Deleting Keywords

[JL]

It looks like it's possible but it doesn't work for me. What am I missing?

[BogdanH]

Hi,

Using GUI, the most obvious way to delete keywords is as follow:
First you need to know where keywords are stored in files (either IPTC or XMP). After you select image files, click on apropriate "^" button. New form will apear, where you select second (Keywords) tab. Here all selected files will be shown again -but this time showing existing keywords in each file. Here, select all files you wish to modify keywords. Below file listing, there are radio buttons for various deleting options:

1. delete nothing (selected by default) -in case you only wish to add keywords,
2.  delete all -all keywords in above selected files, will be deleted.
3.  delete [KeywX] -only specified (KeywX, in this case) keyword will be deleted from selected files.
3a. you can check "if" condition, which can be usefull in cases like: "delete KeywX if KeywZ exist in the same file".

To confirm changes, you need to click on Update button ("Save" button doesn't work for Keywords and Categories).
That's it.

If you only need to delete all keywords in all selected files, then using "Exiftool direct" button is faster. Use command (in case keywords reside inside XMP):
-xmp.subject=
-and click Execute button.

Bogdan

[JL]

Yes, it seems very straightforward but nothing happens. Keywords don't get added and they don't get deleted.

I don't know how to use Exiftool Direct. I tried but I don't know the language.

[BogdanH]

Hi,

I somehow can't imagine the case where "nothing happens"... there 's always some message after you click on "Update" button. How about other tags? Can you edit/change values there?

I have explained how to use Exiftool direct: you simply click on "Exiftool direct" button and enter command I have told above. What version of ExiftoolGUI are you using?

Bogdan

[JL]

There's a message that says either a file was updated, or it says there was no file updated. Either way there was no file updated. The keywords are still there. Same with other tags.

I think this might be associated with MediaDex that I used to use for IPTC. I have two ApplicationRecordVersion numbers. I don't know if it's supposed to be that way or if there's something wrong. After I left MediaDex and went to Photo Mechanic I made changes through a lot of my 10,000 or so photos in the IPTC fields.

I first noticed a problem when I tried Windows Search 4 some months ago and it brought up the old tags in the search results. I thought they were supposed to be overwritten. In Photo Mechanic and XnView I can only see the new versions.

Just this week with a new computer and Windows 7 Photo Gallery I noticed the same thing. Windows 7 scans everything and brings up keyword tags in the gallery. Pretty cool thing but, of course, I can see the old tags again. I have tried reinstalling MediaDex to see if I can delete the tags from within. No luck. They seem stuck there like cement. So, the same thing is happening in ExifTool. I can't get rid of the tags.

MediaDex is gone and unsupported since 2008. I wrote to Canto and two people wrote back both with a long sales pitch for Canto Single User but no help.

The only way that works so far is to use the nuclear method of stripping all IPTC using your "Remove metadata" option. That's pretty rude if you can imagine, going back through 10,000 photos, stripping and then rewriting all the IPTC data. It took me years to do it the first time.

I also tried Exiftool Direct and it says, "Tag -xmp.subject does not exist". What's supposed to come after the "=" sign?

The version number I'm using is 3.38.

P.S. For the first time today, after trying this a hundred times, (I'm not kidding) I found a picture where I could delete the keywords. This one had only one ApplicationRecordVersion number so I'm sticking to that theory. But, that's not a picture with old tags I need removed.

[Phil Harvey]

I think that should be -xmp:subject=

- Phil

[JL]

That works in so far as it says, "One file updated" although 'nothing' happens and I still don't understand. What comes after -xmp :subject= ? For instance the keyword or the keyword in quotations? Neither one works anyway so perhaps I'm missing something.

[BogdanH]

Hi,

I'm sorry for mistake (thank you Phil).
Nothing comes after
-xmp:subject=
-it means "delete" all data in xmp:subject tag. Another example:
-xmp:subject=MyKey -deletes all previous keys and places MyKey there
-xmp:subject+=SecondKey -adds a key (now there would be two keys: MyKey and SecondKey)

You didn't tell if your keys are in XMP or IPTC section. If your keys are in IPTC, everything is the same, except you replace "xmp:subject" with "iptc:keywords". For example:
-iptc:keywords=
-deletes all keywords in iptc section.

Can you post one of your "suspicious" file somewhere, so I could see it?

Bogdan

[JL]

The only thing I've been talking about is IPTC so, yes, it's IPTC.

