Geotagging, or the act of applying detailed geographic coordinates, to my photos is exceptionally important to me. I do a lot of traveling and am often photographing in remote areas. So, being able to remember exactly where I took a particular photo has saved my bacon a number of times.
Additionally, it just makes things so much easier if/when I want to return to a particular spot to have another crack at a photo. Finally, when I’m out shooting, it’s important to me that I don’t keep my feet planted in one place. I want to know that I was moving around, trying out different compositions and locations.
By geotagging my photos, I can easily plot all of their locations on a map and see whether I concentrated on one area for too long and, if so, I can determine why. Once I am able to get a GPX file (a file format standard containing geographic data from a track), I can easily import it into Lightroom and automatically sync my photos with their corresponding coordinates. From there, Lightroom’s Map module does a great job of laying out each geotagged photo on a map for me to review.
Let’s Get Geotagging!
Before we begin, there is one crucial step that you need to take. It’s something that I do before every shoot and that is to sync the time reported on your phone with your camera. This is important because the time/date stamp of the track is the single record that will be used to match up against the time/date stamp of each photo. This is something to be especially mindful of when you’re traveling to different time zones.
For the purposes of this tutorial, I’ve decided to focus on geotagging photos with a device that just about each of you likely already have: a smartphone. Because I own and use an Apple iPhone 6+, the screenshots provided are on the iOS platform. On iOS, I use an app called GPS Tracks.
Fortunately, Google released an equally capable GPS app for Android called My Tracks. The good news is that both apps operate in very similar ways, so you Android users out there should be able to easily replicate this workflow. For the purposes of this walkthrough, I’m going to present each step as an image in the gallery below. Be sure to read the caption of each photo to follow along.
Ok. Let’s begin. Click each image to see the steps.
Let’s Get Syncing!
Ok, now that we’ve recorded and exported our track log, it’s time to sync these coordinates with the photos that we just took. To begin, you should obviously import your photos into your Lightroom Catalog. As before, I’m going to present each step as an image in the gallery below. Click each image to see the steps. Be sure to reach the caption of each post to follow along.
So there you go! I hope this tutorial has inspired you to begin logging your treks so that you can always know exactly where you were when you took your photos.
Some Other Options For Geotagging
Besides your phone, there are tons of ways that one can go about geotagging photos. You can invest in a proprietary handheld GPS device, which will track your path with great detail. One such device that I recommend with extreme gusto is the Garmin Oregon 600. I own one and have friends who do, too. It’s fast, capable, and exceptionally intuitive to use. Your camera may even have a GPS radio built right in, which gives you the option of having your geographic coordinates written to each photo as its exposed. This is SUPER handy but can be taxing on your camera’s battery and not many cameras have GPS built in.
This has been the most detailed and easy to follow artic
I like gps4cam for geotagging. You don’t need to worry about syncing your camera time – they’ve got a nifty way around that by having you snap a picture of a QR code which contains all the info. A side benefit of that is that the geo track is actually stored with your pictures, so you have easy access to it even several years later.
Came here o say this! +1 for gps4cam. It also lets you adjust the GPS capture rate so it grabs your location every minute or longer, but it GREATLY increases battery life over capturing every few seconds.
Brian. Thanks so much for this tutorial. I’ve been looking for a solution and this hit the nail on the head. There are so many options and apps out there it can be overwhelming. I’ve already downloaded the app and am looking forward to getting started. Had Sony (or others) made a hot shoe option, I probably would have gone with that. But until that happens, this will be fine. Thanks Again.
Dear Kirsty Not sure if you subscribe to this – they send out lots of emails and I don’t read them all – but there are a few good ones which I do read – this one being one of them. I have just purchased the app GPS tracks and it works a treat – in the past I have not been able to get anything to work. Raining here today – very pleasing! Lots of love Shona From: Photofocus <[email protected]> Reply-To: Photofocus <[email protected]> Date: Sunday, 1 February 2015 3:04 am To: Shona Jaray <[email protected]> Subject: [New post] Easy Photo… Read more »
Brian, a question or two
1] being if you are not using your camera to geotag, how is lightroom putting the pictures in the right spot on the area you walked [or drove]?
2] presumably this could be used with app that gives you the path you walked.
Thanks,
I’ve used both time stamp syncing and direct writing to EXIF. One reason why I’ve stuck with Nikon instead of going to Canon or even M43. It’s kind of distressing though, that geotagging seems to have lost some steam. Photo app. on the iPad no longer has a Places tab which shows all the pins where your photos were shot. Not a big fan of LightRoom’s presentation of the map. Aperture still is best, though they switched to Apple Maps instead of Google Maps. Wary of how the OS X Photo app will present geotagged images given the change they… Read more »
As I use my iPhone largely for “communication”, I am still on an iPhone 4.with the old Operating System. Sadly, the Apps referenced seem to require at least an iPhone 5 and the newer OS. Guess I’m stuck with my current manual method: a) locate the place on Google Earth; b) add a place marker at the location of the photo to set the GPS coordinates; c) cut and paste those coordinates into Lightroom. It is tedious – but since I usually only do this for photos that I will publish to another site it is really not that time… Read more »
According to what I see, gps4cam only requires iOS 5.1.1 or later. I know that I used to run it on my iPhone 4 when I had it.
