Geotagging

How to use technology to stay organized and track your photography

By Josh Weisberg

Labels: How-To

This Article Features Photo Zoom

Major advancements in geotagging technology are making it easier for photographers to pinpoint where they captured their images. Downloading GPS coordinates into a program like Microsoft’s Pro Photo Tools allows you to automatically tag images and get city, state, country and address information. Having this kind of data is useful for searching, organizing and sharing your photo archive. If you don’t want to carry a GPS device, applications like Adobe Photoshop Lightroom and Apple Aperture include specific fields in the metadata for recording location data.

For outdoor photographers who need the highest level of accuracy, a handheld GPS is a good idea because it’s automatic—you simply have to turn it on and start recording a track route. In addition to popular handheld GPS units, such as Garmin, there are now numerous units designed specifically for geotagging. The biggest limitation is that GPS receivers only work when they have line-of-sight access to the network of GPS satellites, which means they don’t work indoors. A new and innovative geotagging device from Eye-Fi makes use of WiFi location data, rather than GPS data, to geotag images. This has the benefit of working indoors, but only works in locations where WiFi is available.

If you don’t want to carry a GPS, there are several other easy ways to record location data to your images. One simple way is to tag your images with the location where the image was taken. This can be done using any application that supports metadata tagging, including the popular Adobe Photoshop Lightroom, Apple Aperture and Microsoft Expression Media. These applications support a variety of metadata formats and include specific fields for location and hierarchical keywords. I recommend applying these tags when you first import or copy images to your computer while the location is still fresh in your mind.

Another fun and exciting way to geotag your images is to use an application that allows you to drag images onto a map. When using this method, you can select one or more images and copy them onto a map, then you can refine the location by dragging the image around. This will get you GPS coordinates as well as the location text.

Several popular photo-sharing sites, such as Flickr or SmugMug, support displaying geotagged images on a map. Simply upload your tagged images to these sites, and you can make a visual record of your locations—visitors easily can see where the image was captured. (Note: You may need to set the preferences in your sharing site to display location data.)

Geotagging also can help you get that award-winning shot. Last year Outdoor Photographer, PCPhoto, Canon and Microsoft put together a pair of programs—the OP and PCPhoto Top 100 Iconic Photo Locations projects. They can be accessed on the OP and PCPhoto (www.pcphotomag.com) websites. There, you can see the GPS coordinates and map locations for some of the world’s best photo subjects.

The Top 100 Iconic Photo Locations project was a joint effort by Outdoor Photographer, PCPhoto, Canon and Microsoft to create a map of the best photo locations around the globe. Powered by Microsoft Virtual Earth, you can click on a geographic region to view the locations, learn more about specific destinations and get photo tips.

Geotagging offers a powerful way to automatically tag your images without spending a lot of time keywording. It’s an important tool for outdoor photographers of all skill levels. By simply carrying a GPS device, you can add a new dimension to your organization that will make finding images much easier and faster—particularly in the distant future.

Josh Weisberg is director of Microsoft’s Rich Media Group and leads a team that’s focused on building better technology for digital photographers. He’s Microsoft’s resident expert on metadata and is the founder and chairman of the Metadata Working Group.

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Andy Bryant makes this comment

Saturday, 14 November 2009

As per OrganizePictured and Kevin, I've found that geosetter is by far the best s/w for geotagging I've discovered so far - both flexible and powerful (including raw file support). I have blogged about it here http://andybryant.squarespace.com/blog/2009/11/14/geotagging-photos.html Andy.
Pesto makes this comment

Saturday, 31 October 2009

To OrganizePictures, Take a look at this if you are planning to add geotags with Picasa (at least with version 3.5.0 []79.74,0]). In: http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Picasa/thread?tid=56c7f584f0691581&hl=en Here is a summary of the changes Picasa made to the metadata (the image was a JPEG image straight from a Pentax K20D camera): 1. The caption was written to the IPTC Caption-Abstract. 2. All maker note information was COMPLETELY DELETED! (So all information about camera-specific settings is lost.) 3. The byte order of the EXIF was changed from big-endian to little-endian! (Which goes against the current MWG Recommendation.) 4. The EXIF software tag was changed! (From "K20D Ver 1.00" to "Picasa 3.0".) 5. An EXIF ImageUniqueID tag was added.
Mark makes this comment

