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EXIF data editing; incorrect camera lens data

Forum|Forum|1 year ago
August 7, 2024
4 replies
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Hello, I'm having a heck of a time figuring this out. I have several files with incorrect (possibly corrupt) EXIF fields. I have 100's of images with various metadata issues like:

lens:ffffffffffffffffffffffffffff.."
70-200, 70.0-200.0 mm, 70-200mm f2.8 DG OS HSM | Sport, 70-300 f4 IS USM, 70-300 f4 (all these are the same lens)
5dMII, 5DMIV (but was the same camera taken seconds apart)
unknown lens
etc.

All of these are mismatched labels even though they were the same camera, same lens, from the same event on the same day so they are clearly errors. It is also not the camera or lens because it's "only" a fractal % of 300k+ images over years and with different cameras.

After hours of searching, I can't find a way to edit these errors within any Adobe products since it apparently only lets you edit IPTC, GPS, Keyword, and time stamp data. How can I fix these errors without diving into 3rd party potentially sketchy software? Or is there one that is officially recommended?

This topic has been closed for replies.

L

Lumigraphics

Brainiac

Read up on EXIFTool and do some testing with your camera to see if it writes bad data to original files. It might need a trip to Canon for repair.

I publish a script to integrate EXIFTool with Photoshop and Bridge but I'm sketchy so...

Conrad_C

Community Expert

In which software are you seeing these errors, and is the EXIF metadata wrong when viewed in just one application or is it wrong in exactly the same way when viewed in multiple other applications?

Are they wrong straight out of camera (which would be very weird), or have they somehow gotten incorrect over time?

After hours of searching, I can't find a way to edit these errors within any Adobe products since it apparently only lets you edit IPTC, GPS, Keyword, and time stamp data.
By @LTH Mitchell

That is what you will generally find in the photo editing applications from the most well-known software companies. In general, much of the industry treats EXIF data as read-only, not to be messed with, especially for raw files with undocumented proprietary metadata that these developers do not want to corrupt accidentally. So most pro photo editing and management apps you find will let you edit only IPTC data and not EXIF.

In Lightroom Classic, the only raw file EXIF metadata it will let itself change is the capture time, and that option is off by default, again to lean towards protecting raw file integrity.

A tool that many might suggest for you is the free Exiftool. It has a long history, is widely used and known, and is so trusted that various well-known apps and utilities embed or call Exiftool to do their EXIF heavy lifting. It’s a command-line tool, so if you are not comfortable with that, it might not be an option.

There are some point-and-click GUI options. I use a Mac and am not very good at using the command line, so the software below is what I am familiar with. If you use Windows, I do not know what the options are other than Exiftool, but there must be something.

The first application shown below is GraphicConverter, and the second application is A Better Finder Attributes. They are respected and credible because both apps have been available, tried, and tested for around 30 years. Both do provide EXIF editing. Both are not free, but GraphicConverter is shareware so you can try it and only pay if you decide to keep using it. I verified that EXIF lens edits I make in these two apps do show up in other applications.

L

LTH MitchellAuthor

New Participant

Thanks for the thorough reply, I'll have to give Exiftool and or GraphicConverter a try. I'm proficient enough in a few programming languages/ command line to cause more problems for myself 🙂 I'll post an update on my results.

I definitely understand their desire to prevent laymen people from messing up that data. Not being able to freely change it technically helps with copyright and other issues as well. I just find it hard to believe that I'm the only one who has ever needed to change faulty material, where a temporary disable of those locks wouldn't be possible as a downloadable add-on.

So far I've seen the exact same (wrong) MetaData in Lightroom, Bridge, and Windows File Explorer so it's not the application misreading it resyncs have not done anything. I also don't believe it's an issue coming right from the camera, I assume it's something that has happened over time. Like I mentioned I have files taken seconds before and seconds after with the same camera/lens that have the same Lens info while a few inbeteen say the lens was "fffffffffffffffff..."

The funny thing is that if it wasn't out of camera, or software's misreading it, and the EXIF is so locked down we can't change it; how have some of these changed themselves to "fffffff..." over time?

While I was at it (fixing the actual broken ones) I wanted to clean other discrepancies like my 24-105 has 4 tags, 70-200 has 6 tags (same lens for 10+ years, just on different bodies) and my catalog has all these tags:

70-200mm
70.0-200.0 mm f/2.8
70-200mm f2.8 DG OS HSM
EF70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM
EF70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM (78 images, this is wrong, I haven't used a 300mm and others in the same folder from the same event are correct)
EF70-300mm f/4-5.6 (245 images, also wrong)

Conrad_C

Community Expert

So far I've seen the exact same (wrong) MetaData in Lightroom, Bridge, and Windows File Explorer so it's not the application misreading it resyncs have not done anything. I also don't believe it's an issue coming right from the camera, I assume it's something that has happened over time. Like I mentioned I have files taken seconds before and seconds after with the same camera/lens that have the same Lens info while a few inbeteen say the lens was "fffffffffffffffff..."

The funny thing is that if it wasn't out of camera, or software's misreading it, and the EXIF is so locked down we can't change it; how have some of these changed themselves to "fffffff..." over time?
By @LTH Mitchell

That’s really odd, so one reason you don’t see much info about fixing it is because this specific kind of EXIF discrepancy just doesn’t come up very often in photography discussions as far as I know. I also don’t know how it could have ended up that way. One theory (which I am not saying is likely) is that at some point, the photos were managed by software that did alter the original EXIF data, even unintentionally, maybe due to a bug. But again, it’s not something I’ve heard of so I have a hard time believing that. I have no good answer as to how it happened.

The “ffffffff” could have been a metadata corruption problem with the original photo file, maybe. But that kind of data corruption doesn’t result in the other instances of perfectly spelled variations of lens models. 🙂 Very strange.

kglad

Community Expert

in the future, to find the best place to post your message, use the list here, https://community.adobe.com/

p.s. i don't think the adobe website, and forums in particular, are easy to navigate, so don't spend a lot of time searching that forum list. do your best and we'll move the post (like this one has already been moved) if it helps you get responses.

<"moved from using the community">

kglad

Community Expert

what app?

L

LTH MitchellAuthor

New Participant

I don't understand your question, I am asking for the software (app) or a method that can do this. I mentioned "I can't find a way to edit these errors within any Adobe products" I have the full suite and have directly tried LR-C, PS, and Bridge. None of these have let me change the EXIF data other than the items listed above. Nor have I been able to find any information other than third-party EXIF editors shown in a video by a person in their basement. (untrusted)

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