Is there any software which will set the EXIF Dates based on the file's modification date?

Question

I have been using Exifer for many years to re-date and re-name my photos based on the EXIF dates from the camera(s).

I have now started using some alternative camera apps available on the iPhone (specifically Plastiq Camera and Hipstamatic) but these do not save any EXIF information in the images.

What I would like to do then is to insert the Date Digitised, Date Taken and Date Modified EXIF values based on the JPG file's Modified Date (which is correct to the time of taking the photo) and to also set the Make to Apple and Model to iPhone 3GS (although the process would apply to any JPG image which has no EXIF data, regardless of the source)

I have looked at Exifer, IrfanView, ExifTool, Picasa and others and they either cannot set the dates at all or can only set them to a specific date/time.

So, is there any software available which will automatically set the EXIF Dates based on the file's Modified date property?

Or, is there some switch in ExifTool that I have missed possibly?

I would like to be able to do this as a batch on a folder of images.

EDIT: Following John's answer, this is the Windows .bat file I created to do this. The order of commands is important so as not to overwrite any of the dates with other commands.

"D:\Program Files\ExifTool\exiftool.exe" "-FileModifyDate>AllDates" *
"D:\Program Files\ExifTool\exiftool.exe" "-Make=Apple" *
"D:\Program Files\ExifTool\exiftool.exe" "-Model=iPhone 3GS" *
"D:\Program Files\ExifTool\exiftool.exe" "-FileModifyDate<DateTimeOriginal" *Pause

Answer

I think you can do it with ExifTool:

exiftool -v "-FileModifyDate>DateTimeOriginal" *

Tried on some copies of jpegs and it seems to have worked.

Check more discussion of this question.

What's the best website for showcasing my work to the public?

Question

Wondering which website is more popular for posting own photography art and maybe get some feedback from community in other words a way to carry photography to mass public. FB is not the right place.

Answer

Flickr is definitely a good fit for what you're after:

1. It's public by default (unlike Facebook which tends to be private).
2. It's huge: it definitely ticks your "mass public" box.
3. It has excellent social features that make it very easy to interact with new users (people you don't already know) and get your photos seen.
4. It doesn't over-compress your images (like Facebook does) so it's a great place for a high-quality showcase.

In response to Kiril Kirov's comment ("I created a flickr profile, but not a single view for about a week :D"), it sounds like you're not using Flickr to its full potential. If you want other people to notice your work, try the following:

1. Give your photos meaningful titles, descriptions and tags to ensure they appear in search results.
2. Add your photos to relevant groups and join in the group discussions.
3. Find other users whose work you like and add them as a contact. It's not obligatory to reciprocate but many people will. At the very least, they'll usually check out your stream to see who you are.
4. Look for other photos you like and comment/favourite them. Again, there's no guarantee people will reciprocate but many do.
5. Join a Flickr group local to your area and go along to a meet-up. (If they don't seem to have them, try arranging one! If there's no group, create in!)

Even though Flickr is public by default, you do have to invest some time in it before you'll come to other people's attention. But the same is true of any other photo site. Plenty of people choose other sites (such as 500px, SmugMug or Zenfolio), often because they have a more professional "portfolio" look, but for social features Flickr just can't be beaten.

Check more discussion of this question.

Which focal-length lens is is usually used for portrait photography?

Question

What is used by professionals?

Answer

It depends a bit on the kind of portrait you want to take, but there are two key things you want to do regardless:

1. Not distort your subject. If you're too close to the subject things get warped, so whilst using your wide-angle and getting right up to the nose of your subject may produce an amusing result, it's seldom what you want (but as with all things, it can be great when used sparingly).
2. Throw the background out of focus, drawing attention to your subject.

Bearing in mind that you want to be stood a reasonable distance from the subject to avoid the first issue, for a head-and-shoulders type shot, you'd normally be looking at something that's the full-frame equivalent of 80-85mm, so about 50mm on an APS-C sensor with a crop-factor of 1.6x (Canon).

For a 3/4s length type shot you'll want to be using a wider lens; something like a 50mm on a full-frame body, so about 35mm on a 1.6x crop sensor. You'll get more depth of field with the shorter lens, so may need to ensure the subject is far enough from the background so you can still throw it out of focus. Needless to say fast primes are the norm for portraiture.

Check more discussion of this question.

What are the best settings for black and white portrait photography?

Question

trying to do some "daily shots" thing, and I was wondering what's the best setting for black and white portraits in areas that are well-lit and sometimes not (fastfoods, restaurants, malls)

I want to mostly do candid shots and I have with me a standard 35-80 zoom lens in a Canon EOS 50 film camera, the subjects often are friends and family so I can get as close as I need to (yep, I need to get so close sometimes because my lens, in a way, sucks).

I'm trying to get a grasp of this aperture-DOF relationship, so shots that I usually do are focused subject with out of focus backgrounds, something like this:

most recommend a small aperture (at around f/22 or f/19) but I often mess up my shutter speeds to the point that I usually get a lot of blown-up highlights. That often happens when I use the light meter for exposure in Manual Mode.

Answer

There are no "correct" settings. The settings you need will depend entirely on the lighting on the day, the subject you're photographing and what kind of photograph you are trying to produce. Therefore this answer can't be responded to with anything more concrete than general advice.

