"Legacy" IPTC data support: make it standard

[Jan Luursema]

IPTC data across different programs can give you a lot of headaches.

It took me quite some time to find out you have to mark the checkbox to also store IPTC data in "legacy" IPTC IIC format, for Photoshop (and other Adobe programs) to properly be able to read all IPTC data.

Canon Digital Photo Professional now also supports IPTC data (since 3.5), but again, only if you use the legacy option in BB/ DL, otherwise it will delete your captions.

So I would suggest turning this option on 'out of the box', I can imagine that would save a lot of people some headaches.

This also applies to Downloader Pro obviously.

[DavidB]

Originally Posted by Jan Luursema

IPTC data across different programs can give you a lot of headaches.

Too true.

Originally Posted by Jan Luursema

It took me quite some time to find out you have to mark the checkbox to also store IPTC data in "legacy" IPTC IIM format, for Photoshop (and other Adobe programs) to properly be able to read all IPTC data.

I'm pretty sure that this isn't true. There are obsolete IIM tags which were not carried forward into the current IPTC/XMP standard; I don't think that Adobe applications read those at all. These days I use BB Pro without the option switched on, and all the IPTC data and keywords I enter in DL Pro/BB Pro are fully visible and editable in Lightroom, and vice versa. I'm almost sure the same is generally true (apart from Adobe tweaking the standard in a couple of places and leaving everyone else to find out) of Photoshop from at least CS2 on, and Photoshop Elements from about version 5.

Originally Posted by Jan Luursema

Canon Digital Photo Professional now also supports IPTC data (since 3.5), but again, only if you use the legacy option in BB/ DL, otherwise it will delete your captions.

Presumably (I don't use DPP much), this is only IPTC/IIM; Canon and other camera manufacturers have set their faces against XMP in all its forms (including IPTC/XMP), which is the single most important reason why photo metadata, which should all have been XML/XMP based years ago, is such a mess. Users are caught in a battle between Adobe (which vociferously supports open standards, provided they are Adobe standards) and the camera makers (who try to avoid standardisation at almost any cost).

I'd like to know what you mean by DPP 'deleting' IPTC/XMP data. For CR2 files, this is stored in separate (.xmp) sidecar files, which, I'm pretty sure, DPP can neither read nor edit. So the data is still there, but DPP can't read it. Which is a good reason for either using BB Pro rather than DPP as your converter, or using BB Pro to copy the metadata from your CR2 files to conversions made in DPP, and not using DPP as a metadata editor. If DPP actually deleted the .xmp files, that would be a very strong reason for not using it at all.

Originally Posted by Jan Luursema

So I would suggest turning this option on 'out of the box', I can imagine that would save a lot of people some headaches ... This also applies to Downloader Pro obviously.

Sorry, but I'm afraid this would be a retrograde step. The IIM standard was superseded by the XMP standard as long ago as 2002. Backwards compatibility should be an option, but not the default. Using both standards together is tricky, because the XMP data set is not compatible in some respects with the IIM data set; It's a pity that the IPTC allowed Adobe to get away with this, but it did, and the damage cannot now be undone. In the end, I believe, we'll all have to live with XMP, and avoid or work around applications that can't handle it

David

P.S. It's also worth mentioning that the terminology is itself confused and confusing. Sometimes you see IPTC/IIM referred to as just 'IPTC' data and IPTC/XMP as just 'XMP'. This is quite badly misleading, because (1) both standards are 'owned' and endorsed by the IPTC, which has replaced IPTC/IIM with IPTC/XMP, and (2) there is a lot of XMP data (which is, in essence, metadata written in XML format) that has nothing to do with the IPTC standard. For instance, both Lightroom/Adobe Camera RAW and BB Pro store their conversion settings in XMP data sets (or 'schemas').

[Jan Luursema]

Wow that's quite the reply

I'm pretty sure that this isn't true,

Well let's put it this way: if I don't use the checkmark, photoshop won't read any edits I make to the IPTC. It will only read the first version which I usually write in Downloader.

I'd like to know what you mean by DPP 'deleting' IPTC/XMP data.

