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Yesterday, I wrote about my considerations on buying or not some geotagging equipment. Later, I was going through the feeds on my reader that I had neglected for the past few days and read a piece by Brian where he mentions, in a parody kind of way (yeah Brian, you almost got me there) the possibility for a GPS enabled Compact Flash card.

Could it be possible?

This article actually made me think about the possibility. In the end, Brian mentions that the technology that would enable such a device is not that far off. I’m almost sure that the technology is readily available to be explored by manufacturers. Knowing that CF cards exist with embedded Wi-Fi transmitters, it can’t be that hard to incorporate a GPS receiver into one.

Is it useful?

Following his spoof post, Brian continues with a poll asking his readers how much would they pay for such a thing with 4Gb memory. At the moment I’m writing, $150 leads followed closely by $100. Knowing that an external GPS receiver costs something between $100-$150, it’s clear so far that not many people would pay much more.

But I have a problem with this idea: What if I want extra cards? The huge majority of photographers, amateur and professionals, don’t rely only on one card. If you want all the photos to contain the coordinate tags, would you have to buy several of the cards, and pay the extra to have a GPS receiver on all of them?

Going back to the Wi-Fi enabled memory cards, one way that some manufacturers found to bypass this problem was to integrate the Wi-Fi into a SD card shell, while the actual memory comes from an interchangeable mini-SD. This way, you can have as many memory cards as you want and not having to pay for the Wi-Fi on everyone of them.

Would this approach work for CF cards? Not sure. One reason why CF cards are the standard for dSLRs is their capacity for high speed data transfers. If keeping the CF card shell with the GPS receiver would mean the need for a slower card to be inserted, then it would not work.

Until the technology is mainstream, I guess external GPS receivers are the best option. Nonetheless, I’m still not completely convinced how useful this is to go out the door and get one right now. Maybe after that extra lens…

I’ve recently considered investing in some Geotagging equipment. But, besides the cost factor, I’m still not overly convinced about the general benefits for my photography of such capabilities. But first things first…

What is Geotagging?

Geotagging is simply the process of including geographical information to the photographs, such as latitude and longitude coordinates, which is then kept as part of the EXIF information on the files.

How does Geotagging work?

Unfortunately, camera manufacturers are not keeping up with technology on this field. Either because including a GPS device would make the camera more expensive thus putting off some costumers or simply because geotagging is still not a mainstream requirement, the fact is that cameras with in-built GPS receivers are more the exception than the rule, although some high-end cameras are already equipped.

If you are fortunate enough to have opted for such a camera (probably you did it because of the other camera features and not because of the GPS) you don’t have to battle with yourself as I’m doing to figure if it’s really worth the investment. Just use it, you have nothing to loose.

If, on the other hand, your camera is devoid of a GPS receiver, there are several off-camera choices available and all of them are based on a very simple principle: time synchronization.

Basically, all you have to do is synchronize the clock on your camera with the clock on your GPS receiver (a one time process). Now, every time you turn on the receiver, it will record your position at defined intervals (15 seconds, 1 minute, etc.) and store this information on a flash memory card. When you are back at your computer to download your photos from the camera, just plug the receiver and the software compares the exact time at which a photo was taken with the closest time a geographical information was recorded and add the coordinates to the metadata of the photo file. Very simple.

What are the benefits of Geotagging?

From a “photography as art” point-of-view, the benefits of Geotagging are virtually non-existent. It will not improve your photos per se.

Geotagging is more an organizational tool than anything else. It will allow you to see on a map the exact location where a photo was taken. It will also allow you (and others if you share your photos online) to search for photos taken on or nearby a specific location. Although on a short time scale it will probably be very “boring” to see your photos just concentrated on a very small portion of the map, if you tend to photowalk a lot and do some traveling, the range will broaden and it will become much more interesting to have a large scale view of where all your photos were shot. Back to photowalking, it can be fun to be able to track your route on a specific date and it will probably improve the plan for future photowalking tours. Besides the software that comes with whatever receiver you acquire, there is a multitude of software available that allows for interaction with either Yahoo! Maps or Google Maps and Google Earth.

If you are into photography sharing networks, since August 2006 Flickr also supports geotags and, together with Yahoo! Maps, can display the locations of your photos. Same goes for other networks like Zooomr.

As an added benefit, yesterday (Nov 28), Google launched a new layer to the Google Maps - the Google Terrain - which gives a more 3D view of the existent maps and can, together with your geotags, provide a more spacial arrangement to what your surroundings were when a photo was taken.

Limitations of Geotagging

Although I’ve almost managed to convince myself to go for a GPS receiver, there are still some limitations to the technology that I’d like to see addressed.

First, any external GPS receiver is an extra thing that you have to carry around. Ok, it’s not big, it’s not heavy. But it’s an extra thing. With an already cluttered camera bag, any extras will need to be evaluated to see how worth it they are.

