XMLSchema#base64Binary for EXIF:Copyright tag?

[Mac2]

Windows platform, ExifTool command line app, latest version.

A image file contains the text © SomeName in the EXIF:Copyright tag. When I do a

exiftool -G -exif:copyright <file_name>

i get

[EXIF]          Copyright                       : ® SomeName

but when I use -x to produce XML output, I get:

<IFD0:Copyright rdf:datatype='http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#base64Binary'>qSB....HQ=</IFD0:Copyright>

(I changed the original copyright string / base64 code  for privacy reasons).

Since the XML output is in UTF-8 which should handle the © character just fine, why does ExifTool fall back to using Base64-encoding in this case?

(the XMP-dc:rights tag contains the © SomeName string without Base64-encoding).

I played with -charset exif= but no change in the result for XMP (when I use -charset exif:Arabic the normal output changes).

The metadata in the file was produced apparently by ExifToolGui.

[Phil Harvey]

I think I'll need to see a sample (you can email me: philharvey66 at gmail.com).  I get this (on a UTF-8 console):

Code Select Expand

> exiftool -ver
9.33

> exiftool a.jpg -copyright="© SomeName"
    1 image files updated

> exiftool a.jpg -copyright
Copyright                       : © SomeName

> exiftool a.jpg -copyright -X
<?xml version='1.0' encoding='UTF-8'?>
<rdf:RDF xmlns:rdf='http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#'>

<rdf:Description rdf:about='a.jpg'
  xmlns:et='http://ns.exiftool.ca/1.0/' et:toolkit='Image::ExifTool 9.33'
  xmlns:IFD0='http://ns.exiftool.ca/EXIF/IFD0/1.0/'>
<IFD0:Copyright>© SomeName</IFD0:Copyright>
</rdf:Description>
</rdf:RDF>

- Phil

[Mac2]

I sent you an email with a JPEG sample file and the ARGs file I use to import the data on Windows.
So far this worked with a wide range of files. This is the first file reported with this specific issue.

[Phil Harvey]

I got the sample, thanks.

The problem is that the copyright symbol is not UTF-8.  It is Latin1.  By default, ExifTool assumes UTF-8 for EXIF:Copyright (actually, but the EXIF spec it should be ASCII, but the MWG suggests UTF-8).  This is why it is converted to base64 in the XML.  Specifying -charset exif=latin1 should fix this (because the symbol is Windows Latin1 encoded).  It did for me.  But you say you tried this?

- Phil

[Mac2]

My software so far always used the default character set for EXIF. For IPTC I had added a way for the user to configure the character set to use for reading/writing. I have now added a identical option for configuring the EXIF character set to assume for import and export. When specifying Latin(1) for reading, the data is properly converted  and the users can handle their old files.

[Phil Harvey]

Sounds good.

- Phil