately saving it as a .JPEG file to overwrite the original. Then i could tag the photo.  The error itself does not occur on every file, and opening and saving again is laborious. I suppose in a folder of .JPEG files a bulk file converter could convert all the originals to .JPEG as it were and reset the EXIF field that had too much data, and then you could tag them.

[StarGeek]

My photos come via Google Photos, and I think it adds metadata to empty EXIF fields.

Google photos does not remove any metadata from the files. The downloaded files are the same as when they were uploaded. In all probability, you do not need to "fix" them.

I resolved it by opening the file in Microsoft Paint, and then immediately saving it as a .JPEG file to overwrite the original.

This is a destructive recompress, which leads to "needs more jpeg".

I gave two ways to fix the issue, neither of which are destructive. The commands in FAQ #20 "How do I repair corrupted EXIF?" might also work.