It’s not cheap. Ok, it’s also not expensive. For something like $100 to $150 you can get a receiver specially designed for photography geotagging. Nonetheless, for that amount, you can always get an extra battery or an extra memory card or start thinking about your next lens. When the budget is tight, even the smallest amount of money available to invest in photography needs to be well thought.

Battery limitations. A normal AA battery on such a device will give you something between 10 to 20 hours of continuous use. Although this is more than enough for a normal photowalking tour, if you go on vacations on a place where normal batteries might not be readily available, it is another something to have to think about.

Precision. Although most GPS receivers are very precise, they are not perfect. There will be always a percentage of your tags that will be “off the mark”. For the more common (and cheap) GPS receivers specially designed for photography, there are some complains about how precise the device is.

Photographer or Object. This is a big one if you are a perfectionist. The receiver is with you, so the tag will be your location and not the object of your photo’s location. Can’t do much about it except manually editing the tags. I don’t see myself having a problem with this one, but for some applications it can arise as an extra complication.

Bearing. Another of those things that you can’t do anything about, but would be nice to see implemented, specially if you are much into landscape photography. With such high-tech features such as image stabilization that works by countering the movement of the camera and adjusting the sensor, it would be nice and not hard at all if metadata would also include a bearing and tilt angle. Together with focal length (which is already recorded) and coordinates, it would be possible, on a map application, to “see” exactly the photographed area. Too geeky?

Overall

Overall I think that Geotagging has a true potential to improve the photographer’s experience. It has some limitations, but every technology has them. Nonetheless, at this moment, I still am not completely convinced that a GPS receiver simply for the ability to add coordinates to the metadata is the best choice for my money.

Can you help me on this one? Do you think it is worth it? Do you have experience with automatic geotagging? Share your thoughts with us… any help is appreciated.

If you’ve read my last post, you know that Jim at JMG-Galleries had a nice photo project going on where he asked us to photograph something that was related to the little places where we live.

15 entries were submitted and bellow you can find the links to them all (thanks for sending the HTML Jim).

In Your Own Backyard

Old Steel Garden Furniture by Dion van Huyssteen - DV Photo “The photo is of some ancient steel garden furniture in my parents backyard.”

A Suburban Morning by Steven Vore - Steven’s Notebook “I took a camera to work (my office is 2 miles from my home, so I’m still within the “5 mile” rule), and about 11am went for a walk to see what I could see. On one side of the parking lot were all the colors of fall, with some green still peeking through the yellows and greens. On the other side, construction; torn, brown and ugly.”

Untitled by Matt Collinge - Madmat01 at Flickr “Taken from Waddington Fell looking at pendle hill in the Ribble Valley Lancashire England”

The Birds by libeco - LiBeCo “Since we have a birdfeeder in our backyard a lot of birds visit us, which gave me an opportunity to take some pictures.”

That Country Feeling by Tam - First Time Critic *Open To Critique* “I’m open to critique, but I know this image isn’t the best. It is however the best photo I’ve taken in terms of representing the area I live in.”

Tennis I by MT Fanders - mannedspace “My oldest playing the game he enjoys: Youth Tennis.”

 Don’t litter in our backyard by Richard Wong - In The Field: Richard Wong’s Photography Blog

Looking Back by René Modery - Singapore In Pictures “Mother carrying her little daughter home in the evening”

 Another Day at the Beach by Brian Auer - Epic Edits Weblog “Surfers on the beach at Encinitas, where surfing is a way of life and a big part of the culture.”

Trains to Mars… I, II, III, IV and V by Mannii - Trains to Mars… “Three parts - rice fields, one part - apple orchards, and a WHOLE LOT OF culture. Throw in occasional urban spaces, and a few bullet trains for a perfect mix - called Morioka, Japan”

Untitled by Glen - gZphotoGraph “Rocky Nook Park in Santa Barbara’s Mission Canyon”

 Small Town General Store by Karen Wink - Fotokew “I shoot southern style. my blog are photos taken in rural mississippi.”

 Hate Free Campbell by Rafa - Why Yet Another Photo Place

Storm Cell at Sunset by Sandy Redding - dot.double:dot “We seldom get storms here. Only five inches or so of rain per year. There’s a nice outcropping of rocks not far from my house that has a good view of the desert and the Sierra Nevada range in the distance. The lightning was flashing as the storm approached us. I stayed as long as I dared, but eventually had to retreat.”

Contour by Antonio Marques - Words:irrational

All of the entries were great, but I have to pick my favorite.

I was very undecided between Tennis I and Old Steel Garden Furniture. Both are very powerful images and represent what I think Jim sought with his project. Nonetheless, the latter has my vote as the best of the group. There is just something to it that is very pleasing to the eye and the mix of man-made and nature is just fantastic. Well done Dion. I hope you don’t mind the thumbnail.