How do see what lens I used?

Benjamin

Well spotted - I had missed this and agree with the other posters that this information should be included
I just had a look at some RAW files in GraphicConverter and as far as I can see it does not show the lens type. Needless to say Nikon Capture does and so does Photoshop.

So - lets all get onto:
http://www.apple.com/feedback/aperture.html

Brian

hello, ben 🙂

quote: "How can I get Aperture to tell me what lens I had on the camera?"

Metadata View: EXIF - Expanded

you can also select what metadata you want to see by selecting EXIF button at bottom and place a check mark in the items you want.

🙂

victor 🙂

I don't think this does it. The expanded EXIF in my Aperture system shows focal length, max and min focal length (providing the camera fills this is). It does not show the lens used.

However, when I look at one of my photo's exif in iView, and under applescript, I can read the lens exif (i.e. 24-105 mm). The method you desribe does not produce this result in Aperture.

For example, if I shot a picture with a 24mm prime or my 24-105 mm zoom at 24mm, the focal length would both display 24mm and I would not be able to ascertain what lens it was shot with.

To my knowledge, Aperture does not provide access to this information.

I'd like to know this too, if I am wrong. Otherwise, I need to import with iView, then run scripts that dig this information out of the EXIF, and put it in the keywords, sync the annotations back to the master file. Then I open the file with Aperture, import it.

Please correct me if I am wrong.

J.

Various Apple Stuff Mac OS X (10.4.8)

I changed my exif window to "EXIF Expanded", then went looking through all the EXIF tags.

I think you're right, it doesn't show the lense specific information 😟

I think we should submit this as a feature request!


Macbook Pro Mac OS X (10.4.8) 2GBRam,7200

Yeah, this is a fairly significant problem. I don't know why, if they are supposed to be making this for pro usage, that they wouldn't include - somewhere - ALL of the EXIF info.

I do this with iView and have it create a custom field with the lens in it. I've written some applescripts to take this information and include it in the keywords and also to take the people fields and copy them to the keywords. So my flow, providing I use Aperture, will be to import in iView (which has much better metadata support, IMO), save that in the iView database, sync those annotations back to the orginial files and then take it into Aperture.

Otherwise, there is no way to document which lens the shot was taken with - which is sort of important if one is going to publish something somewhere or for books.

Very disappointing....

Maybe it is in there somewhere, but I can't find it.

J.

Is there any program that automaticaly reads what the lens is beyond providing the focal length of the shot. That would assume that the lens passes that info to the data. Its not the program's fault. What if you use manual focus lenses from a generation ago. I think beyond the focal length, you are going to have to imput that info when you import if its important for you to have it. I'm not sure how an editing program could be made to do this. The exif info has to be passed by the camera. Does your camera know if its a zoom or fixed. Or if your fixed is certain version of a focal length as opposed to another version? If you need that info, you best keep a shot log.

Hello, John 🙂

quote: " The expanded EXIF in my Aperture system shows focal length, max and min focal length (providing the camera fills this is). It does not show the lens used."

quote: "if I shot a picture with a 24mm prime or my 24-105 mm zoom at 24mm, the focal length would both display 24mm and I would not be able to ascertain what lens it was shot with."

In exact terms as you describe Aperture does not tell you what lens was used, I agree it would be a nice feature to add.

The workaround would be looking at the EXIF focal length & aperture setting in combination.

🙂

victor 🙂

My cameras - both of them - the Canon 350D and the Canon 5D both determine the lens AND the focal length. So for a 24-105mm zoom lens, I can find that in the EXIF and I can also find the focal length that was used for that specific shot - say 58mm. The camera does not report min and max focal lengths.

With iView, I can read the lens type and do what I want with it. I cannot do that with Aperture.

I shoot with both primes and zooms. I need to know if I shot something with my 70-200 at 135mm or with my 135mm prime.

This needs to be in there. Look at any photography book, they will tell you with which lens a shot was made.

This needs to be added to Aperture.

J.