Here's a sample picture. http://dl.dropbox.com/u/574752/cem-alta_mesa1.tif

The photos that have a problem are the ones with 2 different Application Version Records. i.e. the ones that were edited in Photo Mechanic after doing my initial work in MediaDex.

Perhaps the question is, why did Photo Mechanic create a new AVR instead of overwriting the original one?

Or maybe the question is, why does Windows only read the first one?

[Phil Harvey]

Thanks for the sample.

Wow.  I have never seen a TIFF with these 3 types of IPTC.  Cool.

Of course, there is only one standard location for IPTC in a TIFF, and the other 2 versions are in non-standard locations.

Yes.  ExifTool writes only 2 out of the 3.  The AFCP_IPTC is not currently writable, but I will add support for this in the next release (version 8.35 will have this new feature).

Any software that adds IPTC records in non-standard locations should not expect that this information will be readable by any other software (except ExifTool of course).

- Phil

Edit: I may have spoken too quickly.  I see now that I have disabled writing of AFCP_IPTC on purpose, but I can't remember why.  Maybe due to conflicts with the other IPTC.  I'll have to check my notes on this and do some more thinking before I can say I will change this.

[JL]

So, are you saying there's no way for me to delete the IPTC version that I thought was overwritten by Photo Mechanic? The one that's still showing up in Windows 7 search results?

I don't really care if it shows up in Exiftool because it's not likely to be seen by my less technically-inclined friends and relatives, but Windows 7 is likely to be used.

[Phil Harvey]

So, are you saying there's no way for me to delete the IPTC version that I thought was overwritten by Photo Mechanic? The one that's still showing up in Windows 7 search results?

I'm surprised that Windows 7 is picking this up.  Yes, currently there is no way to delete this, but I have looked into the problem in more detail and the next version of exiftool (8.35) will be able to write/delete entries in the AFCP IPTC.

- Phil

[JL]

Perhaps Windows 7 is just picking up the first thing it sees. The Live Photo Gallery also writes 'tags' (keywords) but in the version that's recognizable by Photo Mechanic and XnView.

Since I know the old metadata was put there using MediaDex, I reinstalled my old copy of MediaDex and tried deleting all IPTC data. Surprisingly, it didn't work. But that might be because MediaDex was a really flakey product to begin with.

Is AFCP the European version of IPTC?

I use ExifToolGUI instead of ExifTool because I'm kind of flakey myself.

[BogdanH]

I'm surprised that Windows 7 is picking this up....

Hi,
Just for info... I have downloaded above tif sample, and here, Windows only shows value of CopyrightNotice tag -other tags values from IPTC(n)/XMP aren't shown (Win7 x64 -no additional codecs loaded).

Bogdan

[JL]

I think there's a keyword there of 'photograph' that does show in Windows. I had over 500 of them show up in the Live Photo Gallery for just one folder. Because MediaDex indexed all kinds of file-types, not just photos, I had added keywords like "photograph", "graphic", "documents" etc so I could search that way.

Will the change for AFCP also be included in ExiftoolGUI?

[BogdanH]

Hi,

Till now, I didn't know something like AFCP even exist.. so I needed to look here first:
http://www.exiftool.org/TagNames/AFCP.html

Basic idea behind GUI is, to show all data that Exiftool recognizes. So user get some overview in metadata jungle, there are four section buttons: EXIF, IPTC, XMP and Maker(notes) -I believe these sections are of most interest.
And as you can see, in IPTC view, there are IPTC, IPTC2 and IPTC3 shown (you must enable "List metadata by IFD" in Options menu, to see this) -which is displaying AFCP presence (as far I understood this).

Me personally, I would stay away from this "multiple" IPTC stuff... very confusing.

Bogdan

[JL]

I don't have a choice to 'stay away' because multiple versions are already in my photos. I thought IPTC was a standard. It's quite surprising to me to find out there are different versions of it.

Since Phil plans to add the ability to write AFCP into Exiftool, my question is Do you plan to also add that to ExiftoolGUI or does that happen automatically?

[BogdanH]

I don't have a choice to 'stay away' because multiple versions are already in my photos. I thought IPTC was a standard. It's quite surprising to me to find out there are different versions of it.

I understand your situation as it is now. With "stay away", I was thinking about slowly transferring metadata from AFCP to some more widely known standard. I'm very sure this could be (by using Exiftool) done in batch. Might be some work, but once it's done, you at least know where you are. As it seems, world goes XMP way right now..

