Lightroom: Swaps "Date Time" and "Date Time Original" in Location

"Date Time" is the time stamp it was added to the catalogue. "Date Time (original)" is the timestamp when the original raw or JPEG image was created.

The original date should be what the UI sorts on, yes.

In most cases the timestamp on the actual image file is not very useful. But I would expect it to be similar or identical to the time it was added to the catalogue, assuming the way you added it was to create a new file from a card or camera (and/or convert to DNG.)

What is the source of your photograph? I bet it's not a digital capture.

Regarding the terminology "Date Time Original": That name comes from the EXIF industry standard, where the metadata field DateTimeOriginal is defined to be the "date and time the original image data was generated", as distinguished from other date/time fields such as DateTimeDigitized, "the date and time the image was stored as digital data". DateTimeOriginal and DateTimeDigitized could differ when, for example, you scan a film negative ten years after the negative image was taken.

The term Date Time Original is widely used throughout the industry, coming as it does from the EXIF standard. I can see why you might have been led to believe that Date Time Original might mean the original capture date/time before you applied the Edit Capture Time command; but that's not what it refers to, as you've discovered.

Regarding the field "Date Time" shown in the LR metadata panel: This corresponds to the EXIF:DateTime / XMP:ModifyDate fields in the file's metadata. The Metadata Working Group's standard (which LR is following) says that EXIF:DateTime and XMP:ModifyDate be set to the current local time whenever the file is written. LR doesn't do this -- if the field is not present, the Edit Capture Time will set it to the same value as Date Time Original, but if it is present, then LR never changes it, contrary to the MWG standard.

He already said it was a digital capture with a BORROWED (DIGITAL) POINT AND SHOOT. I realize it's an old post but I am experiencing the same issues now some two years later with Lightroom 5.

So is Date Time Original the capture time from the camera?
Does the Date Time Digitized change if you edit the image, say in photoshop with LR edits intact as a TIF or PSD and then return the edited TIF or PSD to the catalog? And, does the DATE TIME ORIGINAL stay the same or do they both change and what should LR's behavior be?

What is the LR EXIF DATE TIME field used for? And LR IPTC Date Created field.

This is all very confusing and Adobe should clarify and document the fields and how and when LR changes the information.

I agree that it's all very confusing, and Adobe hasn't made much effort to explain it to LR users. The root of the confusion is multiple legacy industry standards that are imperfectly followed by camera manufacturers, other software vendors, and other teams within Adobe. Within those constraints, I think LR 5.6 has finally gotten to where it does an OK (but far from great) job of handling time for images, though it punts completely with video metadata.

The industry standards define three date/times for images: The original date/time, the digitized date/time, and the modification date/time.

The original date/time is when the image was taken by a camera. It is stored in these industry-standard photo metadata fields: EXIF:DateTimeOriginal, XMP:DateCreated, and IPTC:DateCreated/TimeCreated. LR accurately displays these fields in its Metadata EXIF and IPTC metadata tagsets.

The digitized date/time is when the image was first recorded in digital memory. For digital cameras it is the same as original date/time, but for scanned images, it could be much different (e.g. a photo taken in 1904 that is scanned in 2014). Digitized date/time is stored in the photo metadata fields EXIF:DateTimeDigitized, XMP:CreateDate (sic), and IPTC:DigitalCreationDate/Time. LR also displays these fields in its Metadata EXIF and IPTC metadata tagsets. LR (except for one version 3.4) does not modify digitized date/time fields.

The modification date/time is when the digital image was most recently modified by software or firmware. It is stored in EXIF:DateTime and XMP:ModifyDate. LR displays these fields in its Metadata EXIF metadata tagset as "Date Time". Not all cameras set the modification time, and neither does all software. LR will set it correctly on exported photos but it doesn't update it when it saves metadata back to photos in the catalog. Note that the modification date/time metadata field is completely different from the operating system's file-modification time.

