SmugMug uses PS description field for Titles - Why?

WinsomeWorks

This has bugged me for awhile, but since I haven't uploaded photos lately that were edited/keyworded/titled etc. in Adobe Photoshop, I sorta forgot about this problem or thought it was fixed. For some reason, SmugMug uses the PS "Description" field for the captions on uploaded photos, rather than the "Title" field, which is what should be used. Is this ever going to change? Or is there some reason why this is happening & I can do something about it?

I upload photos to several stock agencies, and have only ever found one agency that has this same problem. Since captions are important to me due to having lots of travel shots, It just means extra work, having to go into every photo and open up the original to copy the "Title" field and then correct it on the upload. If nothing else, it should be possible for people to choose which field they want as their caption, but I can't imagine most folks wanting the (usually longer) description as the caption. There are times I wish there were a place for descriptions besides titles, but if we only have one, I'd like titles.

Andy

Because that's the IPTC Description field ,which we use for Caption.

WinsomeWorks

Andy wrote:

Because that's the IPTC Description field ,which we use for Caption.

Hmm, well, I know... but I'm asking "why?" Here's the thing: on the IPTC "Status" page, there's only a place for a "Title". PS automatically puts in the same title I put on my first page of "File Info". So that seems to me it would be the logical SmugMug "caption" as well. (when I say the first page, I mean the page that PS calls "Description" & that has a bunch of info). Then on the IPTC "Content" page, there's a "description" field, which again automatically enters my description from the first page. But there is also a "Headline". That does not fill in automatically. Lately, I've been entering my "Title" there as well as on page one.

I would expect that SmugMug would at least use the Title from that "Content" page as its photo caption if there IS a title entered. But it doesn't. It uses "description" no matter what. I just don't understand why, as it's not typical, nor is it how most folks would probably caption, given the option. Isn't a caption usually shorter, like a title? Seven out of Eight stock agencies would say so too...

Dan7312

SmugMug seems to be using Description in the way the IPTC spec say is should be used, that is as the caption for an image.

The IPTC specification (http://iptc.cms.apa.at/std/photometadata/specification/IPTC-PhotoMetadata%28200907%29_1.pdf) says that the Description field is where you put the caption for an image.

The original IPTC spec says that Title is used to name a news object and doesn't mention it use for an image, however a Title is not a Headline which is sort of like a caption but for a news story. In the extension spec it mentions that Title may be used for the file name of an image, though it doesn't require that.

Before there was an IPTC spec there was an "Information Interchange Model" that had a Caption property. The IPTC spec has no Caption field and it recommends mapping the IIM Caption to the IPTC Description field.

I specs.


Description definition

Generic Specification 2desc
Name Description
Definition A textual description, including captions, of the item's content, particularly used where the object is not text.
Photo Definition A textual description, including captions, of the image.
Photo Help Text Enter a "caption" describing the who, what, and why of what is happening in this image,
this might include names of people, and/or their role in the action that is taking place
User Note(s)
Implementation Note(s)
Field label/title Caption/Description


Title descrition

Name Title
Definition A shorthand reference for the item. Title provides a short human readable name which
can be a text and/or numeric reference. It is not the same as Headline.
Photo Definition A shorthand reference for the digital image. Title provides a short human readable name
which can be a text and/or numeric reference. It is not the same as Headline.
Photo Help Text Enter a short verbal and human readable name for the image, this may be the file name
User Note(s) Many use the Title field to store the filename of the image, though the field may be used
in many ways. Formal identifiers are provided by the Digital Image Id, or the Registry
Entry property of the IPTC Extension.

WinsomeWorks

Dan7312 wrote:

SmugMug seems to be using Description in the way the IPTC spec say is should be used, that is as the caption for an image.

The IPTC specification (http://iptc.cms.apa.at/std/photometadata/specification/IPTC-PhotoMetadata%28200907%29_1.pdf) says that the Description field is where you put the caption for an image.....

Dan-- thank you for the thorough answer. I see how SmugMug got there now. The problem I see though is that what we happen to call a "caption" here on SmugMug is probably for most people more of a title. Typically what I've seen here below people's photos is the shorthand title kind of thing-- such as what your specs seem to describe as a "title". I think the "caption" the specs describe are more the kind of caption-thing that might get used in a newspaper... which would probably tend to be longer. We're not like a newspaper, where you see just a few photos per page & each may have a longer caption & where text on a page is the main focus.

The thing is, the text in most themes here on SmugMug don't appear designed to be used for long descriptions, and most people looking through an entire gallery of photos aren't going to be reading long descriptive texts such as what people may tend to put in their PS description fields. Typically viewers just need a title such as what we'd have in PS "title" field, similar titles to what a stock photo would need. For example: the photo I just edited... the PS title is: "Forget-Me-Nots or Myosotis Growing in Rubble". Can't imagine many viewers needing more than that. My description is: "a spring clump of perennial forget-me-nots pushing through some broken concrete in Eastern Pennsylvania" TMI for most folks, but that's what will upload to SmugMug. Oh well... I'll just hope perhaps we get an option someday so I won't have to go in & change them all. The thing that's a pain is having to open up PS to copy them off, & it'll get a lot worse when I finally learn how to bulk edit.

jfriend

WinsomeWorks wrote:

Dan-- thank you for the thorough answer. I see how SmugMug got there now. The problem I see though is that what we happen to call a "caption" here on SmugMug is probably for most people more of a title. Typically what I've seen here below people's photos is the shorthand title kind of thing-- such as what your specs seem to describe as a "title". I think the "caption" the specs describe are more the kind of caption-thing that might get used in a newspaper... which would probably tend to be longer. We're not like a newspaper, where you see just a few photos per page & each may have a longer caption & where text on a page is the main focus.

