How To Add Metadata to Your Photos in Photoshop

© 2009 Wazari Wazir | Towards The Summit | Climbing Mount Kinabalu | Sabah | Malaysia North Borneo

I know that most photographers are too busy to care about Metadata, some of you maybe haven’t heard about it or know about it but simply doesn’t know what it’s function or how Metadata can be any good to you.

Metadata is a set of standardized information about a file, such as author name, resolution, color space, copyright, and keywords applied to it. For example, most digital cameras attach some basic information to an image file, such as height, width, file format, and time the image was taken. You can use metadata to streamline your workflow and organize your files.

The main reason why professional photographers put their effort to key in their data or personal information to their pictures is because of easy archiving and most importantly also to make it easy for the Google or search engine to find their pictures and hopefully someone who are interested with their photograph can find some information under Metadata about how to get in touch with the photographers. To make it easy for you to understand, metadata is a set of information related to the photograph. A brief description about the photograph.

You must take note also that search engine or Google can’t see a picture but they search a picture through the help of words and in this case Metadata is also a Keywords that will help Google to understand what’s the picture is about. Can you imagine if I just put my picture here, Mount Kinabalu picture there as DSC 2011, how come Google know that the picture is about Mount Kinabalu, so we need to help the search engine to make it easy for them to find our pictures and adding Metadata to your picture will make it easy for the search engine to sort out through million of pictures on the internet.

Metadata information is stored using the Extensible Metadata Platform (XMP) standard, on which Adobe Bridge, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe InDesign, and Adobe Photoshop are built. Adjustments made to images with Photoshop Camera Raw are stored as XMP metadata. XMP is built on XML, and in most cases the metadata is stored in the file.

Lets not confuse about Metadata and EXIF Data (Exchangeable Image File), EXIF data will only record about the camera settings and scene information are recorded by the camera into the image file. Examples of stored information are shutter speed, date and time a photo was taken, focal length, exposure compensation, metering pattern and if a flash was used. EXIF Data doesn’t know what’s the picture is all about, it is just a data about the camera setting, more like technical info to be exact.

© 2011 Wazari Wazir | How To Add Metadata to Your Picture in Photoshop

Without going further, and without making you confuse, lets get start with business, if you are using Lightroom or Aperture (MAC) or Bridge, you can add Metadata on that platform also but in this article, I will show you how you can add simple basic Metadata in Photoshop.

STEP 1 : Once you finished editing your picture, just go to File > File Info

© 20011 Wazari Wazir | How To Add Metadata to Your Picture in Photoshop

Step 2 : If you do it right, you will get this new dialogue box, I’m using Photoshop CS5, so you will get this kind of interface but if you are using Photoshop CS3 or before, you will get a different interface but their function is just the same, more or less.

So what are you going to do with this dialogue box? Just fill in the blank, it is that easy. Let me help you a little bit, among the most important things that you really need to look for is the title of your document. If you are using Flickr and let’s say you put Mount Kinabalu under the document title box, this title will appear as your title in flickr, I mean under your flickr picture this title will be shown up. So you don’t need to do double job, just put the right title here and when you upload the picture into your flickr account, this title will be shown up, exactly as you have written it here.

The next thing is about the Author or the Photographer in this case, so just write your name there. Author title, if you are Designer just put designer and if you are photographer, just put Photographer.

Description is more or less like a caption of your photograph, you can write long caption or just simple caption, enough to tell the viewer about the picture, standard caption basically should have 5 W, What, Who, Where, When, Why (or How). This will be more than enough to tell the viewers what your picture is all about.

I know that people always say that  “A picture is worth a thousand words” but lets get realistic here, some picture do need a little bit of explanation, so the people will have a greater understanding about a particular photograph, this will also help them not to misunderstanding your pictures. A good caption will make your picture to tell the truth about what’s really going on there because only you knows what really happen. Like the photograph above, if I don’t tell the viewer that this photograph were taken at Mount Kinabalu Sabah, some people will make  wild guess that maybe this photograph were taken in Indonesia or maybe in other Asean country, only those who have been here will recognize this trail. So the caption will make things more clear.

Description about the picture is as important as your picture title, if you want your picture to be easily found by Google or any search engine, put a lot of effort crafting your captions, I’ve to admit that I’m not very good at caption writing but hopefully, you get the idea, I do put a lot of caption for my official job and caption writing is a must have skills for anyone who have an interest in Photojournalism. You must be very good at caption writing as much as taking picture. Any Wire or Press Agency will not be interested with your pictures if you don’t have any caption about it. It is very-very important.