Great article Brian. I didn’t realize that this was now so easy to do in Lightroom. I use Strava to record all my hikes already and can easily export a GPX that works perfectly in Lightroom.
Great article Brian. While your out there taking pix and creating a gpx track with your phone or GPS device, why not also have some fun at the same time and look for Geocaches (hidden containers containing a logbook and sometimes trinkets/SWAG to trade). Lots of fun. there are millions of them everywhere in the world. Some easy and some very hard. check it out at http://www.geocaching,com There is an app for iOS and Android or load them and the GPX files on your handheld GPS device. Enjoy. ” salsaguy ” (on geocaching site)
What a useful technique! Thank you for your excellent instruction.
I use Geotag Photos Lite and from your workflow above I feel that Geotag Photos Lite is easier to use. Try it, its free.
Absolutely loved this, huge help, thank you very much!
Great article Brian. While your out there taking pix and creating a gpx track with your phone or GPS device, why not also have some fun at the same time and look for Geocaches (hidden containers containing a logbook and sometimes trinkets/SWAG to trade). Lots of fun. there are millions of them everywhere in the world. Some easy and some very hard. check it out at http://www.geocaching,com There is an app for iOS and Android or load them and the GPX files on your handheld GPS device. Enjoy. ” salsaguy ” (on geocaching site)
Great article Brian. I didn’t realize that this was now so easy to do in Lightroom. I use Strava to record all my hikes already and can easily export a GPX that works perfectly in Lightroom.
I use Geotag Photos Lite and from your workflow above I feel that Geotag Photos Lite is easier to use. Try it, its free.
Absolutely loved this, huge help, thank you very much!
I’ve used both time stamp syncing and direct writing to EXIF. One reason why I’ve stuck with Nikon instead of going to Canon or even M43. It’s kind of distressing though, that geotagging seems to have lost some steam. Photo app. on the iPad no longer has a Places tab which shows all the pins where your photos were shot. Not a big fan of LightRoom’s presentation of the map. Aperture still is best, though they switched to Apple Maps instead of Google Maps. Wary of how the OS X Photo app will present geotagged images given the change they… Read more »
What a useful technique! Thank you for your excellent instruction.
Dear Kirsty Not sure if you subscribe to this – they send out lots of emails and I don’t read them all – but there are a few good ones which I do read – this one being one of them. I have just purchased the app GPS tracks and it works a treat – in the past I have not been able to get anything to work. Raining here today – very pleasing! Lots of love Shona From: Photofocus <[email protected]> Reply-To: Photofocus <[email protected]> Date: Sunday, 1 February 2015 3:04 am To: Shona Jaray <[email protected]> Subject: [New post] Easy Photo… Read more »
Brian, a question or two
1] being if you are not using your camera to geotag, how is lightroom putting the pictures in the right spot on the area you walked [or drove]?
2] presumably this could be used with app that gives you the path you walked.
Thanks,
As I use my iPhone largely for “communication”, I am still on an iPhone 4.with the old Operating System. Sadly, the Apps referenced seem to require at least an iPhone 5 and the newer OS. Guess I’m stuck with my current manual method: a) locate the place on Google Earth; b) add a place marker at the location of the photo to set the GPS coordinates; c) cut and paste those coordinates into Lightroom. It is tedious – but since I usually only do this for photos that I will publish to another site it is really not that time… Read more »
According to what I see, gps4cam only requires iOS 5.1.1 or later. I know that I used to run it on my iPhone 4 when I had it.
This has been the most detailed and easy to follow artic
I like gps4cam for geotagging. You don’t need to worry about syncing your camera time – they’ve got a nifty way around that by having you snap a picture of a QR code which contains all the info. A side benefit of that is that the geo track is actually stored with your pictures, so you have easy access to it even several years later.
Came here o say this! +1 for gps4cam. It also lets you adjust the GPS capture rate so it grabs your location every minute or longer, but it GREATLY increases battery life over capturing every few seconds.
Brian. Thanks so much for this tutorial. I’ve been looking for a solution and this hit the nail on the head. There are so many options and apps out there it can be overwhelming. I’ve already downloaded the app and am looking forward to getting started. Had Sony (or others) made a hot shoe option, I probably would have gone with that. But until that happens, this will be fine. Thanks Again.