Since Phil plans to add the ability to write AFCP into Exiftool, my question is Do you plan to also add that to ExiftoolGUI or does that happen automatically?

Sorry not being clear about this. Yes, this happens automatically: GUI doesn't manipulate metadata -Exiftool is called to do the job. But.. To edit AFCP metadata inside GUI, all you have is, "Exiftool direct" option -which means, you should be familiar with Exiftool usage to some degree. That is, I don't plan to make some dedicated form to edit AFCP data the "user friendly" way (like this is the case with Exif, IPTC and XMP right now).

Bogdan

[Phil Harvey]

Actually, the AFCP IPTC will be kept synchronized when you write/delete any IPTC to the file normally.

- Phil

[JL]

BogdanH,

I've already written the IPTC data the way I want it to be using Photo Mechanic and I guess that's what Phil calls "standard". I don't need to transfer the AFCP version; I just need it deleted.

[BogdanH]

Hi,
Great news -as it seems, your "problem" isn't really a problem

To Phil:
About sinchronizing you're planning: does that mean, if I change, i.e.: -iptc:city=Paris -changes will be done in all IPTC (sub) sections containing this tag? For above sample, this only happens in IPTC and IPTC3 right now (IPTC2:City doesn't change).

Bogdan

[Phil Harvey]

Hi Bogdan,

Yes.  That is what will happen.

- Phil

[JL]

Excellent work, Phil! I downloaded the latest version of the ExifTool and ExifToolGUI and I'm able to use the GUI to delete the AFCP keywords. That's as far as I've gotten, testing this on one folder. Some of the copyrights need to be changed too.

Is there a way to delete the entire Application Record Version? For my purposes it doesn't matter, as long as I can get some of the metadata out of there so it stops showing up in Windows Search. Just curious.

I guess another fix would be for Windows to stop reading it. 

[JL]

And now ensues the next batch of questions: 

Sometimes the keywords will not delete - about 4% of the time so far. I put up a couple of samples:

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/574752/watts-hosp4.jpg
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/574752/0000-unkwnbaker-0003.tif

Sometimes when trying to delete CopyrightNotice under IPTC, I get the error message:

'Unrecognized data in IPTC trailer'

[Phil Harvey]

Code Select Expand

> exiftool -a -keywords= tmp
Warning: [minor] Unrecognized data in IPTC trailer - tmp/0000-unkwnbaker-0003.tif
Warning: [minor] Unrecognized data in IPTC trailer - tmp/0000-unkwnbaker-0003.tif
Error: Not a valid JPEG (looks more like a TIFF) - tmp/watts-hosp4.jpg
    1 directories scanned
    0 image files updated
    1 image files unchanged
    1 files weren't updated due to errors

> mv tmp/watts-hosp4.jpg tmp/watts-hosp4.tif

> exiftool -a -keywords= tmp/watts-hosp4.tif
    1 image files updated

> exiftool -a -keywords= -m tmp/0000-unkwnbaker-0003.tif
    1 image files updated


ExifTool is always cautious when it sees a problem in an image.  The .jpg file fails because it has the wrong extension.  The second file fails because the IPTC data is not written properly.  Here a warning about the IPTC trailer is issued and the IPTC isn't updated.  If you ignore this warning (with the -m option), then the IPTC will be updated.

Currently there is no way to selectively delete the AFCP_IPTC without rebuilding all of the IPTC with a command like exiftool -iptc:all= -tagsfromfile @ -iptc:all FILE.

- Phil

[JL]

Over many hours I was able to delete all the AFCP-IPTC keywords and copyright notices using the editing options in ExifToolGUI. Thanks for your help with that.

Now, with recently discovered devastation caused by Window Live Photo Gallery to the EXIF and file compression, I'm having to retrieve backup discs from around the continent and start over again. Now that the keyword editing options have been removed from ExifToolGUI I'm no longer able to do this or, at least, I don't know how with ExifTool. This is affecting almost 9,000 photos.

Any assistance would be appreciated.

[BogdanH]

Hi,

..Now that the keyword editing options have been removed from ExifToolGUI I'm no longer able to do this..

Keywording has been moved to main GUI screen and can be done at any time in Quick view -please, see manual for details (near the bottom of the page). At least from my experience, as it is now, keywording can be done much easier and faster than before. Try it and let me know.

Bogdan

[JL]

Sorry. The manual is at the bottom of what page?

[Phil Harvey]

You can find the ExifTool GUI manual here.

