Geoff Coupe's Blog

Reflections on life at “De Witte Wand”…

Geotagging Photos

I’m rather taken with the concept of geotagging my outdoor photos. At the moment, I have to do this manually using software applications that use either Google Earth or Microsoft’s Virtual Earth. While, as I predicted, cameras with built-in GPS receivers are coming onto the market, I don’t want to throw away my investment in a Canon 300D just for that.

But now I see that ATP has brought out a rather nifty little pocket device to add GPS data into photos taken with any digital camera. This may herald a new type of device becoming available. I rather think though that I will wait for the second generation of these devices. At the moment, the ATP device only handles SD memory cards directly (I use CF memory cards). It’s clearly a device aimed at the consumer market – I suspect that it will only handle images taken in JPEG format; I rather doubt that it will handle the RAW formats favoured by professional photographers.

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3 responses to “Geotagging Photos”

  1. Jose Avatar
    Jose

    I use a Garmin Gecko 201 GPS and GPicSync (http://code.google.com/p/gpicsync/)  to geotag my photos. Also, check out Geosetter (http://www.geosetter.de/), which seems to also support RAW files.

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  2. Geoff Avatar
    Geoff

    Jose, thanks for the comment. I see that the Gecko is more expensive than the APT device. Of course, it does more, but unlike my brother, I don’t hike for miles in uncharted wildernesses, so the tracking capability of the Gecko is not something that I need. I like the concept of the APT device – it may do only one thing, but allegedly does it elegantly and simply.

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  3. Jose Avatar
    Jose

    True, I do not use my GPS for anything else but photo geotagging. Still, I do sometimes find it useful to store the tracks of where I have been and sometimes create a placemark. I find the method employed by the APT device very interesting and easy to use. Do check reviews first. There are 2 things which one should always pay attention to when purchasing GPS devices: Accuracy and Battery Life. My Gecko GPS drains batteries in no time, but the accuracy is very good (In terms of fixing on satellites and position), even with WAAS disabled. I was tempted to get the Sony GPS-CS1, but two friends told be that while the battery life was good its accuracy was not that good.  

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