15 Replies Latest reply: Oct 22, 2010 2:54 PM by Soula-55 RSS

    Action to erase some File info

    Soula-55 Community Member

      I have a large amount of photos from which I want to remove the camera information that is contained in the file info. So far, I was unable to make a "blank" metadata xmp file  to use when needed with an action. That is, even if I modify the xmp file manually removing camera info data, and import it (selecting the option to clear existing data) in my photo, when I re-open the photo the camera data is still there.

      So far, other than saving for web & devices, the only way I could find is copying and pasting the photo on a blank file, then re-naming it.

      Can someone indicate to me a simple & quick way to clear the camera info from the file info file info

      (I am using Photoshop CS4)

      Thanks to all

        • 1. Re: Action to erase some File info
          Mylenium CommunityMVP

          Image viewers like XnView have stripping features for EXIF/IPTC and of course Bridge has a Replace Metadata option...

           

          Mylenium

          • 2. Re: Action to erase some File info
            Soula-55 Community Member

            Thanks Mylenium, I will check the XnView as you mention, but in principle, I would like to resolve my problem within Photoshop or the Bridge.

            Yes, the Bridge does offer tools for metadata modification, but I was unable to find where I have to go to modify the camera info. Can you give me a clue as to where it is?

            Also, I did not manage to create a "blank" info file that I can append to my picture, is there a way to do this?

            Thanks again for taking the time to respond

            • 3. Re: Action to erase some File info
              Mylenium CommunityMVP

              I'm not sure if you are going about this the right way. Since that info is in the native EXIF/ IPTC data, the only way to  get rid of it would be a force overwrite. So the metadata template cannot exactly be empty, but of course you can simply fill in nonsense data. Even then there may be some special things to observe, depending on what camera you use and what otehr data it produces. Using this method works reasonably on JPEG files I occasionalyl get, but it's possible it doesn't work on specific RAW or TIFF file types. In any case, make sure you force Bridge to embed the data rather than store sidecar XMP.

               

              Mylenium

              • 4. Re: Action to erase some File info
                Soula-55 Community Member

                Well, I checked again Bridge, under Tools where we can create templates and modify metadata. I do not see there the option to remove the camera info.  Where else should I look?

                What I did though, I opened the xmp file in the notepad, left it as is mostly, just removed the camera info manually and saved the template with another name. I then re-opened the file in Photoshop, and still ther camera info was present!! The question is, if I removed it from the xmp file, how come it can find this info? it seems that camera info is recorded somewhere else also. Weird!!!

                • 5. Re: Action to erase some File info
                  Silkrooster Community Member

                  From reading this, it sounds like you are under the impression that you can rewrite a raw file. To my knowledge some of the metadata is stored in the raw file it self. What you add using a template is stored in the sidecar xmp file. Deleting the xmp file only deletes what has been altered leaving the original negitive in tact. That the whole point of a raw file, to make sure nothing happens to the original file. This is where raw files and dng's differ. Try converting the file to a dng and alter the meta data. you should have better luck. That being said, I have not tried what you are doing, so for all I know I could be full of hot air. Ouch...

                  • 6. Re: Action to erase some File info
                    Soula-55 Community Member

                    The raw files (my files) will remain always as they are, but I have some psd files that I want to send to someone, and I do not want him to see the camera info within the File Info, when he opens those files in Photoshop. The other file info in xmp can remain as is, or is easily modified anyway. The problem is with the camera info.

                    So far, I was unable to do this in Photoshop or the Bridge in CS4

                    • 7. Re: Action to erase some File info
                      Paul Riggott Community Member

                      The best tool for manipulating metadata is Exiftool (It is a command line tool).

                      http://www.sno.phy.queensu.ca/~phil/exiftool/

                       

                      To remove the camera make and model from jpgs and tiff the command would be..

                      exiftool -Make= -Model= *.jpg *.tiff

                      • 8. Re: Action to erase some File info
                        emil emil Community Member

                        If you want to remove the camera info by using only Photoshop, have in mind that copy/paste and dragging layers to a new image with the same size will not carry the camera info. So you may try to automate this.