- Phil

[JL]

Bogdan, the keyword thing really isn't working anymore. We had a lengthy conversation about AFCP-IPTC after which you and Phil did something to the keyword options in ExifToolGUI to make it possible for me to delete it. Now I can't.

Your new arrangement is taking out some of the keywords, the XMP I think, but it's not touching the AFCP. I really need to be able to do this.

[BogdanH]

Hi,

Because I somehow lost the track of whole issue, I've read complete thread again.. and here's my finding based on example file you gave at beginning (cem-alta_mesa1.tif):
A: Inbetween Phil changed treatment of "multiple" (AFCP) IPTC metadata -now it works as he said it will.
B: In your example, keywords are inside IPTC2 section -thats why Windows Explorer doesn't show them.
C: To see them inside Win Explorer, keywords must be in (main) IPTC section or in XMP section -that's the place where they belong anyway.

What you should/can do:
1. Select desired image file(s), click on Exiftool direct button and write:
-iptc:keywords<iptc:keywords
and hit Enter key. This will copy keywords from IPTC2 into "standard" IPTC section and Win Explorer will show them.
The problem is (or might be), keywords inside IPTC2 aren't deleted.
Maybe Phil knows the way how to move keywords from IPTC2 to IPTC and delete them in IPTC2 afterwards...?

2. Select desired image file(s), click on Exiftool direct button and write:
-xmp:subject<iptc:keywords -iptc:keywords=
and hit Enter key. This will copy keywords from IPTC2 to XMP and delete keywords in all IPTC sections afterward. Again, Win Explorer will now show keywords.

Note: Both of above will only work as expected, if there are no keywords inside main IPTC before execution one of above commands -if there are some keywords inside main IPTC section, only those from main IPTC will be copied.
Thus, if you have no keywords inside main IPTC section (as in your example file), then it's easy to clean things.

Summary (from what I've found out):
When editing IPTC keywords, you can't specify particular AFCP section (IPTC2, IPTC3..). If more than one IPTC section exist, adding/deleting keywords will affect all IPTC sections. IMO, that's the main limitation of AFCP -despite the fact, that Win Explorer (and some other tools) can't handle AFCP properly.

Your new arrangement is taking out some of the keywords, the XMP I think, but it's not touching the AFCP. I really need to be able to do this.

You can edit any IPTC metadata in GUI (as before) by using ExifTool direct button (the only difference in v4.xx is, it became more "user fiendly" with XMP than with IPTC).

Bogdan

[JL]

I somewhat understand what you're saying but the ExifTool Direct commands are way too complicated for me to ever get this work done. I have over 12,000 photographs to go through.

Is it possible to get a version of ExifToolGUI that existed before you made the major upgrade? I was able to do this work then much more easily although with the staggering amount of photographs 'easy' is a relative term.

[BogdanH]

Hi,

You can download last old GUI version here: ExifToolGUIv3.42
Sorry I couldn't help you further...

Bogdan

[JL]

Thanks. That's fine. The way you explained above it won't work for me because I'll end up deleting all my keywords and I just want to AFCP deleted. That worked for me the last time when I used the old version.

[JL]

The problem is that Windows Explorer does see AFCP. That's how I discovered it in the first place. It seems to not read standard IPTC necessarily, just the first thing it sees.

[Phil Harvey]

Just throwing in my 2 cents:  The number of images should not matter as long as you are doing the same thing to each image since it is the same command to process 1 or 1000000 images with exiftool.

- Phil

[JL]

I wish. It's not the same thing to 12,000 images as there's a variety of keywords and copyright notices that have to be taken out. They exist across 125 folders. Perhaps I could Select All on each folder and wipe out what's there using one command? I don't think so as the text is different across the fields. With the old version of the GUI I can select all the pictures and simply empty the field and then Save.

[Phil Harvey]

The crossing of multiple folders is a problem for ExifTool GUI, but not for the command-line version.

But I understand if you don't feel comfortable using the command-line version.

- Phil

[JL]

I might be comfortable someday but I'd have to learn first. There's so much damage to my photos from Windows Live Photo Gallery I'm very carefully picking through it one photo at a time. The AFCP is 'extra' and I believe came from MediaDex long before WLPG happened. It will likely be the last 'repair cycle' the photos go through, now that I'm starting to establish a pattern with my process. So, I really wouldn't want to screw it up, from inexperience, after spending what looks like will be hundreds of hours and weeks repairing the WLPG damage.