A bunch of disjointed questions from a newb trying to migrate to Smugmug from Picasa

marassa

Hi there!
Am currently evaluating SmugMug as a possible new home for my pictures - got a lot of questions in the process.
SmuggLr seems to be a formidable tool for moving all my pictures/galleries complete with captions in one click but I've hit a couple of hitches:
1. SmuggLr does not seem to preserve the order of pictures in the gallery. Is there a way to make it respect that?
2. SmuggLr seems to ignore the geo locations I have set manually in Picasa. Apparently it only imports the geo data that is in the EXIF straight from the camera. Is there a way to somehow move my geo info from Picasa? I put a LOT of work into it, would hate to do it all over again.
Some FAQ I have stumbled upon mentions another migration tool - Migratr - but it won't even download, all I'm getting is a fatal error: http://www.callingshotgun.net/downloads/Migratr_Setup.msi
Now to the functionality of SmugMug as such:
1. Do I get it right that I only can specify locations for individual images, NOT for galleries? For some of my projects I would rather have links to galleries on the map, not to specific images.
2. Is it at all possible to replace the existing MapQuest map content block with a handwritten Google Maps integration block? Like using JavaScript to populate a Google Map with data from my galleries, then use the same JavaScript to display SmugMug galleries when I click on objects in the Google Map? I don't mind doing some HTMLing and JavaScripting but I would appreciate any heads up before I start spending time understanding the API and stuff.
Would appreciate any insight!
Cheers,
Andrei

AceCo55

Hi and welcome.
I can't help you with most of it as I have never migrated and I don't use maps.

JavaScript is not supported on Smugmug - at all.
Deliberately and by design. It will not be implemented.

Phyxius

marassa wrote: »

Hi there!
Am currently evaluating SmugMug as a possible new home for my pictures - got a lot of questions in the process.
SmuggLr seems to be a formidable tool for moving all my pictures/galleries complete with captions in one click but I've hit a couple of hitches:
1. SmuggLr does not seem to preserve the order of pictures in the gallery. Is there a way to make it respect that?
2. SmuggLr seems to ignore the geo locations I have set manually in Picasa. Apparently it only imports the geo data that is in the EXIF straight from the camera. Is there a way to somehow move my geo info from Picasa? I put a LOT of work into it, would hate to do it all over again.
Some FAQ I have stumbled upon mentions another migration tool - Migratr - but it won't even download, all I'm getting is a fatal error: http://www.callingshotgun.net/downloads/Migratr_Setup.msi

1. If you have a manual sort of your image on Picasa it's possible that the sort order will not be preserved. You can try to set your sort order on SmugMug to date uploaded which should get them in the order they were moved from Picasa to SmugMug by the app. There are additional auto sort options including filename, date taken, date modified etc. You will find the sort type/direction in the gallery settings under APPEARANCE or also in the Organizer in the upper right corner.

2. Geo data added after upload will not add the geo data to the metadata/EXIF meaning we won't import it with the image. I'm sorry that we don't have a different answer for you. You can add location information to the files with a program like Lightroom which will allow the location to stay and travel with the image.

2b. An additional app that can help you move content from Picasa to SmugMug is Photo-Sync: https://photosync-app.com/ but, this one will also not be able to move the geo data.

marassa wrote: »

Now to the functionality of SmugMug as such:
1. Do I get it right that I only can specify locations for individual images, NOT for galleries? For some of my projects I would rather have links to galleries on the map, not to specific images.
2. Is it at all possible to replace the existing MapQuest map content block with a handwritten Google Maps integration block? Like using JavaScript to populate a Google Map with data from my galleries, then use the same JavaScript to display SmugMug galleries when I click on objects in the Google Map? I don't mind doing some HTMLing and JavaScripting but I would appreciate any heads up before I start spending time understanding the API and stuff.
Would appreciate any insight!
Cheers,
Andrei

1. Yes, currently location information can only be added to images rather than to galleries. You can add your comment/suggestions to the feature request for this option here: http://feedback.smugmug.com/forums/17723-smugmug/suggestions/1349925-mark-galleries-instead-of-photos-for-the-around-t

2. Currently only the MapQuest map can be used on SmugMug. Javascript is not allowed on SmugMug however, if there's a service they provide you can request that we add it as a content block. For example we have content blocks for Wufoo forms and Google Calendars. We do have a feature request to allow Google Maps content blocks, you can add your comment/feedback here: http://feedback.smugmug.com/forums/17723-smugmug/suggestions/6856619-add-a-google-maps-content-block

marassa

Hi Christina,
Thanks for a detailed reply!
Sort order: Yes the order was manual in Picasa and I just checked that the order for the resulting SmugMug gallery is already "by date uploaded". The order is not quite correct but neither is it completely random - I guess reordering those manually should not be such a huge task.
Geo data: Too bad SmuggLr won't take the geo data from Picasa. Is there a feature request for that where I could vote?
Thanks for pointing me to the feature requests - will read and add my comments there.

marassa

I just discovered that Picasa can export all the pictures into a zip file preserving the gallery/folder structure AND every image file is accompanied by a .json file containing geoinfo among other things, even if it's not in the EXIF but was added manually.
Now the question is: is there any tool out there that would import my pictures not directly from Picasa Web but from my local computer paying respect to those json files? If not then is there a tool or API that would allow me to write such a tool easliy without spending the rest of my life on it?

Lille Ulven

Hi marassa

I am not sure how good you are in writing your own scripts - it wouldn't be a big script either from what I can see (at least not for Linux or Mac, I can't do Windows scripting).
But if you look here: How can I write exif data from a JSON file into a JPG the second comment would give you the command to use with exiftool.

Good luck

Lille Ulven

marassa

Lille Ulven wrote: »

if you look here: How can I write exif data from a JSON file into a JPG

Thanks for a great idea Lille!
Of course it's best to stuff the geoinfo right into the file before uploading it anywhere. Will do it this way now!