The thing is, the text in most themes here on SmugMug don't appear designed to be used for long descriptions, and most people looking through an entire gallery of photos aren't going to be reading long descriptive texts such as what people may tend to put in their PS description fields. Typically viewers just need a title such as what we'd have in PS "title" field, similar titles to what a stock photo would need. For example: the photo I just edited... the PS title is: "Forget-Me-Nots or Myosotis Growing in Rubble". Can't imagine many viewers needing more than that. My description is: "a spring clump of perennial forget-me-nots pushing through some broken concrete in Eastern Pennsylvania" TMI for most folks, but that's what will upload to SmugMug. Oh well... I'll just hope perhaps we get an option someday so I won't have to go in & change them all. The thing that's a pain is having to open up PS to copy them off, & it'll get a lot worse when I finally learn how to bulk edit.

Smugmug has one caption field. In some views (like the Smugmug view), it works better to be short. In other views, Journal (old) or Journal, it works fine to be long. I sometimes annotate a whole trip with multiple sentences in the caption. It really all depends upon how you want to use it.

WinsomeWorks

jfriend wrote:

Smugmug has one caption field. In some views (like the Smugmug view), it works better to be short. In other views, Journal (old) or Journal, it works fine to be long. I sometimes annotate a whole trip with multiple sentences in the caption. It really all depends upon how you want to use it.

I completely agree, and that's basically my point. I've done the same thing with journal view. However, those kinds of long story-like descriptions are generally not ones that I would have already had in my PS file. I'd be adding them here on SmugMug. Or even if they were from PS, ok, maybe it would be nice to have that option (the option of caption drawing from description field rather than title field). But it would sure be handy if the short caption (title) that I want automatically added 99% of the time would do so upon upload, rather than my having to go back to PS & copy each one manually, or re-type it from memory or whatever. The rare times I might want a longer description, I could deal w/ that much easier. Most of the time, I just want the title.

jfriend

WinsomeWorks wrote:

I completely agree, and that's basically my point. I've done the same thing with journal view. However, those kinds of long story-like descriptions are generally not ones that I would have already had in my PS file. I'd be adding them here on SmugMug. Or even if they were from PS, ok, maybe it would be nice to have that option (the option of caption drawing from description field rather than title field). But it would sure be handy if the short caption (title) that I want automatically added 99% of the time would do so upon upload, rather than my having to go back to PS & copy each one manually, or re-type it from memory or whatever. The rare times I might want a longer description, I could deal w/ that much easier. Most of the time, I just want the title.

I'm not sure what solution exists to your issue. Smugmug is following the spec. Smugmug has a long history (6-7 yrs) of taking a particular IPC field into their caption field and a zillion customers are used to that. It doesn't seem like something they could or should easily change. The only thing I could imagine them doing is populating their caption field from a different field if and only if the IPC_Description field was empty. But, even then that would probably mess some existing customers up who are used to the way it works now. What exactly would you propose that would be appropriately compatible with the way everyone else is used to how it works now?

Dan7312

The site/gallery could have a "Caption" property where you said what IPTC field to use for the caption. You could even compose a caption out of multiple IPTC fields. The default would be Description.

But is seems like a lot of work to implement a feature that probably wouldn't be used that much. It's also something that could be done as a final workflow step by the user with a something like EXIFUtils.

jfriend wrote:

What exactly would you propose that would be appropriately compatible with the way everyone else is used to how it works now?

WinsomeWorks

jfriend wrote:

I'm not sure what solution exists to your issue. Smugmug is following the spec. Smugmug has a long history (6-7 yrs) of taking a particular IPC field into their caption field and a zillion customers are used to that. It doesn't seem like something they could or should easily change. The only thing I could imagine them doing is populating their caption field from a different field if and only if the IPC_Description field was empty. But, even then that would probably mess some existing customers up who are used to the way it works now. What exactly would you propose that would be appropriately compatible with the way everyone else is used to how it works now?

I dunno-- I'm not on that end of it, so cannot visualize the processes that might "remedy" this. I think it would be interesting, first of all, to know how many people are already having to re-do their captions because of this. I sorta doubt whether most people who are going to the trouble of editing in PS are only then uploading said photos to SmugMug. I mean, would most people put their caption in the description field just to fit SmugMug's way of doing it? I really can't, when I'm uploading to a bunch of stock agencies. Like I said, in my experience with other major sites, we're the oddball, no matter how long we've been doing it this way. I don't think you can really argue the fact that most people's PS description fields generally tend to be longer & that most SmugMug views/themes/fonts aren't really designed for long texts under photos except in journal view. So.... sure, just having an option of where "caption" is populated from would be fantastic. If raising the issue now helps make this possible someday, then it was worth it!