iPhone 4 Photo's & Video Rotating Sideways In Email

Same problem with my 4s. I hatethis!!! I was hoping that making the upgrade with the new camera would allow meto not use my point and shoot so much. But I hate this phone because of thiscamera issue. As to those who say just hold the camera right - take verticalshots is holding a camera right. I take landscape and vertical shots with meCanon 7d all the time and it work perfectly. Also I never had this problem withmy 3gs.

This has to be a iphone camera app issue. I just download iphoto and ivideo and nether have this problem.

I am using an iphone 3gs with os 5.0. I am having the same problem, I take photos and they show up on the phone fine but when I upload them to my computer, they are all rotated 90 degrees. I took over 80 photos of damage from a recent snowstorm that I need to show to my insurance adjuster. Telling me to rotate the phone for each photo is not an answer to the problem. Telling me to just rotate the photos using some app is not an answer to the problem, This is a problem that Apple has to do something about.

iOS 5.01 doesn't fix this annoying bug... 😠

Apple must fix this!

In my case I take HD video with an Apple iPhone 4S and an iPad 2. These cameras can be just as easily oriented in any of four orientations by hand, or in various iPhone or iPad holders for mounting on a tripod. As long as I stay with Apple or Adobe products for my whole video handling process, I have no problem with software support for orientation

While there are countless software programs available today that display JPEG images, only a subset of them actually interpret the EXIF Orientation flag. Just like color management, many programs simply display the JPEG image as it is stored, and completely ignore any extra details stored in the file's metadata. The most important of these additional details is the Orientation flag, stored in the JPEG APP1 marker under EXIF IFD0.

More explanation of this is in the text below.

Briefly, Apple is doing it right, with their iPhone 4S and iPad 2, the way most High end video cameras do it. And they made sure that their apps looked at the appropriate flag to rotate the image before showing it. To understand this look at this site:

http://www.impulsead...rientation.html

This is a site that explains the whole deal. Apple and Adobe are looking at the flags for image rotation. Plex,and many others are not doing so. VLC for instance, DropBox is anpther example, Thunderbird is another example, the list is long.

Many newer digital cameras (both dSLR and Point & Shoot digicams) have a built-in orientation sensor. Virtually all Canon andNikon digital cameras have an orientation sensor. The output of this sensor is used to set the EXIF orientation flag in the image file's metatdata to reflect the positioning of the camera with respect to the ground. Canon calls their sensor the "Intelligent Orientation" sensor. It is presumably a 2-axis tilt sensor, allowing 4 possible orientations to be detected. The paragraphs below are taken from that wonderfully illustrated link.

Auto-rotation in Digital Cameras

While your digital camera may include an option to "auto-rotate images" due to the camera's orientation, this is almost always just a "virtual rotation". A flag is set to indicate to the viewing software / LCD preview which way to rotate the image before display, rather than rotating the image content itself.

As lossless image rotation is a fairly compute-intensive operation, digital cameras are not likely to include true lossless rotation after capturing the photo. The CCD/CMOS sensor hardware is designed to stream raw data in a particular direction (e.g. rows then columns), and so it may be hard to incorporate true auto-rotation in-camera without a performance impact to continuous shooting (frames per second).

Agree - all very annoying! Very simple work around - upload the pics to facebook ( or indeed anyanother app that recognises the tags correctly ), then do File Save as from there. Voila! Pictures the right way up - havent tried video yet but suspect that will be the same.

Workarounds stink. Not that they don't work, but that it's not so "simple" in that it requires many other steps in order to simply send a photo in the proper orientation so that it's viewed the same way by the recipient. Sorry, but I think it's pretty janky. I love my iPhone 4S and that aspect of it is pretty disappointing. When someone spends $200-$300 for a device that's supposed to have a quality camera in it, they should reasonably expect the device to adhere to basic photo file orientation standards (that have existed LONG before the iPhone came into existence) like every other computer and image display device in the world does. I have NEVER had this problem with other cameras, devices with cameras, computers (Mac and PC), different brands/models, etc. for the last two decades until I started using the iPad and the iPhone 4/4S. Anyone who suggests the rest of the world has "got it wrong" is delusional.

Dear sir,

I had the same problem, when playing movies on my computer,

that were created on the iPhone 4S ... when using Windown Media Player.

The solution:

right-click on the video icon,

left-click: "Opens With"

left-click: " iTunes".

When you play your iPhone movies, using iTunes as the media player ....

the problem will be solved.

Best regards.

I've had my 4s for a few months now and this was never happening to me until very recently. The pics were fine. Started noticing the sideways pics in the photo stream folder on my PC. So I tried emailing to myself and like others, the thumb was fine but open it and it's sideways. I can txt them fine. I wish I could pinpoint when it started happening. When I activated photo stream?

You will think I'm crazy but I'm also experiencing this too. If I try to rotate the pic and save it, I can, as long as it's not a facial photo. I'm not kidding. I can rotate and save scenery, a pic of a diet coke can, a chimp, crowds or pics with faces at a distant. But when I try it for photos of people with full facial, the pics will not save when rotated. Windows photo viewer almost crashes trying. Try it for yourself. Take a self portrait and a pic of a shoe. When they show up in photo stream, copy them to your desktop. See if you can rotate and save both pics. I can not save my facial pic but can save a pic of a beer bottle.

There is some voodoo Apple software facial recogntion software at play here!

May I just add that this is particularly annoying when I'm sending pictures of "baby's first..." to an 84 year old relative. She's pretty high tech for her age, but still must view these by contorting her neck and upper body!

