35.18 Metadata for Images

20220116 Metadata is stored with photos and can be displayed with some image viewing apps. jpg images have EXIF (exchangeable image file format) formatted metadata. gif images do not have EXIF data but do have metadata though supporting comment tags and embedded XMP metadata/tags. See Section ?? to remove potentially private data from a photo.

The exiftool command provides access to image meta data.

$ exiftool photo.gif
ExifTool Version Number         : 10.80
File Name                       : photo.gif
Directory                       : .
File Size                       : 2028 kB
[...]
File Type                       : GIF
File Type Extension             : gif
MIME Type                       : image/gif
GIF Version                     : 89a
Image Width                     : 640
Image Height                    : 480
Frame Count                     : 11
Duration                        : 1.65 s
[...]
Frame Count                     : 11
Duration                        : 1.65 s
Image Size                      : 640x480
Megapixels                      : 0.307

We can modify the EXIF data using exiftool. Here we add a Date to a gif image:

$ exiftool -Date="2019:02:14 12:30:30.0713" photo.gif 

$ exiftool photo.gif
ExifTool Version Number         : 10.80
File Name                       : photo.gif
Directory                       : .
File Size                       : 2028 kB
[...]
File Type                       : GIF
File Type Extension             : gif
MIME Type                       : image/gif
GIF Version                     : 89a
Image Width                     : 640
Image Height                    : 480
[...]
Date                            : 2019:02:14 12:30:30.0713
[...]
Frame Count                     : 11
Duration                        : 1.65 s
Image Size                      : 640x480
Megapixels                      : 0.307


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