Capture One: How to Attach GPS Coordinates to an Image?

Published in Capture One · Photography
April 29, 2022
approximately 2 minutes of reading

Capture One is capable of reading Exif data, one of which is GPS location embedded into a photograph. Unfortunately it does not give ability to modify this data and in case you were taking your pictures with a camera not being connected to an external device that could obtain GPS coordinates (like your phone), you end up with no location at all. Let me show you how to attach GPS coordinates to RAW images using command line tool called ExifTool.

Here is an example of a photograph that was taken with no GPS location.

As you can see, a lot of EXIF data related to exposure was obtained during the import process but GPS part is empty.
ExifTool Installation

First let's start by installing a CLI tool that will allow us to embed Exif GPS data into images. on macOS the ExifTool can be easily installed via Homebrew by typing:

brew install exiftool

Check if the tools is correctly pulled and avaiable:

$ which exiftool
/usr/local/bin/exiftool
Know Your Coordinates

This is the most funny part as I always use Google Maps to search exactly where I have been while taking shots with no GPS. In this case, once you have found the location, simply right click to get the coordinates and copy them to clipboard.

Locate the Image

Now, find the absolute path to the image you are about to attach new coordinates. For example:

/Users/slick/Pictures/CO/2022/2022-04-29_London/A7300001.ARW
The Command

Coordinates you have copied from Google Maps look like:

51.50775960785679, -0.12792905598806262

First value represents latitude, second value represents longitude.

Syntax for the command looks like:

exiftool -XMP:GPSLatitude=<lat> -XMP:GPSLongitude=<long> -P -overwrite_original <path>

Replace:

  • <lat> with 51.50775960785679
  • <long> with -0.12792905598806262
  • <path> with /Users/slick/Pictures/CO/2022/2022-04-29_London/A7300001.ARW

Final shape of the command:

exiftool -XMP:GPSLatitude=51.50775960785679 -XMP:GPSLongitude=-0.12792905598806262 -P -overwrite_original /Users/slick/Pictures/CO/2022/2022-04-29_London/A7300001.ARW

The -P argument preserves the original modification date / time. Lastly -overwrite_original modifies original file without creating a copy. Execution of this command should give you output like:

1 image files updated

To see the changes in Capture One, open affected image and from the menu bar go to Image and click on Sync Metadata.

EXIF - GPS section contains the coordinates we have embedded using ExifTool.

This is it. 📷

Words: 404
Published in: Capture One · Photography
Last Revision: May 11, 2023

Related Articles   📚