[delenca]

Hi,

I've used Downloader Pro for 6-12 months now. Great program.

But just recently I discovered something annoying about my 300D Raw files - it turns out that a certain % of .CRW files have a 1 second time difference in their EXIF DateTimeOriginal field in relation to the corresponding .THM file. Then, I discovered that different Raw processing programs don't all use the same file for the timestamp. i.e. ACR, DPP use the .CRW file whereas RSP and ZB use the timestamp on the .THM file. As a consequence, I end up with .jpgs that have mistmatched "OriginalDateTime" - which, in turn, can lead to all kinds of weird problems down the line.

Now I am looking for a solution to this annoying problem. One of the simplest and most reliable solutions I can think of is synchronizing this information right at the beginning of the workflow - i.e. when we download the information from the CF card with Downloader Pro.

So, to get to the actual point (finally), consider this is a feature request: would it be possible to add the following option to Downloader Pro: "Copy EXIF Creation Date/Time from .CRW file to .THM file (or vice-versa)"?

Since I've started researching the problem, I have found others discussing the issue (i.e. http://forum.pixmantec.com/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/22376/an/0/page/0#22376), and it seems to affect most Canon cameras that utilize the .CRW and .THM system (300D and older) (whenever the writing speed is ~
Thanks,
Alex

[Chris Breeze]

I've never noticed this before but it appears to be a bug in the 300D. I don't know whether other Canon cameras have the same problem.
It is too specialized a feature to add to Downloader Pro, but it could be added as a plug-in.

[delenca]

Hi Chris,

Thanks for the answer. According to Michael Tapes, this has been a problem since the D30 (http://forum.pixmantec.com/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/22376/an/0/page/0#22376)

As to the plug-in idea, I am a little confused. I thought that the plug-in SDK does NOT provide routines that read/write EXIF directly. i.e. http://www.breezesys.com/forum/showthread.php?t=572&highlight=plug-in

Thus, I would not be able to copy the EXIF "DateTimeOriginal" field from the .THM to the .CRW file directly (or vice-versa). Or am I missing a newer version of the SDK that allows this?

Thanks,
-Alex

[Chris Breeze]

The plug-in SDK doesn't povide any routines for writing EXIF data and so you'd have to write your own routines to read date/time from the CIFF data in the CRW file and then update the EXIF date/time fields in the THM file.