It sounds like what you need is to expand on your base knowledge of photography and exposure. I would recommend that you buy a copy of Bryan Peterson's excellent "Understanding Exposure" which excellently explains the relationship between shutter speed, aperture and ISO and caters for both film and digital photographers.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Understanding-Exposure-3rd-Photographs-Camera/dp/0817439390/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1297634656&sr=8-1

I shoot my Canon AT-1 with ISO400 all the time, you don't need heavy filters to achieve well exposed photos - you need to understand how to read your camera's built in light meter and how best to configure the settings to achieve the desired result.

Check more discussion of this question.

When shooting HDR, is it better to use RAW images or jpgs?

Question

I just recently started shooting HDR images, and I like the effect when it's done right. I was just wondering, when I take 5 bracketed images and tonemap them using Photomatix Pro, is it better for me to just give the program the 5 RAW images, or should I convert them all to JPEG before tonemapping? Sometimes it seems like the tonemapping process adds a lot of noise that wasn't previously there, and I didn't know if perhaps using RAW images caused that. If you want to see the HDR images, feel free to view my G+ profile. Thanks!

Answer

Firstly you can produce HDR images with either raw or JPEG. However as raw files contain greater dynamic range than JPEGs to begin with it makes sense to shoot raw if you plan to produce HDR images, as you'll get better results.

To expand on your point about noise here is an important relationship between dynamic range and noise. Simply put dynamic range of a camera is the ratio between the brightest and darkest things the sensor can capture. The limit on how bright an object you can capture with digital is simple - it's the point at which the sensor pixels become saturated (full) after which an extra light does not affect the signal.

The limit on how dark an object you can capture is more complicated. You ought to be able to go darker and darker until there are no longer any photons being reflected from your object into the camera. However, there is a base level of noise you get even when the camera is not exposed to light. As you photograph darker and darker objects there will then come a point where all detail in the object is lost to noise.

The dynamic range is thus determined by noise, but more importantly noise and DR are inverses of each other! The noisier the camera the lower the dynamic range and vice versa.

What's happening when you're tonemapping is that the software (which has the job of taking a true high dynamic range image and squashing that down into a standard dynamic range image suitable for display on regular screens) is pushing the captures too far in order to even out brightness variations and you're seeing a lot of noise. The solution to this is to extend the dynamic range of the data you're working with, as we've established this will lead to less noise. The way to do that is to increase the range of camera exposures by capturing more images, or moving your 5 bracketed images further apart.

The fact has other consequences too. Your HDR image doesn't have to have the mega contrasty painting look that many people object to, it's possible to use HDR techniques to produce an ordinary looking image, but with exceptionally low noise!

Check more discussion of this question.

How do I get a a soft, washed-out film effect with a digital camera?

Question

I use digital for the convenience aspect of it, but sometimes I take a picture and can't help thinking that the soft, slightly "faded", washed-out look would be nice. How would I go about getting such an effect in post-processing, and what (if any) in-camera settings are required to do a good job?

Answer

The answer you don't like - out of all the digitally added film effects I've tried (and I've tried many along with actually shooting film) none really come close. That is not a scientific type of knowledge, but rather an impression. So if you really really want film look, you'll end up shooting film and even then, you'll most probably be disappointed on how far your results are from the film icons.

In many cases what is perceived as the film effect is not just a film effect, but photographer's creative vision put into right film choice and shooting technique plus the specifics of the emulsion plus photographer's editing. Harald Mante's Kodachromes are worlds apart from Steve McCurry's Kodachromes (again, personal impression based on the books, can't provide a reference).

The answer you might find useful - Nik Software's Color Efex Pro plugin contains many color film emulations and their Silver Efex Pro contains B&W film emulations. Other than that, DXO FilmPack also has pretty decent choice of films. These are the ones I've tried myself and can recommend, although this is not a guarantee of realistic rendering. Based on just web examples, Alien Skin Software's Exposure also looks interesting (I'm looking forward to try out their Kodachrome emulation).

Check more discussion of this question.

How can I recover photo files from a CF memory card with a corrupt filesystem?

Question

I know this is not specifically a photography issue but since many of us with prosumer/professional-level DLSRs use Compact Flash cards, it is bound to happen to others as well.

I have a Sandisk 16GB Ultra card that occasionally had the camera reporting inability to access the card. I had to reinsert the card to continue using it. I was able to read the card and transfer the photo files to my computer drive. Today, the same thing happened again, just that nearing the capacity of the card, it failed one last time and the camera was subsequently unable to read it anymore. Despite reinsertion.

My other CF cards never once exhibited this problem, so it's pretty much isolated to this card.

The card is similarly unrecognisable on my computer CF card reader. I think the filesystem is toast, but I suspect the photo files are still intact. I would like to find ways where I can inspect the raw binary data in the card and hopefully recover the photos?

Answer

There are two utilities from CGSecurity that might help.

• TestDisk - Allows direct access to disk data and file recovery from corrupt partition tables.
• PhotoRec - Specifically targeted at recovering photos by identifying byte patterns in images (& video) files.

Depending on what has caused your card to fail will depend on which of these tools will work best.

You can use TestDisk to do a raw backup of the card first to prevent further damage by using recovery tools incorrectly.

Check more discussion of this question.