When I caption/ keyword with BB or DL and then use DPP to convert, those captions and keywords will be gone when I try to read the converted file in BB. Except when I use the checkmark.
So DPP must override (or indeed delete) these data, even though they're stored in a separate XML file. (Edit: converted files (tiff) don't have XMP files anymore, even with BB)
I don't use DPP for IPTC ofcourse. Just for the occasional conversion which needs the Canon lens correction data (now it would be awesome if BB could read those!!)

Sorry, but I'm afraid this would be a retrograde step.

That may be so, but it increases compatibility enormously. Those extra few bytes won't hurt anyone.
I really don't care how it works, as long as it does. And until all software producers get their act together and use a truly universal standard, this would be a good option to help BB users.
I'm sure I'm not the only who has had headaches from fighting with his IPTC data.

[DavidB]

Originally Posted by Jan Luursema

...if I don't use the checkmark, Photoshop won't read any edits I make to the IPTC. It will only read the first version which I usually write in Downloader.

You don't say what version of Photoshop you are using. What is probably happening is that the edits are only being written to the Bridge database, and not being copied to the .xmp files. There is, I guess (as an infrequent Photoshop user), a setting that allows you to do this; there is certainly such a setting in Lightroom. I'd also guess that, if your version of Photoshop finds IIM data , it will copy the relevant tags across from XMP for compatibility reasons; IIM data is embedded in the source file, while XMP in RAW Files is in (of course) the .xmp file. Most applications (including BB Pro) silently copy certain metadata tags to a number of locations. Also, by default, BB Pro does not display the IIM data when the XMP field is empty; switching on legacy IIM changes this behaviour, I believe, so that the IIM tags become visible. In the long run, the better option, in my opinion, is to make sure that the data is properly written to XMP in the first place.

Originally Posted by Jan Luursema

When I caption/ keyword with BB or DL and then use DPP to convert, those captions and keywords will be gone when I try to read the converted file in BB. Except when I use the checkmark ... So DPP must override (or indeed delete) these data, even though they're stored in a separate XML file. (Edit: converted files (tiff) don't have XMP files anymore, even with BB)

This is easier to understand. The data would be in the .xmp file, but DPP can't read it, and so doesn't copy it to the conversion. As you can easily do that in BB Pro, that is not a very big deal.

Only RAW files have .xmp sidecar files. This is because RAW formats are proprietary and can change without warning, so Adobe decided that the only safe way to store XMP data for those files is in a separate, 'sidecar' file. All the publicly documented, standard image formats (JPEG, TIFF and DNG) have embedded XMP metadata.

Originally Posted by Jan Luursema

I don't use DPP for IPTC of course. Just for the occasional conversion which needs the Canon lens correction data (now it would be awesome if BB could read those!!)

I'm pretty happy with PT Lens as implemented in BB Pro, and I can also use it with Photoshop Elements as a plugin. The (I think) $10 I paid for a full licence of PT Lens was money well spent. I guess that it's pretty unlikely that Canon will ever implement lens correction and some of the other fancy features of DPP, including their recipes, in their SDK, so these features will probably never find their way into BB Pro.

Originally Posted by Jan Luursema

That may be so, but it increases compatibility enormously. Those extra few bytes won't hurt anyone ... I really don't care how it works, as long as it does. And until all software producers get their act together and use a truly universal standard, this would be a good option to help BB users ... I'm sure I'm not the only who has had headaches from fighting with his IPTC data.

We'll have to agree to differ on this one. I shall be interested to see what view Chris takes. I believe that that the mixture of IIM and XMP is a mess, and I have tried to tidy up my own workflow so that legacy IIM data is not needed.

Because of the mutual distrust between Adobe and the camera makers, I don't think we can expect the metadata issues to be resolved, or the people concerned to behave like responsible adults, for some time yet. You only need to look at what Microsoft did to the personal computer industry in the early 1990s, and what Google is trying to do to the mobile phone and software industries now, to understand the camera makers' dislike of Adobe. In the real world, however, they need Adobe, and Adobe needs them.

Metadata is much more important than most people realise; it is integral to the effective manipulation and use of an image. I for one would not use any application, however attractive it might be in other ways, that prevented me from using metadata properly. Fortunately, BB Pro has an excellent range of tools for solving the problems that some other applications create.

David