Sorting: EXIF metadata (Aperture, Shutterspeed, Focallength)

[XnTriq]

A minor issue is left:
From what I can see the sort order ascending/descending is wrong: When sorting ascending, list should start with shortest shutter speed and end with longest shutter speed.

Confirmed

[m.Th.]

Confirmed also: - see that there are three groups of the same values - there are exact copies of the same files three times! - however XnView MP sorts them erratically)

Sort-ShutterSpeed.png (5.44 KiB) Viewed 1032 times

Apperture, ISO & Focal Length works ok.

[helmut]

Thank you, XnTriq and m.Th. for checking. Looks like there are still two problems:

1. Sort order of shutter speed is the other way round (ascending / descending)
2. For video files(?) or in special cases the sorting seems still not work properly

@m.Th.: Could you perhaps provide three sample videos or sample photos?

[m.Th.]

Thank you, XnTriq and m.Th. for checking. Looks like there are still two problems:

1. Sort order of shutter speed is the other way round (ascending / descending)
2. For video files(?) or in special cases the sorting seems still not work properly

@m.Th.: Could you perhaps provide three sample videos or sample photos?

Yes, I can provide some samples. Should I send them to Pierre?
These are images (not videos) shoot with pretty standard dSLRs (Canon 5D3 mostly).

[helmut]

Yes, I can provide some samples. Should I send them to Pierre?
These are images (not videos) shoot with pretty standard dSLRs (Canon 5D3 mostly).

Good. If you don't mind to make your images public, please post them here. This way other people can also reproduce the problem and do retesting if needed.

[xnview]

Yes, I can provide some samples. Should I send them to Pierre?.

yes please send me them

[helmut]

Yes, I can provide some samples. Should I send them to Pierre?.

yes please send me them

No, please upload your sample files if possible (see my previous post). Additionally, you can send them to Pierre.

[xnview]

O.k., thank you, I can also reproduce the problem. Issue 641 is fixed in next version.

[CameronD]

I think it is more involved than that, and it is certainly not working for all shutter speeds.
I included some long exposure photos, and there are several issues, illustrated in the screen shot:

"ShutterSpeed" seems to be the wrong value, at least as far as Canon interpret it. ShutterSpeed seems to be the user-selected value, while ExposureTime is the actual exposure that the image was given. These are usually the same, but there are two cases where it matters

1. Bulb exposure: Exiftool reports that EXIF:ShutterSpeed is set to zero, but the EXIF tab and details display somehow convert it to "1.#J". EXIF:ExposureTime reports the actual time.
2. I don't know why, but occasionally I see images where the recorded exposure time was not the same as the ShutterSpeed value. For example in the screenshot the image with ShutterSpeed 32.0 seconds the ExposureTime was given as 30s. The ShutterSpeed 1/332s had ExposureTime 1/320s. It seems that Exposure time is rounded to some fractional E.V. value. I don't know which the camera actually used.

The times are sorted in 4 different zones:

• Bulb : (manual time exposure) these are not sorted by exposure time at all
• times expressed as seconds (up to cameras limit): are sorted correctly by numerical value. ( this includes 0.3 and 0.5s)
• times expressed as fractions of a second: these do not seem to be sorted at all - or rather they are sorted by filename
• files with no exposure time at all: are placed in the middle of the list. Surely they should be at the bottom.

It is a bit ambiguous whether the order is inverted or not, because if you are thinking as "speed" then fastest is bigger, but the units are seconds, so the bigger number is slower. Using "Exposure time" would remove this ambiguity as well as fixing some of the other problems.

[CameronD]

here is a zip file with a collection of images (the ones that produced the screenshot, less non-images) - heavily reduced in size but with metadata largely intact.

[HanVroon]

Hello all,

I have noticed the issues listed in this topic quite some time ago, and they were on my "to report list", so I thought it's time to add my observations...

I will wait for a next (beta) release to look at the shutterspeed order. At this moment ordering seems odd. In older versions I thought I noticed that the values were sorted as string, not as fraction, but I'm not sure.

My contribution deals with the exif tags used for shutter speed and aperture value.