ALSO - if someone intends to film upside down, wouldn't it be nice if they could view the subject that way and know for sure it's filming as intended? I have tested the camera in both directions in order to guarantee the proper alignment, but it still seems to be hit or miss!! GRRR!!! APPLE PLEASE FIX THIS!!!!

I've done a little research on this topic, and it appears that the "answer" is that when Apple records video, it uses an EXIF tag to indcate the camera orentation. The newer iPhones support this tag, so they just attach the file as is, and display it according to the phone's current orientation and the EXIF tag in the file. The problem comes in that if sent as an email attachment, the receiving end might (or might not) properly use that same EXIF tag to display the video. It appears that many older applications, and some newer ones don't even look at this tag so they just display the file as it's attached and do not take the orientation tag into account. This is why you get some photos or videos on their side, and some upside down.

As for what's "right' and what's "wrong"? Well, that's a matter for discussion that may go on for a long time. Needless to say, according to the current standards, Apple is "right" but not all software follows the current standards, and for that software Apple is "wrong". Needless to say,during ths time of transition, those of us on the "bleeding edge" just need to think about backwards compatibility in what we do, and it may just be easier for us to take a few extra steps to make sure that others get the esperience we want them to get from our pictures or videos...

As you can read in my earlier response above, I believe that Apple is using EXIF for jpg file orientation of still photos.

Apple is certainly using something for providing orientation information for still images and videos. I have recorded about half a terrabyte of video per year with Apple iPhone and iPad 2 cameras, and am looking forward to using the new iPad 2S ( or iPad 3, what ever it is called) and the new iPad 5.

I take my videos in landscape mode with the home button on the right, with the + and - buttons on the bottom left of the iPhone 4S or iPad 2.

Apple provides developers with a software known as QTKit which automatically provides orientation metadata to the jpg still photo files and mov video files.

I have no idea if QTKit is writing EXIF metadata, or some other orientation metadata, in the jpg and mov files, but it is certainly writing something that orientation aware software in the Windows and Mac development world are able to read.

I am mildly curious about what orientation metadata Apple actually appends to the camera files. If any reader of this thread cares to provide such details I will be greatly appreciative.

At the end of the day, I do not need to know, as I know how to hold the camera so that orientation is not a problem for those I send images to, and I know how to open and save upside down, or sideways, images other folks send me when they hold their iPhone camera in one of the other three out of four of the possible home button locations.

What we all want to know is why is this just happening now though? I had the 3gs and recently got the 4s in November. I "think" some of the first pics with the 4s were fine???

I believe it's the EXIF issue too but there is another factor at play here. For correcting the orientation on my own computer I downloaded a freeware program off CNET called Faststone image viewer that would both rotate and save the pic in the new orientation. Here's what else I believe I have found. Apple has also embedded some kind of facial recognition software. When I tried to upright and save all my pics in photo stream using windows native pic viewer, any inanimate objects such as scenery, a beer bottle, even crowds or people at a distance could easily be both uprighted and saved using windows native picture viewer. But when I try to upright and save a pic of a person , i can rotate the pic but when I try to save it the program just about crashes. I have two pics of the same two woman standing together. First shot at normal distance of about 15 feet could be rotated and saved. The next pic of the same women taken moments later, but zoomed in, could not be saved in the rotated position.

I've spoke with Apple on our issue and it's an ongoing ticket. I'm gathering info for him and will be calling back. He called me once asking me to test something so I know they are aware of it and want to fix it.

I had this same issue when sending email to a hotmail account. FYI - I'm running on an iPhone 4S with Photo Stream enabled. I ran a test taking 4 pictures at 90 degree increments and sending them from my Camera Roll Album to my hotmail account. Each one showed as a different rotation. Then I took those same four pictures and sent them from my Photo Stream Album to my hotmail account. All photos showed right side up!

I know it's a workaround and you must have Photo Stream on, but at least it doesn't require manually rotating the photos. You just have to remember to send them from your Photo Stream Album.

If anyone else gets a chance to try that, I'd be curious if it works. Good luck!

Here is how it went for me. This is hard to follow.

I did get that to work when emailing the pics from the photostream folder on my phone to my PC. Pics are received upright on my PC. So I tried emailing them from the photo stream folder on my pc as is, the way they arrive rotated from the cloud. When emailing them they are received still rotated if I view the email on my PC but they are fine if I view the same email on my phone. Which means my phone uprights the pic even when emailed from my PC while rotated.

Here's where it gets more interesting. The pic used for this experiement was of a chair.

I duplicated this experiment with a self portrait. Again testing my theory on Apple using face recognition software.

The experiment failed. Emailing from the photo share folder on my phone and viewing on my phone it is received upright just as before, But, that same email viewed on my PC, my self portrait is rotated. The facial recognition software used by Apple doesn't work well with PC. And, if I try to fix it the windows native pic viewer crashes. Apple doesn't want a PC to correct the pic rotation. So I used Faststone image viewer to rotate it and save it.

So what have we learned from this? I have no idea....except that the iPhone and a PC don't play nice in the sandox. There is a workaround by emailing from the phones photo stream folder as discovered, but NOT if that pic is a face shot.

The solution seems to always take pics in the widescreen mode with the home button to the right. That's kind of the way you would hold it as a real camera anyway. (but not for the front facing camera. home button to the left or the pic will be upside down! aaaaahhhhh)

Sorry Steve, it doesn't "just work"