To reply to Barry and expand the discussion about a feature I feel is useful and should be included....

Nikon Capture includes a lot of data in the EXIF, including (yes) the exact name of the lens (AF and AF-D are differenciated). I don't own any lens without a cpu but I can venture a guess that since they don't have a CPU they cannot tell the body who they are... ect...

Now the problem with Aperture finding this info is that I'm not sure whether Nikon gives access to all the EXIF to anyone, via an API. If indeed Nikon withold some fields, some other software companies have reverse-engineering it. that part is unclear to me.

Currently my method is to keep an eye for the EXIF field called 'Maximum Lens Aperture'. The info is often wrong (ex: f/3 instead of f2.8), but still telltale enough!!!

In general I agree that I would like aperture have the same kind of info Capture has, and intend to lobby Nikon for this to happen.

At present I'm not very happy about Nikon being a software company because there is a conflict of interest for my own use.... but that's life 😉

mp

Now the problem with Aperture finding this info is
that I'm not sure whether Nikon gives access to all
the EXIF to anyone, via an API.

I think they do because Lightroom has total access to this EXIF data.

This is a feature I really want with Aperture. I have a few zoom lenses that share some of the same focal lengths and I want to tell them apart using the EXIF data.

Aperture is still, really, a 1.0 program. Hopefully it'll grow up a bit by version 2.

Antonio

You know it appears I'm very wrong. I just opened up Lightroom and looked through some om my images. On those that were taken with a CPU lens read on the D200, the focal length was given and so was the lens range. So it would be for example 63mm with the lens being the 18-70 zoom. It didn't give all the lens nomenclature ie, AF, G whatever but it did give the Aperture range of that lens.

Also, since the D200 allows you program it for Non-Cpu lenses, it was able to provide info for those lenses as well. I have a55 micro and it read it as a 55mm lens. Likewise it caught the 24mm. For the non Cpu lenses it only gives the lens length, not the apeture range. Besides it also gives other info like ISO etc that you get in Aperture.

So the data is there and Aperture isn't picking it up. Developement team???
Here's a good feature request.

I didn't know that was possible, and of course, I can see in some situations knowing what lens you used would be extremely helpful.

"Extremely helpful" is right. "No-brainer" might be another term. (I mean for them, not for you, Barry.) Why on earth would Apple not give us access to any EXIF data, in a Pro application? This is really puzzling, as well as irritating. I wonder what else is lurking in there?? (Anybody got a GPS-equipped camera body yet?)

Hi Victor,

quote: The workaround would be looking at the EXIF focal length & aperture setting in combination. /quote

How so? For example, both my 135mm and my 70-200 f/4 both have an f/4 setting. This doesn't help if the 70-200 is at 135mm. I also cannot search or sort for my shots taken with my 70-200.

So, I guess I'm not seeing any workaround here.

J.

hello, johnj80 🙂

quote: "How so? For example, both my 135mm and my 70-200 f/4 both have an f/4 setting. This doesn't help if the 70-200 is at 135mm. I also cannot search or sort for my shots taken with my 70-200."

2 — 135mm with the same f-stops? ok.

normally, photographers use lens with single focal length because the lens has a bigger f-stop to shoot a shallow depth of field or shoot in low light situations. And use zoom lens for the flexibility.

Most of the time I shoot with 3 different lens, 50mm 1.4, 135mm 2.0, 80-200 2.8 so, by comparing the focal length & aperture I know which lens was used.

In your case, with your lens and shooting techniques I guess you would need something other than Aperture to find out what lens was used.

I was mistaken that Aperture showed the exact lens used. After a closer look the workaround I posted would work for most photographers that do not have a duplicative lens collection and duplicative settings on their shoots.

🙂

victor 🙂

I'm not sure if this would work but I wonder if Applescript could get at the data and add the lens as a tag. I'm pretty new with Applescript (and photography and Aperture <g>) but maybe I'll give it a try.

PowerMac G5 Dual 2Ghz Mac OS X (10.4.8)