Saturday, 17 October 2009

I have used MetaGPS unit mounted on my Nikon D300 and D90. It is designed to insert GPS and heading info directly into the picture. No additional work needed after the pictures are taken. It is small and easy to use. Recommend it. Check out their product information page at: www.metagps.com
Fotografo Matrimonio Milano makes this comment

Tuesday, 15 September 2009

I tried Microsoft Photo Tools but does not support NEF files. I found Geosetter (also free) and I works fine.
OrganizePictures makes this comment

Thursday, 27 August 2009

I have used Geosetter as well and was impressed by how easy it is to do bulk geotagging. However, the software is very slow to write the geolocation information to the pictures. Also, many times it doesn't connect very well to the server for geolocation information. After a while I started (again) using Picasa...their newest version supports geotagging very well via Google Earth...so you have to have both installed.
Bryan makes this comment

Wednesday, 26 August 2009

Hi, how can I contact with Josh Weisberg? For there will be a new and more convienant geotagging device available on the market. Wanna introduce it to him.
Rick makes this comment

Tuesday, 09 June 2009

Being both a GIS analyst and a photographer, what's frustrating is that we're stuck with using Long/Lat when geocoding our pictures. Which makes automating the integration of geocoded photos into a GIS project just that much more difficult when we're working in UTM, or Albers, or some other coordinate system. Long/Lat is not really the best choice for land navigation and topo issues.
Seb makes this comment

Thursday, 30 April 2009

Unfortunatly direct connection of a GPS is not common until now. Nikon is on top with some DSLR (D2x -D3x, D90, D200-D700 and the new D5000). I use the "Solmeta Geotagger N2 Kompass" as it saves the direction of view, too. It writes directly to NEF and/or JPEG. It is placed on the hotshoe and connects directly to the body with a short cable. Easy! Info (mostly in German) on www.gps-camera.eu
Stuart Brown makes this comment

Saturday, 11 April 2009

I bought a Jobo PhotoGPS last year because I do not want to be tied to the camera by USB cable. This is a simple to use hot shoe mounted device which allows me to attach the geotags to my photos when I download them to my PC. My only irritation has been that some of the tags come with only arabic or chinese characters for the street address depending on where I use it, if somebody out there knows an easy way of translating these into English I would like to know about it.
Jason Corneveaux makes this comment

Thursday, 26 March 2009

I have been using gpicsync (code.google.com/p/gpicsync/)for a long time. I like it because it will tag RAW files, something other programs sometimes have problems with... It takes GPX files, and a directory of images, and tags away. It will even generate a google earth kml file that can be handy for uploading to a website to share. Also -- if you geotag, Lightroom will show coordinates that can be clicked which will open a browser and then go right to google maps :)
Franco makes this comment

Thursday, 19 March 2009

Hi, I'm new to photography and I wa wondering if i should start with a film camera or a D-SLR?
Kevin makes this comment

Tuesday, 17 March 2009

After using several different software packages for geotagging, I went for Geosetter (http://www.geosetter.de/en/). I found it superior to everything else out there, on the market. What I REALLY want, is like what Nikon has, but for Canons. The ability to just plug in a GPS unit, and auto-log the coordinates when you take the picture. Better yet, add a small compass to it, so it shows location, AND direction. I know my android G1 has the above capabilities. I like MS programs, and I keep meaning to check out the Pro Photo tools again. When I last tried them, they were still pretty new, and not very feature complete.
Pros makes this comment

Tuesday, 10 March 2009

I use my iPhone as a GPS data logger. The big advantage is that it uses GPS outdoors and automatically switches to WPS (WiFi based position like the EyeFi) when indoors. I'm a Mac user, so the latest release of iPhoto with the Places functionality makes it very easy to organize my photos based on location. The iPhone app I use for geologging is GeoLogTag. It's easy to use and accuracy is very good. http://www.galarina.eu/GeoLogTag/News/News.html

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Geotagging

How to use technology to stay organized and track your photography

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