As Phil Harvey from Exiftool states:
"ExifTool reports more than one shutter speed or aperture value, and they are slightly different".
There are a number of different ways that aperture and shutter speed information are stored in many images. The standard EXIF values (EXIF:FNumber and EXIF:ExposureTime) should correspond to the values displayed by your camera, but these values may have been rounded off. The corresponding EXIF APEX values (EXIF:ApertureValue and EXIF:ShutterSpeedValue) may be different due to their own round-off errors. If available, the MakerNotes values may be the most accurate because they haven't been rounded off to nice even values for display, so with these you may see odd values like 1/102 instead of 1/100, etc.

I think that the exif tags used for the shutter speed and aperture value in the Browser details view are the wrong ones, for two reasons:
1.
We have photos of 5 different digital cameras over the years, three Canon cameras and two Panasonic cameras. Only the Canons show shutter and aperture values in Details view, for the Panasonics the columns are empty.
2.
When dumping all the exif tags of my Canon 5DII with Exiftool I see four values for shutter speed and aperture value (for my reference: photo IMG_9345.JPG):
[Composite] Aperture : 11.0
[EXIF] ApertureValue : 11.3
[EXIF] ExposureTime : 1/125
[EXIF] FNumber : 11.0
[Composite] ShutterSpeed : 1/125
[EXIF] ShutterSpeedValue : 1/128
[MakerNotes] TargetAperture : 11
[MakerNotes] TargetExposureTime : 1/128

For a Panasonic FZ1000 (P1020019.JPG for my reference):
[EXIF] ExposureTime : 1/250
[EXIF] FNumber : 8.0
[Composite] Aperture : 8.0
[Composite] ShutterSpeed : 1/250

So some cameras, at least Canon models, record a "real" value and a rounded off value.
I think that we would be better served with the rounded values. Those are the values that we are used to, that we see in our viewfinders while taking the photo, and that correspond to our references over the years.

In Windows Explorer, Properties, Details, Exposure time is also 1/125 instead of 1/128.

I don't know how Pierre extracts the values, I suppose not with Exiftool, otherwise I would see Exiftool being unpacked in my temp folder after starting XnViewMP on a fresh VM without having triggered Exiftool by selecting the Exiftool tab in the Info pane.
But I think there is an option to use ExposureTime instead of ShutterSpeedValue and FNumber instead of ApertureValue.
ExposureTime and FNumber seem to be recorded by any camera, when using other exif tags it depends on the manufacturer if you see values or not.

Perhaps readers can confirm this?
Maybe it is better to change this first before dealing with the sorting?

Best regards,
Han

[m.Th.]

Good points. In some cases the differences between nominal and real Shutter Speeds can be somewhat surprising. (for ex. 1/1250 Exposure vs. 1/1328 Shutter Speed)

However I would advise, before correcting this, to change the underlying database schema.

Pierre doesn't use ExifTool for the data used for sorting. The program has his own EXIF engine.

ExposureTime and FNumber seem to be recorded by any camera, when using other exif tags it depends on the manufacturer if you see values or not.

ALL are recorded by the camera.

...however some are compulsory, imposed by the strength of the core EXIF standard, the other ones are (much) more freely avoidable. MakerNotes is a mess (yes, CaNikon I look at you) - very good that you have so much data but why, oh why, so proprietary?

[HanVroon]

Unregarded if EVERYTHING is recorded by the camera, not everything has been discovered by people investigating EXIF tags.
For example whether the use of image stabilization is recorded or not for a 5DII with a EF 24-105mm f/4L IS lens has never been discovered. I was involved in an investigation for that.

Anyway, I'm sure that Pierre can choose to use the common EXIF tags ExposureTime instead of ShutterSpeedValue and FNumber instead of ApertureValue in his engine.
I checked some other models as well, for example I have some D300, Coolpix and Olympus photos as well, they all contain these standard tags, beside others, depending on what was discovered by the Exiftool community.
So I'm quite sure that ExposureTime and FNumber are common and other tags are not (so) common.

[CameronD]

I have tested with 0.85 beta1 10-mar-2017

The issue of sorting speeds greater than or less than 1 second is now fixed.

The issue with "Bulb" settings showing as shutter speed "1#J" is still present.

I suggest:

1. short term: Use the value of zero for shutter speed when "Bulb" (manual time exposure), otherwise depending on sort order these images are sometimes split from non-images
2. short-term (better): if shutter speed is zero or otherwise unsortable, load the exposure time value instead
3. longer term: use exposure time across the board.

[xnview]

The issue with "Bulb" settings showing as shutter speed "1#J" is still present.

could you send me a sample file?