How to Geocode with Aperture & HoudahGeo
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.
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.
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.
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:
Once it is done switch back to Aperture and choose Metadata > Update EXIF from Master
You now have geocoded images!
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: Aperture, Geocode, HoudahGeo, Mac OS X, Photography
This post has 10 comments
May 20th, 2008
Hello,
I’ve tried this workflow and all works fine until I export the image to let’s say a JPEG. The JPEG does not contain any geodata whatsoever. Did you try this?
Rutger
May 22nd, 2008
Exporting JPEG versions works for me. Preview in 10.5 shows the geoposition data and links to Google Maps.
Are you sure you exported the JPEG with embedded metadata? The export presets can be set to not include metadata (which I occasionally do for certain projects).
I’ve added a sample exported JPEG to the bottom of the post that you can look at.
May 30th, 2008
GPSPhotoLinker will do the same with maybe a step or two more, but none of them hard. It’s shareware and has been well supported. I’ve been tagging them before importing, but maybe an old habit from iView MediaPro and early Aperture days. But probably easier if you’re going to import them into Aperture.
Also helpful to have a Garmin that can record to a card. Then you can save months of data.
http://oregonstate.edu/~earlyj/gpsphotolinker/.
June 3rd, 2008
Your final point is an excellent one. One of the main reasons I spend a few extra bucks for the eTrex Vista HCx was the support for a memory card. I have a 2GB card in it right now- that should be enough space for quite a bit of track files!
I’d actually forgotten about GPSPhotoLinker. I’d used it a while ago but forgot about it. I’ll have to give it another look.
Thanks!
June 22nd, 2008
Hi,
Thanks a lot for this in depth review. I’m planning on buying a GPS this week and I had a Garmin Collorado 300 in mind. I love hiking and taking pictures while doing so, and would be interested in adding the GPS location data to my pictures in Aperture. I’ll surely give this workflow a try.
Thanks a lot,
Stefaan Lesage
June 22nd, 2008
Hi,
I have an additional question though. I’m not using referenced files (I use the Aperture Library to store my pictures). Is there any workflow I could use to get the Geo Data in the picutres ? Maybe first copy the images to my Hard Drive, add the Geo Data information and then import those into my aperture library ?
Regards,
Stefaan
June 22nd, 2008
Thanks for your comments.
What I do is import my images as referenced masters (Vaults handle my backup while I’m shooting) and then I’ll move them into an external folder to do my geocoding. After HoudahGeo takes care of my images, I re-consolidate them.
It’s kind of a pain, but it allows me to use managed masters and still geocode.
I could just copy the files off of the media card, geocode them and then import them into Aperture, but I usually want to look at my photos and get them annotated too much to wait to deal with the geocoding beforehand.
FWIW, I looked at the Colorado as well but couldn’t justify the cost since I already have a car navigating GPS and only wanted a GPS for trail use.
August 17th, 2008
re exporting geotag metadata with versions from Aperture -
I’ve found that this works fine, when the Masters are stored outside of the Aperture Library. When stored in the Aperture Library, the added EXIF data is stripped on export-as-version.
To move an existing project outside of the Aperture Library, just use the “Relocate Masters for Project” menu item from the drop-down menu on the project directory in the Aperture “All Projects” sidebar pane - and move these to an external directory.
All your geotagged images will now export as version from Aperture with geotagging intact.
October 25th, 2008
Hi there,
I have an AMOD GPS tracker which is tiny and has a USB port. I import all the imagery into houdahgeo from the card, then apply the track log and then save it all. I then save it into Aperture as normal (geocoded) However I recently did this without having confirmed my camera time first and nothing worked. So always confirm camera time with online time before setting out to do geo-coded stuff (it may also have been because I only shot RAW and Canon RAW apparently doesn;t support GPS embedding?!?!?!) In future I will shoot a JPG at the same time.
October 25th, 2008
@Matthew-
I shoot Canon RAW almost exclusively and HoudahGeo seems to put the GPS metadata into my master RAWs fine. It may have been a glitch for you that day.
I always try to remember to shoot a picture of my GPS before I start a trek to make sure that I can more easily sync my camera and GPS’s times. It really helps!
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