'File' information isn't metadata that is actually embedded in the image, rather it comes from system information.As you may or may not already know, metadata included in image files comes from several different sources, each of which gets its own ExifTool Group: Each individual bit of metadata information has a 'tag name' the tag name lets you know which bit of metadata information you are looking at. If you've ever used digiKam, ExifTool or other software to look at your image metadata, you've noticed that there's a whole lot of it. Tags & groups: Where does image metadata come from? Set the orientation tag to normal for all images in a folder and its subfolders.Copy hierarchical tags written by digiKam or other image organizer from the preview jpeg sidecar files to the corresponding raw files.

Copy metadata from the raw file over to the corresponding preview jpeg sidecar.Extract the preview image embedded in raw files.Move or copy image files into folders by year and month.Rename image files according to their creation date.Basic ExifTool commands for image organization.Tags & groups: Where does image metadata come from?.But they probably do.Īs always when working from the command line, do your homework before trusting any commands you find on the internet. This doesn't mean that all the command examples on this page still work exactly the same as they did when I first posted the article. I put this article up on my website mostly so I would have a quick reference for the Exiftool commands that I use the most often. Although this article was written in 2010, Exiftool and the Exiftool syntax seldom change except to add new tags and new capabilities. Minor update in March 2015.Įxiftool is a mature and reliable metadata reading and writing application. But if you need to quickly and safely move, copy, rename, reorganize, extract preview jpegs, and/or tag hundreds or thousands of images at once, ExifTool is the tool of choice. ExifTool example commands skip to main content Nine Degrees Below Photography - color management, photography and painting using free/libre softwareĭigiKam and other image organizers are perfect for viewing and tagging images one by one.

Exiftool example commands