Under Description Writer, you can wrote a little about yourself but I just put my copyright there, but it is good if you can write a little bit about yourself or your business.

The next important things is the Keywords, write everything that is related with the photograph, for an example about my Mount Kinabalu picture there, I write, mountain, Sabah, Malaysia, adventure, travel, Asia, anything that is related with your photograph, just don’t add Madonna there, unless she has climbed the Mountain before, use common sense, just put something that is related with the photograph, like landscape, trekker, hiking, just to name a few.

The rest of the info like Copyright status, info and your website or blog address are easy for you to fills up. If you think that you need to put more info then just hit the IPTC tab there which stand for  International Press and Telecommunications Council and just fills in the blank as you wish.

© 2011 Wazari Wazir | How To Add Metadata to Your Pictures in Photoshop

Step 3 : The next thing is to save the Metadata template for future use but if you think you don’t need to use it again, just click OK and save the file. But lets say that you have hundred of the same picture taken during same event or occasion which the Metadata is about the same and you wanted to use it for another picture, you can use the same Metadata but first, you need to save it.

Before you click OK, just hit the small arrow button to the left of cancel button and hit the “Export” menu. If you can see I’ve a lot of Metadata template there, some of them are in no use anymore and some of them can be use again and again and it is quite easy to delete those unused Metadata template. If you are just starting out, those field will be empty, so just hit the “Export” menu.

© 2011 Wazari Wazir | How To Add Metadata to Your Picture in Photoshop

Step 4 : Save your new Metadata template with the title of the event or occasion for future use, actually once you save your Metadata here in Photoshop, it will also appear in Bridge or Lightroom and like I said before, you can do this Metadata things right inside the Bridge, Lightroom or Aperture if you are using Mac. By default your new Metadata template will be save in Metadata Template folder in Photoshop. Just click save once you’re done.

After that you can Save the picture in Photoshop and now your picture are ready to be uploaded on the internet or Flickr and your Metadata will follow, some photo sharing site will show you the Metadata info like in Flickr under “EXIF INFO” and if you are using Facebook, this Metadata will not be shown but it is good habit to put Metadata into your picture. Lets say that you email someone your picture and your are in hurry and suddenly your friends asking you abut the detail information of the photograph, just tell him to open it with Photoshop or any image browsing or preview program and most of them can show the EXIF Data completed with your Metadata. At the very least, just put your email address or blog address to make it easy for someone to contact you.

© 2011 Wazari Wazir | How To Add Metadata into Your Picture in Photoshop

Updated : For Photoshop CS3 user, you may follow the Figure below to save your Metadata.

© 2011 Wazari Wazir | Follow This Figure if You Use Photoshop CS3 to Save Your Metadata

Then when you need to put Metadata in your new picture under the same event or occasion, jut hit the small arrow on the left side of the cancel button there and look for your Metadata and click the Metadata and all the information will be filled automatically. You might be thinking, how can I do that to a lot of pictures, lets say, if I have hundred of picture with the same occasion, how can I do it at one go without painstakingly do it one by one.

Yes you can do it at one go and they called it batch processing, where you can put Metadata to hundred or thousand of a picture at one go, the easiest way to do that is by using Bridge, under Menu Bar, select Tool and “Append Metadata” provided that you have selected a desired pictures that you need to put Metadata, just “Append Metadata” and then select your Metadata template, just to let you know that once you have create your Metadata template inside Photoshop, it will also be shown up inside the bridge, so you don’t have to do double Metadata key in.

Just be remember that you might think that you have much more beautiful picture than your friends have but you might feel jealous once you know that your friend have just sold the picture to advertising agency for a thousand dollars and you shake your head in disbelief, how come the advertising agency can’t found your picture, your pictures is on the internet as well, on flickr as well but why your friend pictures being the chosen one. By now you should know that putting the right keywords, captioning and taking the time to put Metadata into the picture is the answer. I myself have sold few pictures to the magazine and various agency simply because they can find my pictures easily with the right keywords, tagging and captioning and most importantly to keep SEO or Search Engine Optimization friendly with your captioning.

Take the time to craft your Metadata, make it a habit to put the right Metadata into your pictures and don’t be surprised when someone from afar contact you and suddenly you are in business and all of your effort bear fruits at the end of the day, just make it a habit and everything will be easy.

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