Captions and keywords are not exporting to SM with my photos

MacLoyal

I thought it was a fluke when these items didn't appear with a small batch of exported photos recently. I just exported about 80 photos into a new gallery and once again I have no captions or keywords. This information has automatically transferred with previous exports. What happened? :scratch I have a lot of time invested in both types of labeling.

I am on a MacPro and I use Aperture. I exported through SmugExport using the same steps that I've used many times.

:help Help! I have people waiting to see these photos.

ivar

MacLoyal wrote:

I thought it was a fluke when these items didn't appear with a small batch of exported photos recently. I just exported about 80 photos into a new gallery and once again I have no captions or keywords. This information has automatically transferred with previous exports. What happened? I have a lot of time invested in both types of labeling.

I am on a MacPro and I use Aperture. I exported through SmugExport using the same steps that I've used many times.

:help Help! I have people waiting to see these photos.

Hey Macloyal

Can you link me to the gallery, please?

MacLoyal

keywords, captions and sorting problems
Anything to help get to the bottom of this! I don't always have luck with the link I post letting people get to the gallery (perhaps because my 'logged in' link is different that the link others can use?) but here's what I copied:

http://macloyal.smugmug.com/gallery/4195602#245189008

Here's the path if that doesn't work:

MacLoyal > Honda Ridgeline > 2008 January Utah ROC mini-meet

I've discovered a different problem in experimenting to see if using ApertureToSmugMug's exporter put the captions and keywords into SM (it did not). It seems other metadata is missing too.

I have about 20 photos I took of a hawk yesterday which I put into my backyard birds gallery:

MacLoyal > On The Homefront > Backyard Birds > Birds

They did not post in the correct order so I tried sorting my gallery various ways, eventually trying all the available options. Usually the sure fire way to get them to line up correctly is by time and date they were taken. That did not work. Each of the methods I tried jumbled up the whole gallery. It was after midnight and I was tired. I finally did a rough drag and drop to regroup similar photos shot on different days or during different seasons.

I just resorted one more time from date taken - descending order. That's closer to accurate, but not completely. The first three photos were taken in the last month or so, then it jumps back in time. The batches of recent unlabeled hawk photos are clustered on pages 4-6.

Is there a way while in SM to reveal the photo's metadata? There are only subtle differences in the photos I took yesterday so I'm only guessing the order in which I took them based on which limb the hawk is on in the cherry tree.

As I look back through several of my most recent exports to SM, I see this lack of keywords and captions have been going on for a while.

I want it to work correctly again! Your input is anxiously awaited. I don't want to have to retype each entry, especially since I don't see a way in SM to do any batch labeling.

I have a backlog of many photos to get posted and I certainly want this solved before I post anything else. I hope we can get this fixed because that is what I wanted to spend my time doing today and during the holiday tomorrow.

ivar

Hello again

I have looked at the original photos that you have uploaded to SmugMug. A lot of them do not have any metadata at all (a few do, that's also why there is a problem the birds gallery with the sorting).

I don't have aperture, nor do I know how it works, but it seems that for some reason the images are exported without any metadata. Does Aperture save the data in a library file, but not in the actual image files, by any chance? If so, you may need to 'apply' the metadata to your original image files in one way or another.

Maybe there is another Aperture user who can chime in?

MacLoyal

I have only uploaded from Aperture since joining SmugMug. This has happened flawlessly and automatically up until recently.

I have no clue where Aperture keeps the metadata.

aquaticvideographer

In the library

ivar wrote:

Hello again

I have looked at the original photos that you have uploaded to SmugMug. A lot of them do not have any metadata at all (a few do, that's also why there is a problem the birds gallery with the sorting).

I don't have aperture, nor do I know how it works, but it seems that for some reason the images are exported without any metadata. Does Aperture save the data in a library file, but not in the actual image files, by any chance? If so, you may need to 'apply' the metadata to your original image files in one way or another.

Maybe there is another Aperture user who can chime in?

If I'm not mistaken, Aperture stores all metadata, just like all other data, in the Aperture library, which is a package.

Andy

MacLoyal wrote:

I am on a MacPro and I use Aperture. I exported through SmugExport using the same steps that I've used many times.

Hm. Have you tried ApertureToSmugMug? I just uploaded with that app directly from Aperture and the caption and keyword went along fine.
http://andytheme.smugmug.com/gallery/4199418#245435347

MacLoyal

Problem solved!
Yes, Andy, I did that experiment last night and got the same results: NO metadata. Thanks for checking back with the suggestion, however.

I searched and posted in several forums before calling Apple Support today. I've discovered the problem with that tech person's guidance. If anyone else faces this dilemma, check your settings here:

Aperture > File > Export Versions

Then you get a pop up box with some drop down menus. The top drop down box has 'Edit' at the bottom of its list. Go into there. You'll have several preferences to choose from (file type, dimensions, quality, etc) and there's a tiny box that accidently got unchecked which says something like: Include Metadata.

I can't check it for exact wording because I'm merrily re-exporting right now - Metadata intact!

I will have many photos to resend to SmugMug and it's exporting slow as cold molasses at the moment, but this problem appears to be solved!

I'm cross posting this solution to the other threads I left inquiries in to help anyone else who might end up banging against a brick wall at midnight.