Could someone please confirm for me that the tags, and metadata entered are not actually written and stored in the photo, but only in Tropy? If this is the case, might it be possible in the future to have this functionality so that metadata may be viewed when Tropy is not installed? or on a mobile device?
1 Like
Yes, all the information is stored in your project file (by default saved in your Documents folder).
That said, weāll be considering writing metadata to the image files themselves ā did you have a particular embedded metadata format in mind? Furthermore, Tropy now supports export plugins, so it is likely there will be plugins that export to a format which is easily viewable independently of Tropy (e.g., HTML or PDF).
No, nothing specific - being an amateur historian with a lot of images to sort and trying to make sure that my work is accessible to all in the future. At the least perhaps whatever could be written to show in the Details pane when the image is shown in Windows Explorer would be useful. For me the key data are the tags, source, date and location but I value all the other features of Tropy and intend to use them as much as I can. But I am not willing to repeat the time to enter similar data into the image itself!
I would suggest export to tab delimited - this will make for easier editing as well as the ability to create csv files which are often a format used to import into presentation platforms.
Following up on this, basically just to provide an example of a use case on why it may be useful to write metadata into the jpg file.
Weād like to use Tropy to organise a relatively large collection of scanned pictures. They will then be uploaded to an online archive (with Omeka S), and at some later stage may be passed to other archival organisations. At each stage of the process, they will be accompanied by their full set of metedata with Dublin Core, etc.
However, the person working on these things at the official archives in our province suggested we also embed at least some metadata in the jpg itself. In principle, embedding metadata in the jpg is redundant, but as with all things that should last, redundancy may actually be a good a idea.
All things considered, I see their point.
If you look for example at the image you see on this page, you will see they actually put some metadata in the EXIF, XMP, and IPTC.
It may be complex to get this working smoothly from inside Tropy, partly because those metadata standards have not been conceived with archival pictures in mind, and mostly have no obvious correspondence with Dublin Core. Yet, even just mapping basic fields such as EXIF āImageDescriptionā, or some of the most fitting fields from XMP, would go a long way in ensuring that if a JPG file is ever detached from its full metadata, it has enough information to make it possible to trace it back to its source.
Iām considering scripting a solution that achieves the same result ex-post (mapping some Dublin Core metadata to somewhat correspondent fields in EXIF/XMP/IPTC), but perhaps it would be nice to have this in Tropy, as a way to reassure everybody that the precious metadata they add to files will be less likely to be lost.
I am sorting out how to āpublishā hundreds of images of old records using a CC licence. One overiding reason - it seems to me - to embed a minimum set of metadata is to ensure that images do not become āorphanedā - seperated from the files that says what they are. If they do, then a whole load of copyright law might apply unecessarily. So Iād always embed dc:rights, creator, title and date. And Iād aim to make the file name meaningful using a faceted approach. So there is nothing to stop you from using something like: [Fond][Sub-Fond][Series] and so on. There are plenty of open-source metadata editors out there that will do this on a batch basis painlessly.