Christian Andersson I am not sure how to do that, other than choosing "Save image" and seeing how it downloads. And also, what does one look for in the tag? Should it have the original title as when it was uploaded? What if it has one of those long numbers, what does that mean?
Carla Strozzieri A title (=filename) is of course one example of metadata for an image, although what is usually understood as image metadata is, e.g., EXIF-tags and similar. Thus, for trivial testing, you'll need a program to inspect the tags, upload an image with a given set of tags and then compare with the resulting image on the site. (Yes, you can probably "Save as...", taking care not to overwrite the original not uploaded file.) I suppose it's not strictly necessary to understand the meaning of the respective tags to conclude whether they exist or not? The first of your tests could be, for exemple, to check whether the two files differ in ordinary byte size, something they should not if the site leaves uploaded images untouched.
Christian Andersson Thanks, this is really helpful, Christian. I had not thought about checking file size. Is there a simple program you could recommend for iOS?
iOS, so you have nothing but an iPhone for dealing with this? That doesn't seem very practical. I don't use iOS for any purpose, so unfortunately I have no recommendations, but you shouldn't, I think, look for the simplest imaginative application, but rather something quite advanced for managing (and possibly editing/filtering) images. On the other hand, e.g., EXIF-tags are rather simple technically to pick up from a digital image, so there should be several free alternative apps.
(Perhaps you mean MacOS X, rather than iOS, the Apple desktop OS? iOS is for mobile devices from Apple, iPhones, iPads and so on. I don't use anything from Apple.)
Remember, regarding that trivial file size test, that, logically, it works only if the file sizes differ. Two images with identical sizes aren't necessarily equal. (Obviously!)
On the contrary, binary hash codes, s.a. MD5, CRC32, SHA-1, if supported by the application, can be used, by definition, to compare any two binary files regarding equality. Two files, f1 and f2, with equal hashes, are almost certainly identical (with a tremendously high probability, adherent to certainly). If the files differ, however, ever so slightly, in one byte or similarly, they will have radically different hashes. And this is of course on purpose.
The best is of course if you can find an app which lists meta tags and their values, there are quite a few of them from, e.g., a modern digital camera.
Christian Andersson Thank you so much for that information. My bad. I meant mac OSX. A quick search online yielded no results for such an application. Perhaps I phrased it wrong, but searched a few different ways. For now I can start with the size test, but what I am trying to get at is whether a potential social media site is stripping data away from images so as to create orphan images. That said, I do use watermarks and my artworks are signed prior to photographing the images. But I want to use caution in moving forward to a new online community, and any site that would alter uploaded images is suspect in my book. I am an artist, and not a computer expert, trying to make my way around the world wide web.
I use the command line program "exiftool" for inspecting image metadata. It runs on Mac OSX, Windows, and Linux. If you simply type exiftool followed by the name of the file, it will display all the metadata in the file. You should see your copyright and authorship metadata, assuming you set them, as well as camera settings and a lot of junk you may never have known was in your files (GPS coordinates, Lightroom develop steps, ...). Not the friendliest of tools, but it's very powerful and can be used to modify metadata as well as viewing it.
If you use Lightroom, you could download/save the file from the website, then import it into LR. The metadata will then be available in the usual place within LR. Same if you use Photoshop or any other image processing app that lets you view metadata. Might be simpler than using exiftool.
Carla Strozzieri I don't know what makes a program "friendly" in your book, if you can accept making use of the keyboard of your computer for example. The "exiftool" program, as Alan suggests above, is very specifically exactly what you need to inspect metatags, not only EXIF but also many others. So go ahead, Google it up and install!
Speaking, however, about the proprietary monster applications from Adobe (Lightroom, Photoshop, etc), of course they can inspect and also edit metatags, but it is simply not serious to suggest any of those if you don't already have them and are fluent in using them (since they cost a fortune licensing). To me, what exactly makes a program friendly is whether it is specific in purpose, and exiftool may well be the most specific tool for inspecting image meta tags that anybody could possibly imagine. But I don't know about you "Apple geeks"! :)
And, Carla, I've seen from other posts of yours that you seem currently to consider MeWe, which is not the kind of application I would think about for serious management of digital art, although of course it has numerous other features as a social medium. This is about being specific in purpose again, if you care about your images (which of course you do as an artist) then consider the specific and professional services, for example Flickr comes to my mind, but there are also others.
Christian Andersson I have downloaded Exiftool and will need to spend some time learning to use it, but I get the gist of it (I think) and yes, that it just what I want, something that can give that specific info. Hopefully I can sort it all out (the info, that is).
As for MeWe, it was an exit strategy to keep in touch but is largely not my cup of tea. Hence this thread. I appreciate your suggestion of Flickr, etc. I am hoping to find a site that is this site will both preserve the integrity of my work and affords me some social exposure. I enjoyed a lot of international traffic to my blog as a result of using G+ and I am looking to expand on that, or at least keep it going. In short, I am sorry to see G+ go, and am looking for the best replacement.
