Writing serial number in Nikon NEFs

[Archive]

[Originally posted by dlu on 2006-05-17 02:30:35-07]

I'd like to be able to write the serial number tag of NEFs from a D200.  When I try and do it

  exiftool -serialnumber=123456 foo.nef

exiftool reports "1 image files updated," but

  exiftool -serialnumber foo.nef

returns

  Serial Number         :

with no value for the serial number.  I'm using exiftool 6.17.

Thanks in advance, Doug

[Archive]

[Originally posted by exiftool on 2006-05-17 12:07:35-07]

Hi Doug,

This is FAQ number 3.  Use the "-a -G1" options and you will see where  your serial number information was written.  You can also use the "-v3" option when writing to see what is happening.

Unfortunately, the Nikon serial number for the D200 is not writable (see the Notes for SerialNumber in the https://exiftool.org/TagNames/Nikon.html" target="_blank">Nikon Tags documentation).  This is because it is used as a key for the decryption of other information.  So you are instead writing XMP-aux:SerialNumber, but you need to use the "-a" option to see this duplicate information when you try to read it back again.

- Phil

[Archive]

[Originally posted by dlu on 2006-05-20 18:49:05-07]

My apologies for missing the FAQ, and my thanks for the prompt answer.  I really appreciate it.

- Doug