LR maintains its own notion of capture time in the catalog, displayed as Capture Time/Date in the Metatadata Default tagset. The catalog capture time is initially set from original date/time metadata fields, but if they are not present, LR will look in other fields including digitized date/time and modification date/time (I don't remember the exact rules off hand), and if there are no metadata fields that it's able to read, it will use the operating system's file-modification time. Past LR versions were quite buggy in how they handled missing original date/time metadata, but I think LR 5.6 has fixed all the known bugs except one.

LR lets you change catalog capture time using the Metadata > Edit Capture Time command, and it will save it back to the correct metadata fields in the cataloged photo and in exported versions. Note that you can edit IPTC Date Created in the LR Metadata IPTC tagset, but that effect catalog capture time.

I haven't examined the editing loop between LR and Photoshop, but I think in general Photoshop does a decent job of following the standards. I haven't seen any reports here in the forums over the years about problems there.

See this message for how LR handles time zones, yet more complexity created by the industry standards: https://forums.adobe.com/message/6689....

If you suspect problems in how LR is handling your date/time metadata, the most efficient way to troubleshoot this is to upload a sample pic to Dropbox and post the link here.

The first .jpg you posted:

 https://www.dropbox.com/s/woxkyofsamhal4c/WP_20160526_09_45_11_Raw.jpg?dl=0 

doesn't match the file that Steve analyzed with Exiftool.  Steve's file was 304 kB, little-endian byte order, EXIF version 0230, a Software field "Lightroom 5.7.1 (Windows)", an XMP section containing LR develop settings.  But the file I get is 1321 kB, big-endian byte order, EXIF version 0220, no Software field, and XMP section but no LR develop settings.     Did you replace that file in the Dropbox folder?

When I import into LR 5.7.1 / Windows the three files you uploaded (two .jpg and one .dng), I get correct date/times (all 5/26/2016), with none having year 2023.

Can you please re-upload the .jpg that has the year 2023?  Clearly some application wrote that value into the file.  But the file I examined has indications it was modified by an application other than LR.  It's not at all clear yet that LR is the culprit.

What is the exact workflow you use to get photos off the phone into LR?

 

Here's what we know:

- Exiftool doesn't show any issues with sample DNGs and JPEGs taken directly from the phone.

- When we import those sample DNGs and JPEGs into LR 5.7.1 and CC 2015.6, LR shows the correct metadata dates.

- The file with the 2023 date might have been touched by other software before importing into LR: Capture One Pro, Breeze Systems Downloader Pro and Breeze Browser Pro.

This suggests the issue is triggered when you use some of the other software.  That doesn't necessarily mean the other software is at fault -- it could be the other software modifies the photo in a standards-conforming way but that triggers a bug in LR.   Or it could be the other software isn't conforming to the standards.  Without having "before" and "after" copies of the exact files going in and out of each program, I can't say.

Steve suggested a process of elimination to see which program in your workflow might be causing the problem.  E.g. we know that importing the file directly into LR works ok.  Next, try downloading the files with Downloader Pro -- does that introduce the problem?  Next, try adding keywords with Breeze.  Etc.

I think i have a related issue.
I'm not sure how it happened but I have a number of JPEG files that seems to have lost their "Date Time Original" data, in Light room (version 6) I still see the "Date Time" value (which in my case should be the same as the "date time original" value that has been lost.  
 
Is there a way to filter all the images in Lightroom that have an empty "Date Time original" value?

How can I easily copy the "Date Time" value into the "Date Time Original" field? (I have tried the edit capture time function of LR, and it works, but i have to enter the new date manually on each photo...)

This is not so much an issue in LR as it seems to use the Date Time value but when exporting the files in Windows the "date taken" field is empty which causes all sort of problem with other SW.

"Is there a way to filter all the images in Lightroom that have an empty "Date Time original" value?"

In the Library filter bar's Metadata browser, add the Date column.  Then pics with missing Date Time Original will show up as Unknown.

"How can I easily copy the "Date Time" value into the "Date Time Original" field?"

