Duplicating and amending photo template

Hallo, this is fabulous software and exactly what I was looking for to tame my unwieldy photo collection from the archive - many thanks! I am brand new to Tropy and am trying to produce a new photo template that automatically grabs the photo info. However, if I go to the Tropy photo template to duplicate, it only contains two fields (title and date). File, size, date added, modified are missing (all these fields were showing up with data automatically for the two files I imported). (I have duplicated and saved a new photo template to work on, btw.) This seems a little odd, and I cannot seem to find all the corresponding fields, despite having imported several vocabs through preferences and websearched. For the fields I did add to my new photo template, the data is not being automatically pulled from the files, it would seem. At least, when I change the template in the file, all but title and date are empty. Basically what I want to do is have all the info as per the Tropy photo template with the addtition of the dpi, automatically imported into a field in the template, rather than have to plug it in every time. (Is “Resolution” the correct vocab for this?) I managed to duplicate and tailor a template for my archival sources no problems, so I understand the basic principles of amending a template and have begun delving into the whole vocab thing. Just I am not sure where I am going wrong and cannot find any answers in the forum or handbook. Will be most grateful for some guidance!

File, size, date added and modified are all fields which are automatically fetched from the file; they can’t be edited and will be automatically updated during consolidation when the file changes. So these fields should always be there for your photos – if they are not, it’s most certainly an error we need to address.

As for metadata extraction on import, I think you’re on the right track. You need to create your own photo template and set it as the default photo template in the preferences. When importing photos, Tropy will check all the fields in the default photo template and use the values embedded in photo, if present. Tropy specifically checks the Exif tags and XMP data.

Title and date, the two fields used in Tropy’s default template are a little bit special: if Tropy does not find a title in the photo’s metadata, it will use the file name instead; similarly it will fall back to the file’s modification date if no suitable date field is present in the metadata.

Thank you so much for your speedy response! I did exactly as you suggested and it worked a treat.