Windows 7: Best Windows 7 photo manager that keeps EXIF data

Hello everyone,

I have recently acquired an iPhone, so I am now taking more pictures (and video eventually). I need a program that can import these into Windows 7 from iPhone, just like it would from any other camera that is "mounted" like a disk. But I want a program with some "advanced" features.

I tried Windows Live Photo, and it did not distinguish between the videos and the photos and it put them all in one folder. (It also did not let me preview the videos.) Windows Live Photo did not allow me to preview some photos, which were visible in the program after import. As far as I could tell, there was also no geo tagging.

So, I want a program, or codec, that would work with Windows 7, as my photo manager. I need it to import pictures just like it would from a camera and, as the Widows Live software did (sort of) present them to me before importing for previewing and naming, grouped by date, or what have you, then allow me to select which ones I wanted to import. I want the program to preserve EXIF data, geo tag, and give me the option of deleting from camera after import.

I considered Picasa, but read that it does not preserve EXIF data or geo tags. I tried the other Windows 7 Photo Viewer and that was no better.

I would even be willing (almost prefer) to upload all of my photos to a service that would handle all of this for me, while also having the advantage of "cloud" storage.

If anyone has any ideas or suggestions, either on how I can get Windows Live Photo to work better, or if Picasa is not as bad as I have read, or if there is an even better Windows 7 app, OR, even an online service. (Preferraby one that is cheap or low cost.)

Thanks for your consideration of my question. I appreciate your input.

Best regards,

"just like it would from any other camera" is going to be hard or impossible because it's not a camera like any other camera. I have a strong feeling you're going to need a dedicated piece of iPhone software from a third party that has created it for such a task of being connected like a camera and providing those functions. In my experience, you only get the preview, tagging, and folder allocation options from the dedicated camera software you load onto the computer. Without that, Windows just sees it as an external device and will mount it as such. So you'll just have to scroll through the folders and manually copy them to the computer and then deal with the metadata via whatever third party photo viewer/editor application you like (like FastStone Image viewer).

Thanks for the reply, but no, the Windows 7 PC reads the iPhone 4 as a camera device, and will import pictures into Windows Live Photogallery, which *did* give me the options to choose the images I wanted to import, and sorted them for me by date, then imported them into approriately dated folders, with the Tag that I had assigned to each folder.

So, it DOES work with Windows 7 software, including Windows Photo, but that did not have near as many options, but still would tag as a group and import and then delete from "camera".

I understand that Picasa does this to a certain extent, but from what I read, it was not as good as Windows Live Photo. I just wante to know if anyone in the Windows 7 universe knew of a photo management program that would do these functions, but do them better than Windows 7 included software, or Picasa. (Perhaps there is an Adobe consumer product?)

I think the days you are speaking of, where you needed a specific manufacturer's software to import photos are gone. I think that Windows now recognizes most USB camera devices and, to a certain extent, knows what to do with them.

Have you thought about Zoner Photo Studio 12 ?

You can download the free version which is loaded with more capabilities than you can think of but you can always upgrade to the PRO Edition if needed. Picassa is a great program but I like this one much better.

Anyway, hope you like it.

- Tagen

Many cameras still require proprietary software to preview and/or import the pictures in a sorted and named fashion, to include my new(er) dSLR and several other point and shoots I've connected to Windows 7. So, I figured this much might be true with the iPhone. Do you have iTunes on the computer? If so, that's probably how Windows 7 can recognize the iPhone as a camera when connected due to the drivers bundled with iTunes (third party software that I referred to earlier).

At any rate, since the camera is recognized, you could just navigate directly to the iPhone pictures folder through windows explorer. You can see the thumbnails/previews that way, copy the files in their entirety to wherever you wanted, and then delete them. Of course, this doesn't provide you some of the automation of tagging, sorting, and naming based on date, but it does satisfy the preview and exif preservation requirements you have.

Unfortunately, I can't think of a solution to kill both of those birds with one stone, which is what you're looking for, obviously. But, I wanted to at least mention the option for direct previewing and copying of the files through explorer if that wasn't already thought of.

I'm really surprised that importing the pictures via Live Photo Gallery doesn't preserve the exif data. How are you attempting to view the exif data once imported to your computer?

Quite agree - I was resigned to buying PhotoShop Elements 8 for 70$ after trying, and being disapointed with dozens of free photo aps. I tried Zoner Photo Studio and it is exactly what I want. 20Mb download (PSE8 - 1Gb), 100Mb install (PSE8 - 700+Mb), it's fast, sleek with a great mix of organisation (tagging / geotag), viewer and editor. I've also posted several questions on their forums and had fast polite responses. Excellent software.

allend66,

Thanks for the additional input. I recently learned of Adobe Bridge and the person who spoke about it did so with high regards. Have you any experience with Adobe Bridge, and if so, how would you compare it to Zoner? Do you have any specific examples of why one is better than the other?

Still loving iPhone,

ACDSEE Pro....

ACD Systems International Online Store - ACDSee Pro 3 Photo Manager

No experience at all, sorry. unlikely to try it either as am completely happt with Zoner!

Try to use Photodali Photo Manager for Windows, www.photodali.com