macorin

Q: Time zones and Aperture

There seems to be some confusion when working with Aperture and trying to get the time, and the time zone correct when you need to make changes to the Masters (or versions) and you are importing outside of the time zone that you shot the images in.

For example, I shot my images in Cape Town. I had the camera time set to Cape Town local time. When I get home to New York, I open Aperture and import based on the camera time and actual time being set to South Africa, which I believe is GMT+2. In any case, since I am importing the images in New York, and my computer's internal time is set to EST, something always seems to go awry with the time and time zone management.

What is the real deal with this in terms of the way Aperture was designed to handle this issue? Was it designed based on the concept of importing your images while you are still away on the shoot? I can see this being the case since Aperture is a pro level application and most professional photographers will import their images the same day that they shoot them while on location. In those cases, having the time zone settings to update automatically would make perfect sense because the time zones would always match, and more importantly they would match the camera time settings.

In other instances however, when someone might choose to import all of their photos when they get back home, this might cause some problems (at least in my experience). I have my time zone settings to update automatically, but I am based in New York, and I primarily upload/import my images when I get home, not on location. Do I need to alter my time zone settings and/or turn off automatic time zone updating before importing images and playing around with the time and time zone altering settings in Aperture?

If so, is there a way to fix images that have already been imported based on what I thought was the proper times, but now seems to be the wrong times? If anyone has anything to say about this issue, or has some good old fashioned advice on how this aspect of Aperture is managed, it would be greatly appreciated.

Mac

Macbook Pro 17", Mac OS X (10.6.6), 2.93 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 4 GB 1067 MHz DDR3

Posted on Jan 21, 2011 10:41 PM

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Q: Time zones and Aperture

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  • by Frank Caggiano,

    Frank Caggiano Frank Caggiano Jan 22, 2011 8:19 AM in response to macorin
    Level 7 (25,782 points)
    Jan 22, 2011 8:19 AM in response to macorin
    You might want to check out [Topic : Time Zone Upon Import|http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2639934&start=0&tstart =0]
  • by macorin,

    macorin macorin Jan 22, 2011 10:14 AM in response to Frank Caggiano
    Level 1 (36 points)
    Jan 22, 2011 10:14 AM in response to Frank Caggiano
    Frank,

    The funny thing is, I started that other post. I totally forgot about it. I'm not sure if what I am experiencing is a little different or not, but I will play around with it further and post back.

    Also, do you know if the date and time get permanently embedded in the file? I have changed date and time metadata and applied it to the Master files, but upon upload to sites like Flikr, it doesn't recognize the date and time properly. It could just be an issue on Flikr's end, but I'm just curious as I try to troubleshoot.

    Mac
  • by Frank Caggiano,

    Frank Caggiano Frank Caggiano Jan 22, 2011 10:23 AM in response to macorin
    Level 7 (25,782 points)
    Jan 22, 2011 10:23 AM in response to macorin
    I know, meant to add a

    As for embedding into the file. It's suppose to (never checked outside of Aperture however). It is the only EXIF data that Aperture will change. All the other EXIF fields are read only.
  • by Vivek Shroff, India,

    Vivek Shroff, India Vivek Shroff, India Jul 8, 2016 2:50 AM in response to macorin
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Jul 8, 2016 2:50 AM in response to macorin
    • On importing photos in Aperture, they are imported with date and time = DateTimeOriginal (in metadata) and time zone = current computer time zone.
    • Aperture does not recognize the metadata XMP:DateTimeOriginal which includes information of time zone also.
    • Metadata -> Adjust Date and Time – This only edits date and time. Does not look at time zone.
    • Metadata -> Batch Change – We select Adjust Time Zone. Then we put the time zone of place where we clicked the photos, in both fields – Camera’s Time Zone and Actual Time Zone. We select – Apply to Original Files. Then Ok.
    • Now the metadata displays date and time same as before, but time zone (as GMT offset) as per entered above.
    • However, on exporting the image and checking its metadata, we find :
    • The new DateTimeOriginal is as per current timezone of computer.
    • Xmp:DateTimeOriginal value has been removed.
    • GPS Date/Time fields’ values are safe in metadata. They can be used as reference point to get new values in DateTimeOriginal and xmp:DateTimeOriginal.