How to Fix the Time Stamp on Photos
How to Fix the Time Stamp on Photos
Mac Tip #337, 07 May 2008
I’d taken almost 60 photos on a recent holiday in Hanmer Springs before I remembered that I hadn’t reset the time on the camera since daylight savings ended a few weeks ago. It’s not a huge deal, but it annoyed me that all those photos would be an hour off in their timestamp.
EXIF data is embedded in photos
The problem was not just that the time was wrong when I looked at a list of photos in the Finder. The problem was that the time (and a lot of other information such as shutter speed and aperture) is actually invisibly embedded in the photo. Various programs, and services such as Flickr, access that information and make it available for you and others to see and use.
For example, see the data that came attached to a photo I recently took with my cameraphone (I added the copyright, caption, credit and keywords in the photo software on my computer).
EXIF stands for ‘Exchangeable image file format’. Read all about it at Wikipedia.
How to change EXIF data
It’s not very easy to change the EXIF data. Even if you change the time in the Information panel in iPhoto, the original time is still embedded in the photo.
My screenshot shows a photo selected in iPhoto. At bottom left of the window is where I’ve tried to change the time to 12:16:55. But if I call up Photo Info (Photos menu > Show Photo Info) I can still see the original 13:16:55 is displayed.
A Better Finder Attributes
One solution is a small program called A Better Finder Attributes (€14.95).
It’s easy to use — after installing it Control Click on the files you wish to edit and choose A Better Finder Attributes… from the contextual menu.
Choose a general action from the pop-up and the specific actions (such as removing 1 hour from the time) from the various boxes and buttons in the window. Finally click OK and wait a few moments. Once the changes have been made an alert appears to tell you it’s done.
The screenshot shows me changing the time on one file, but if you select dozens, or even hundreds of files it’ll change them all in one pass.
I made the changes to my photos while they were still on the memory card, and before I imported them to the computer. It was easy to subtract one hour from the time the photos were taken. Meanwhile I’ve adjusted the time on my camera.
A Better Finder Attributes can modify files in many other ways too, but for me adjusting the time on 56 photos in one pass was worth the small fee.
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is jointly authored by Miraz Jordan and Maria Langer.
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