                        • 9. Re: Action to erase some File info
                          Soula-55 Community Member

                          As I stated before, this is what I have been doing, but I want to keep the same file name as the original psd file, which is something that I have to do manually. I have not found a simple and fast way of doing this in a batch.

                          • 10. Re: Action to erase some File info
                            emil emil Community Member

                            How about File > Save for Web.

                            in the Metadata options you have some choices like "None" and "All Except Camra Info"

                            • 11. Re: Action to erase some File info
                              Soula-55 Community Member

                              But, here the problem is that you cannot save large files for the web

                              • 12. Re: Action to erase some File info
                                emil emil Community Member

                                Soula-55 wrote:

                                .

                                But, here the problem is that you cannot save large files for the web

                                You can, It just gives you a warning about the size not making sense for the web but I have no problem with very large sizes - I often just want to preview how my images look in browsers while still working on a multipurpose hi res version. The actual limitation there is not the size but the file formats.

                                • 13. Re: Action to erase some File info
                                  Paul Riggott Community Member

                                  There is a way of creating JPG's with no metadata files from psd, jpg, png, tif, gif files.

                                  All you need is to create a new bitmapdata and export the file to that, here is a script that will do just this.

                                  You just need to select the files you need converting ( the new files will be JPG's and quality 100) the will be placed into a new folder called "JPGnoMeta"

                                  Once the script is installed the command will be available at the bottom of the Tools Menu.

                                   

                                  #target bridge   
                                  if( BridgeTalk.appName == "bridge" ) {  
                                  removeMETADAT = new MenuElement("command", "Remove metadata",  "at the end of Tools");
                                  }
                                  removeMETADAT.onSelect = function () { 
                                     removeMetadata();
                                     }
                                  function removeMetadata(){
                                  var Path =app.document.presentationPath;
                                  var thumbs = app.document.getSelection("psd, jpg, png, tif, gif");
                                  if(!thumbs.length) return;
                                  var JPGOUT = Folder(Path +"/JPGnoMeta");
                                  if(!JPGOUT.exists) JPGOUT.create();
                                  for(var i in thumbs){
                                     if(!thumbs[i].spec instanceof File) continue;
                                      var thumb = thumbs[i];
                                      var md = thumbs[i].synchronousMetadata; 
                                      md.namespace = "http://ns.adobe.com/tiff/1.0/";
                                      var orientation = md.Orientation.replace(/(\w+)(\s+)(.)(\d+)(.)/,"$3$4");
                                      if(orientation == 'Normal') orientation =0;
                                      var bm = new BitmapData(thumbs[i].spec);
                                                      bm = bm.rotate(orientation);         
                                       var parts = thumbs[i].name.match(/(.*)\.([^\.]+)/);         
                                       bm.exportTo(new File(JPGOUT +"/"+ parts[1] +".jpg"),100);      
                                          }
                                  allDone();
                                  function allDone(){
                                   var win = new Window( 'dialog', 'All Done' ); 
                                  g = win.graphics;
                                  var myBrush = g.newBrush(g.BrushType.SOLID_COLOR, [0.99, 0.99, 0.99, 1]);
                                  g.backgroundColor = myBrush;
                                  win.alignChildren="column";
                                  win.g10 = win.add('group');
                                  win.g10.orientation = "column";
                                  win.title = win.g10.add('statictext',undefined,'Thats All Folks');
                                  win.title.alignment="bottom";
                                  var g = win.title.graphics;
                                  g.font = ScriptUI.newFont("Georgia","BOLDITALIC",60);
                                  win.g10.add('button',undefined,'Ok');
                                  win.center();
                                  win.show()
                                      }
                                  }
                                  
                                  • 14. Re: Action to erase some File info
                                    Soula-55 Community Member

                                    Yes, you are absolutely right!!! It just did not occur to

                                    me!!!!


                                    • 15. Re: Action to erase some File info
                                      Soula-55 Community Member

                                      Thank you Emil and Paul, My problem is solved!!!!!

                                      I appreciate your help and advise