As for the integrity of my work, there are issues raised in this thread plus.google.com - So to further muddy the waters, despite Google's claim that they will delete ... that are also very concerning, as in, did my files get downloaded to community owners and moderators? and do I want them to be archived on Internet Archive? And what exactly is the metadata that I need to send to Internet Archive, if I choose to opt out? Unfortunately, this is all transpiring much too quickly, and I am trying to understand what all this means for me as an artist before G+ shutters its doors. (With the added concern that as I take time to do this, more and more moderators are downloading my files) The one good thing I can say is that it is causing me to laser focus on my web presence, and how I want to handle my images. The question of copyright and social media has long haunted me. That, and how to get the best exposure is what this is about.
Carla Strozzieri My recommendations again, i.e. this is how I would proceed in your shoes:
You seem to have two problems, finding a social platform to replace Google Plus and also somewhere to host your digital imagery. Treat these two problems separately, and start with the most urgent part, i.e. somewhere to host your images. I suggested Flickr above, which is only one example of a web-based image host, you can read a lot about that on Wikipedia. Also on Wikipedia is a comparison and list of different services like this, cf en.wikipedia.org - List of image-sharing websites
Find one of these sites which seems to meet your requirements and upload your stuff. If you host this material on G+ today, you'll need to hurry up before they pull the plug!
Finding a social platform I suppose is less urgent, but thanks to Internet hyperlinks (those EU seems currently to try to destroy, but they'll hopefully fail) your art and social communication needn't be the same service, even if it was with Google.
I haven't decided yet where to go myself after G+, but there are I think a few interesting alternatives, s.a. https://youme.social. Sign up there and take a look whether i suits you, and please add me as a contact! I am always "Christian Andersson" everywhere.
Christian Andersson Thanks so much, Christian. I will have a look at the social media site you suggested and look for you, too.
I am currently hosting on Blogger, and did this mainly because it dovetailed so well with G+. So yes, everything needs to be rethought and renewed, but I had that in mind before this.
New comments on this blog are moderated. If you do not have a Google identity, you are welcome to post anonymously. Your comments will appear here after they have been reviewed. Comments with vulgarity will be rejected.
How about simply testing?
ReplyDeleteChristian Andersson I am not sure how to do that, other than choosing "Save image" and seeing how it downloads. And also, what does one look for in the tag? Should it have the original title as when it was uploaded? What if it has one of those long numbers, what does that mean?
ReplyDeleteCarla Strozzieri A title (=filename) is of course one example of metadata for an image, although what is usually understood as image metadata is, e.g., EXIF-tags and similar. Thus, for trivial testing, you'll need a program to inspect the tags, upload an image with a given set of tags and then compare with the resulting image on the site. (Yes, you can probably "Save as...", taking care not to overwrite the original not uploaded file.) I suppose it's not strictly necessary to understand the meaning of the respective tags to conclude whether they exist or not? The first of your tests could be, for exemple, to check whether the two files differ in ordinary byte size, something they should not if the site leaves uploaded images untouched.
ReplyDeleteChristian Andersson
ReplyDeleteThanks, this is really helpful, Christian. I had not thought about checking file size. Is there a simple program you could recommend for iOS?
iOS, so you have nothing but an iPhone for dealing with this? That doesn't seem very practical. I don't use iOS for any purpose, so unfortunately I have no recommendations, but you shouldn't, I think, look for the simplest imaginative application, but rather something quite advanced for managing (and possibly editing/filtering) images. On the other hand, e.g., EXIF-tags are rather simple technically to pick up from a digital image, so there should be several free alternative apps.
ReplyDelete(Perhaps you mean MacOS X, rather than iOS, the Apple desktop OS? iOS is for mobile devices from Apple, iPhones, iPads and so on. I don't use anything from Apple.)
Remember, regarding that trivial file size test, that, logically, it works only if the file sizes differ. Two images with identical sizes aren't necessarily equal. (Obviously!)
On the contrary, binary hash codes, s.a. MD5, CRC32, SHA-1, if supported by the application, can be used, by definition, to compare any two binary files regarding equality. Two files, f1 and f2, with equal hashes, are almost certainly identical (with a tremendously high probability, adherent to certainly). If the files differ, however, ever so slightly, in one byte or similarly, they will have radically different hashes. And this is of course on purpose.
The best is of course if you can find an app which lists meta tags and their values, there are quite a few of them from, e.g., a modern digital camera.
Christian Andersson
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for that information.
My bad. I meant mac OSX.
A quick search online yielded no results for such an application. Perhaps I phrased it wrong, but searched a few different ways. For now I can start with the size test, but what I am trying to get at is whether a potential social media site is stripping data away from images so as to create orphan images. That said, I do use watermarks and my artworks are signed prior to photographing the images. But I want to use caution in moving forward to a new online community, and any site that would alter uploaded images is suspect in my book. I am an artist, and not a computer expert, trying to make my way around the world wide web.