It's not possible with LR. You could select all the affected pics, do Metadata > Save Metadata To File,  use the free Exiftool to copy the fields, then do Metadata > Read Metadata From File.  If you're not experienced with command-line scripting, Exiftool has a steep learning curve, and it could take you at least a couple hours to figure it out.  There is a simplified version called ExiftoolGUI, but I don't know if it's powerful enough to do this.  Make a backup of your LR catalog before attempting this (Exiftool makes individual backup copies of each photo it modifies.)

You might upload one of the problem pics to Dropbox (or similar) and post the sharing link here -- we can take a look at the file to see if there's anything going on that might be confusing LR.

Thanks I might try that option this week end. I have not done scripting for a while so I will have to take the time. I will also share one of the images this WE.

Thank you to  John R. Ellis, Champion - I have been able to begin to fix the incorrect dates allocated by Lightroom.  But I am still of the opinion that Lightroom is not importing the information correctly when it is in the EXIF.

I found this thread because I am really frustrated with Lightroom, and could not find out how to fix the mess it seemed to have made of my jpgs.  These were taken with my own digital cameras.

I installed Lightroom as part of the CC Photography suite on 14 October 2016.   It has set a huge number of them to a "Capture Date/Time" of then.  Initially I thought it was setting them to that date of import, but it seems that is because it used the last time the file was changed, and most files had their "ModifyDate" amended on that date.

Looking at exactly the same photos in Windows explorer and other programs shows their correct time under "Date/Time Digitised". 

Until today, all I could tell was that Lightroom was doing it "wrong".  It has internally allocated its "Capture Date/Time" field but doesn't show it except in sorting.

Following the suggestion of using attributes to filter, I find that most of my files show under "unknown" in the Date column.  So why does Lightroom show a date in the "Capture Date/Time" that it uses for sorting? How can it say unknown yet have a "Date/Time Capture"?  Why is it "Unknown" when there are valid entries in the EXIF? This inconsistency has caused me to waste so much time.

I have now looked at the EXIF using ExiftoolGUI.  There is a field called "DateTimeOriginal" which is I am guessing what you mean in your comment above by  "original date/time" field. That has the correct information, as does the field "CreateDate".  So it should work.  Lightroom has just ignored those, and used the date of last modification to set the "Capture Date/Time" which it insists on using as the default field for sorting!  If Lightroom would allow sorting by the other fields, it would not be as important.


Thanks to this thread, I have now found the way of using ExifTool and ExifToolGUI to fix the date and time so that the incorrect data is corrected and files are sorted correctly by Lightroom.

There is now a field called "Date Time Original" in the EXIF section of Metadata in Lightroom, that was not there before:


So what happened? 

It appears that prior to Lightroom importing the files, some XMP data has been lost, or not created. Because there is SOME XMP data, Lightroom then ignores valid EXIF data.

I fixed the first mentioned files before doing screenshots, so for comparison, here is the Metadata as shown in Lightroom for two other files.  The first has been given an erroneous Capture Date/Time; the second is correct.



In ExifToolGUI, the missing fields are XMP:CreateDate and XMP:ModifyDate.  All of the EXIF fields are there and correct.  Yet Lightroom only allocates the correct date for sorting to the file below which for some reason has those XMP fields.



The two files are on dropbox in case looking at them will help confirm whether I have worked out the issue, or if there is something else that Lightroom is doing / not doing.  Do I need to report a continuing bug?

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/31011761/Lightroom/20030615%20Canon%20PowerShot%20A40%20105_0585.JPG

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/31011761/Lightroom/20030615%20Canon%20PowerShot%20A40%20105_0592...

I don't use CC I have stand-alone LR. WOW, what a lot of work! I have given up trying to understand when and why LR chooses to change dates. Adobe completely ignores the issue and most of the LR pondents act like it's user error. Now I just add the actual capture date to the file name when I import the file. I am also in process of changing over to Capture One. It has a better raw processing engine but lacks some of the organizational capabilities of LR but doesn't screw up capture dates. Capture One also allows for importing into sessions as well as catalogs. Sessions I've found to be very helpful for studio and location portrait work.