Old Photos for new

[sheffield hatter]

Personally, I like looking at old photos, but it would be helpful if there was a way of "backdating" so they appeared with a date from the correct era.

I presume this thread was started because Adam Bell has uploaded shed loads of photos since lockdown. I've only uploaded a handful of photos that are "old" in the context of this discussion - a few times I've written a review and realised that I'd forgotten to upload the photo, for example (but that's usually only a matter of days later; ok, up to a few weeks, maybe). Or recently I realised that on one of my very first cycle rides where pub photography was "a thing" (autumn 2010), I'd photographed about 10 pubs in Cambridge but only uploaded three or four.

Surely the date the photo was taken is included with the information that is uploaded? (Or, at least, the date that the camera/phone "thought" it was.) Would it be possible to extract this information so that it can be displayed alongside the photo? Sounds like it could be a lot of work and not really worthwhile. It would be nice if older photos could be identified as such, but I personally would not exclude them from the site if they couldn't be.

[RealAleRobUK]

I presume this thread was started because Adam Bell has uploaded shed loads of photos since lockdown. I've only uploaded a handful of photos that are "old" in the context of this discussion - a few times I've written a review and realised that I'd forgotten to upload the photo, for example (but that's usually only a matter of days later; ok, up to a few weeks, maybe). Or recently I realised that on one of my very first cycle rides where pub photography was "a thing" (autumn 2010), I'd photographed about 10 pubs in Cambridge but only uploaded three or four.

Surely the date the photo was taken is included with the information that is uploaded? (Or, at least, the date that the camera/phone "thought" it was.) Would it be possible to extract this information so that it can be displayed alongside the photo? Sounds like it could be a lot of work and not really worthwhile. It would be nice if older photos could be identified as such, but I personally would not exclude them from the site if they couldn't be.

I guess that during lockdown, people have more time on their hands to go through old photos, so I guess this is bound to happen.

Perhaps a workaround could be that the uploader of the photo adds a one line review to the pub giving a bit more info on when the photos were taken. Not ideal and no guarantee anyone would look at it, of course. But for pubs that don't attract a lot of reviews, it could be worth it.

I guess the other angle is that the dwarf approving the photo then has to realise it is a historical photo and suppress it in favour of more recent examples. For some photos I imagine it would be pretty obvious, especially if they date back decades, but for photos that are only 10 years old or so, it might not be obvious at first glance.

[rpadam]

I guess the other angle is that the dwarf approving the photo then has to realise it is a historical photo and suppress it in favour of more recent examples. For some photos I imagine it would be pretty obvious, especially if they date back decades, but for photos that are only 10 years old or so, it might not be obvious at first glance.

As previously mentioned, this is what I try to do, but just adding a 'Date taken' field to be entered when uploading a photograph (even if only approximate in the case of older pictures) would seem to be the easiest answer?

NB - If photographs are renamed, resized, rotated, cropped or otherwise modified in any way (e.g. contrast or colour balance) the date / time metadata will probably be lost so it would appear very difficult to automatically extract the required information in many cases?

[Dave M]

NB - If photographs are renamed, resized, rotated, cropped or otherwise modified in any way (e.g. contrast or colour balance) the date / time metadata will probably be lost so it would appear very difficult to automatically extract the required information in many cases?

Photo editing software does often change the metadata, there is usually a field called 'DateTimeOriginal' which shouldn't get changed, however some software removes all of the metadata.

If there are any users who'd be happy having the 'date photo taken' shown on the site for their photos I'll have a play about with the data and see what I have.

[Mobyduck]

If there are any users who'd be happy having the 'date photo taken' shown on the site for their photos I'll have a play about with the data and see what I have.

I wouldn't have a problem with that, though from albeit a somewhat shakey memory, I think most if not all my photos have been current to upload dates within two or three weeks.

[Brainypool]

Photo editing software does often change the metadata, there is usually a field called 'DateTimeOriginal' which shouldn't get changed, however some software removes all of the metadata.

If there are any users who'd be happy having the 'date photo taken' shown on the site for their photos I'll have a play about with the data and see what I have.

I don’t mind, I definitely have a few photos on here that were uploaded long after the fact.

[Lady Grey]

Photoshop has a tool to allow text to be written on images. I sometimes write the date that the photo was taken, onto the image.

[Quinno]

Photo editing software does often change the metadata, there is usually a field called 'DateTimeOriginal' which shouldn't get changed, however some software removes all of the metadata.

If there are any users who'd be happy having the 'date photo taken' shown on the site for their photos I'll have a play about with the data and see what I have.

Yeah fine with me for mine

Some of my earliest uploads here were actually already a few years old - at the time there weren't so many photos on the site so it didn't really matter too much...

[Blackthorn]

Fine with me too, although I think all mine have been uploaded pretty much as soon as they were taken (with the notable exception of the recently uploaded ones for The Goathland Hotel which were about 15 years late!).

[sheffield hatter]

Perhaps a workaround could be that the uploader of the photo adds a one line review to the pub giving a bit more info on when the photos were taken. Not ideal and no guarantee anyone would look at it, of course. But for pubs that don't attract a lot of reviews, it could be worth it.

I guess the other angle is that the dwarf approving the photo then has to realise it is a historical photo and suppress it in favour of more recent examples. For some photos I imagine it would be pretty obvious, especially if they date back decades, but for photos that are only 10 years old or so, it might not be obvious at first glance.

Your suggestions are good ones, but when I stop to consider how much hassle is potentially involved, I begin to wonder if this is really a problem that we have to go to such lengths to solve. If there's a simple solution, easily obtained from the data attached to the photos, that's one thing. But expecting extras, such as you propose, by multiple individuals and then expect nothing to go wrong...

I would suggest that, if there is no simple IT solution, we should just leave things as they are.