Updated August 18, 2008 (thanks Will!)

Geocoding with Aperture before version 2 was almost a non-starter. With the addition of the ‘Update EXIF’ command it is almost too easy. Here are my tips for good geocoding on Mac OS X with Aperture and HoudahGeo.

First off, you’ll need a GPS. I recently started using a Garmin eTrex Legend HCx. So far so good. Apparently the track log issues have been addressed and now I have what appears to be the perfect geocoding GPS. I bought a 2GB MicroSD card when I bought the GPS and the unit will log tracks directly to the card. That amounts to a lot of GPS tracking data.

I recommend setting your GPS up so that you can see the time (with seconds) on screen with your current position. With my eTrex it took a little fiddling but I got that plus a lot more on the screen at once. In order to make sure your GPS and camera are in sync, you should set your camera’s clock to your GPS clock.

I also recommend making your first shot a picture of your GPS. That will allow you to verify the clocks are in sync during post and it will double-check your work when you are done.

Geocode-00-Timesync

In this shot, my camera’s clock is 1 minute, 17 seconds behind the GPS clock.

You can easily adjust your pictures’ time using Aperture 2 by choosing Metadata > Adjust Date and Time… Select all of your images and set the time of your first image (the one of the GPS) to be the same as the time shown in the GPS. Aperture is smart enough to know that you adjusted the time by +1:17 and will adjust all of the other images accordingly.

Next, make sure your images are not in the Aperture Library (ie they’re Referenced Masters) and Control(right)-Click on an image and choose Show in Finder. Make a quick backup of this folder in case something bad happens to your master images.

Better safe than sorry.

Launch HoudahGeo and drag the master images onto the main window. Tell HoudahGeo the time zone the camera was (you don’t need to worry about time difference as there isn’t any anymore because we fixed it in Aperture). It’ll take a minute or so for HoudahGeo to get ready to work with the images.

Geocode-03 Hgeo

Plug your GPS into your Mac and turn it on (one of the great features of the Legend HCx is that it has USB). Then tell HoudahGeo to import your tracks. If you have a Garmin GPS that has any saved track logs, HoudahGeo will alert you that saved track logs don’t contain any timestamps and are therefore useless for geocoding.

Bad Garmin. Good to know, though. So don’t save your track logs, always import the live track log for geotagging.

Geocode-05 Hgeo

If HoudahGeo found track log timestamps that match your pictures’ times then it’ll automatically fill in the position for your images. Once you’ve done that all you need to do is save that data to your images.

Yes, it really is that easy.

Choose Export > Write EXIF Tags… and make your export dialog box look like mine:

Geocode-06 Hgeo

All you want to export are coordinates and altitude. Make sure to work on the original files.

Once it is done switch back to Aperture and choose Metadata > Update EXIF from Master

You now have geocoded images!

Geocode-10-Done

Important note: The geocoding info will not ‘stick’ to exported images unless your masters are stored outside of your Aperture Library (AKA are Referenced Masters).

Technorati Tags: , , , ,

Share