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IPTC to XMP sidecar

Started by marlin_spike, May 01, 2014, 01:20:40 AM

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marlin_spike

Hi Phil,
I've long used Picasa to organize photos but most of my editing is now done in Lightroom. I'd like to write the IPTC metadata for the raw (NEF) files to XMP sidecar files so that LR can read them, but am a complete newbie to ExifTool and a pretty inept programmer. I *think* the command: 
exiftool -tagsfromfile SRC.EXT -@ exif2xmp.args -@ iptc2xmp.args DST.xmp
is close to what I'm looking for but not sure....
If so, is there a way to use it to batch process a folder(s) full of images?
Thanks in advance! Just finding your site gives me hope!!
-Rob


Phil Harvey

Hi Rob,

Your command looks good (be sure you have the .args files in the current directory when running this) but you might also want to copy the XMP directly by adding -xmp:all to the command.  There are a few ways to do what you want for an entire directory.  See examples 11-13 on the Metadata Sidecar Files page for sample commands to do this.  (From the command you mentioned, it seems as if you probably already found this page.)

- Phil
...where DIR is the name of a directory/folder containing the images.  On Mac/Linux/PowerShell, use single quotes (') instead of double quotes (") around arguments containing a dollar sign ($).

marlin_spike

Hi Phil,
Thanks very much, but I'm afraid I still need a bit of help. I copied/pasted the two .args files in a folder, then in terminal window used the following command line while in that folder:

exiftool -tagsfromfile DSC_0043.jpg -@ exif2xmp.args -@ iptc2xmp DSC_0043.NEF -xmp:all  '(since I specified a single file, the 'all' command probably was unnecessary)'

The error message returned was:
Error opening arg file iptc2xmp

hopelessly lost?
Rob

Phil Harvey

Hi Rob,

You should put the arg files in the same directory as your NEF file, then "cd" to that directory before running exiftool.

Alternatively you can run exiftool from any directory, then drag and drop each of the arg files and the NEF file onto the command window at the appropriate place in the command instead of typing the names.  This way the full path will be typed for you.

- Phil
...where DIR is the name of a directory/folder containing the images.  On Mac/Linux/PowerShell, use single quotes (') instead of double quotes (") around arguments containing a dollar sign ($).