People tagging like on facebook

[Dreamer]

The most important info in the photo is (IMHO) - what/who is in the photo, where is it and when it was created.

When - date and time is included in EXIF, no problem, more below.

What/who - some cameras/software can identify it automatically - more in the existing suggestion.

Another way is to (partly) manually tag the people. Is there any standard? Format for example? "Firstname.Surname" ? Where, in the IPTC, XMP?? As keywords, or categories?

Main suggestion of this topic is people tagging, like on facebook, perhaps a bit improved:

In the tree, perhaps as a part of categories there could be another option "People". The list of known people/friends would be shown as a list and it would be working the same as other categories - so select pictures with someone, drag them to his name in categories > people, done.

Now, how to assign the names to faces in the photo. There are few ways:

- in no way - do not assign names to faces
- automatically - if XnView would be able to detect faces, assign faces from left to right, or from top left to bottom right - this might be inaccurate sometimes
- manually, like on facebook, for example:

--- drag the name from tree to the photo - preview, or in MP version in fullscreen auto-hide panel (which is not implemented yes AFAIK)
--- tagging mode (menu item and keyboard shortcut to enable, if enabled...) single click the face and select the name from the list - shown as context menu
--- tagging mode II - right click the name in categories and select "enable tagging this person", then single click the person / face in the photo - perhaps an automated mode would be nice here, automatically go to next picture after tagging a person, then it would be probably the easiest manual way - just click, click, click... If the person is not in the photo, perhaps right click to go to next picture.

Where? - Geotags will be added in the MP version, as Pierre said, so this is great. More below.

Where it will be written? Probably in the IPTC or/and XMP, (and in DB). Don't know where exactly, but perhaps there is a standard?? Definitely it must be (also) in the file - IPTC/XMP so it would be working on other computers, with XnView, or with another image viewer (I know, in this case it would be not so easy, only using search if there is no standard).

Of course also the position must be written somewhere (IPTC/XMP), but I am afraid that there is no standard for that, XnView will be ( ) the first.

And now - how to use it? I have already suggested something. Implement "people tagging" in the MP's quick filter, search, and easily in the categories, same as other categories, just click the name to filter.

Last but not least - how to show the names in the photo, in XnView fullscreen, browser...

- in fullscreen (partly transparent - opacity must be different than fullscreen info):

--- always show all name as part of information
--- always show all names next to the face
--- show all names next to the face for X seconds and on mouse move for X seconds
--- show all names next to the face on mouse move for X seconds only
--- show only one name on mouse move over the face for X seconds

Other information - geotags (partly transparent):

--- show the name of location only
--- show animated map only (with the highlighted place of the photo)
--- show both

--- perhaps show also animated calendar and clock for EXIF date/time?

- in browser:

--- perhaps only as thumbnail label, tooltip, both customizable...

Uff. Done. Any chance to implement such a feature? Thanks.

[thibaud]

as reference you might want to check out how picasa 3.5 implemented people tagging.
I'm afraid implementing such feature is a whole different story than writing a long request about it though.

[Dreamer]

I know it won't be easy. Perhaps we could start with names only - without positions. I could use the categories, but it's not a standard, I'd like to use a standard, if possible.

[Sternenfaenger77]

Is there any progress on this feature request in XnView?

If not, is the problem that there is no standard already defined?
This is my view about the "there is no standard which can tell the implementer how to store the information"-problem:
I know standards are powerful because they make files interchangable between applications.
If you store the information in a proprietary format (a non-standard) the information can only be used from those applications which provide an appropriate import feature.
But how to get a standard for it if there is none yet?
A standard is like like an aggreement between those parties which use the things defined in such standard.
Someone has to do the first step. Big organizations can better define a standard than concurring small ones but sometimes there is no competition because there's a dead lock: everybody from each party is waiting for someone making the first step because nobody wants to implement something which later turns out to be a flop because nobody wants to use it as standard.

Is this the problem?

Ok I have no solution but why can't you just save the information in XMP?

As already stated above from the one who started this thread tagging pictures like on facebook or other social networks are better than to use just categories: You can destinguish multiple persons on a picture because the tags show up on the location where the tag refers to.
You may either just store the point (X, Y coordinate) or a region (x1, x2, y1, y2) with the tagged information like (name of who/what is tagged), (date of when was the tag created), (name who created the tag) ,...

Isn't XMP like XML?
So you can just invent a scheme and put the information in it?
Example

Code: Select all

...
<imageTags>
<tag name="Mr. Who" x="312" y="96" tagDateTime="2009/12/23 02:05:30 am MET+1" tagAuthor="Me"/>
</imageTags>
...