I use the command line program "exiftool" for inspecting image metadata. It runs on Mac OSX, Windows, and Linux. If you simply type exiftool followed by the name of the file, it will display all the metadata in the file. You should see your copyright and authorship metadata, assuming you set them, as well as camera settings and a lot of junk you may never have known was in your files (GPS coordinates, Lightroom develop steps, ...). Not the friendliest of tools, but it's very powerful and can be used to modify metadata as well as viewing it.
ReplyDeleteIf you use Lightroom, you could download/save the file from the website, then import it into LR. The metadata will then be available in the usual place within LR. Same if you use Photoshop or any other image processing app that lets you view metadata. Might be simpler than using exiftool.
Carla Strozzieri I don't know what makes a program "friendly" in your book, if you can accept making use of the keyboard of your computer for example. The "exiftool" program, as Alan suggests above, is very specifically exactly what you need to inspect metatags, not only EXIF but also many others. So go ahead, Google it up and install!
ReplyDeleteSpeaking, however, about the proprietary monster applications from Adobe (Lightroom, Photoshop, etc), of course they can inspect and also edit metatags, but it is simply not serious to suggest any of those if you don't already have them and are fluent in using them (since they cost a fortune licensing). To me, what exactly makes a program friendly is whether it is specific in purpose, and exiftool may well be the most specific tool for inspecting image meta tags that anybody could possibly imagine. But I don't know about you "Apple geeks"! :)
And, Carla, I've seen from other posts of yours that you seem currently to consider MeWe, which is not the kind of application I would think about for serious management of digital art, although of course it has numerous other features as a social medium. This is about being specific in purpose again, if you care about your images (which of course you do as an artist) then consider the specific and professional services, for example Flickr comes to my mind, but there are also others.
Alan Bland Thank you. Great information and just what I was looking for.
ReplyDeleteChristian Andersson I have downloaded Exiftool and will need to spend some time learning to use it, but I get the gist of it (I think) and yes, that it just what I want, something that can give that specific info. Hopefully I can sort it all out (the info, that is).
ReplyDeleteAs for MeWe, it was an exit strategy to keep in touch but is largely not my cup of tea. Hence this thread. I appreciate your suggestion of Flickr, etc. I am hoping to find a site that is this site will both preserve the integrity of my work and affords me some social exposure. I enjoyed a lot of international traffic to my blog as a result of using G+ and I am looking to expand on that, or at least keep it going. In short, I am sorry to see G+ go, and am looking for the best replacement.
As for the integrity of my work, there are issues raised in this thread plus.google.com - So to further muddy the waters, despite Google's claim that they will delete ... that are also very concerning, as in, did my files get downloaded to community owners and moderators? and do I want them to be archived on Internet Archive? And what exactly is the metadata that I need to send to Internet Archive, if I choose to opt out? Unfortunately, this is all transpiring much too quickly, and I am trying to understand what all this means for me as an artist before G+ shutters its doors. (With the added concern that as I take time to do this, more and more moderators are downloading my files) The one good thing I can say is that it is causing me to laser focus on my web presence, and how I want to handle my images. The question of copyright and social media has long haunted me. That, and how to get the best exposure is what this is about.
#ConsiderationsAndFeatures
ReplyDeleteCarla Strozzieri My recommendations again, i.e. this is how I would proceed in your shoes:
ReplyDeleteYou seem to have two problems, finding a social platform to replace Google Plus and also somewhere to host your digital imagery. Treat these two problems separately, and start with the most urgent part, i.e. somewhere to host your images. I suggested Flickr above, which is only one example of a web-based image host, you can read a lot about that on Wikipedia. Also on Wikipedia is a comparison and list of different services like this, cf en.wikipedia.org - List of image-sharing websites
Find one of these sites which seems to meet your requirements and upload your stuff. If you host this material on G+ today, you'll need to hurry up before they pull the plug!
Finding a social platform I suppose is less urgent, but thanks to Internet hyperlinks (those EU seems currently to try to destroy, but they'll hopefully fail) your art and social communication needn't be the same service, even if it was with Google.
I haven't decided yet where to go myself after G+, but there are I think a few interesting alternatives, s.a. https://youme.social. Sign up there and take a look whether i suits you, and please add me as a contact! I am always "Christian Andersson" everywhere.
Good luck!
Christian Andersson Thanks so much, Christian. I will have a look at the social media site you suggested and look for you, too.
ReplyDeleteI am currently hosting on Blogger, and did this mainly because it dovetailed so well with G+. So yes, everything needs to be rethought and renewed, but I had that in mind before this.
Thanks also for the list of image-sharing sites.
Much appreciated and all the best to you, too.