We all know where we took those pictures, don’t we? GPS is only needed by those travelling photographers that globe trot or are documenting something, right? Wrong! We all should be using our GPS settings as I found out recently.
My previous post talked about how too many unnecessary
photos were slowing down my computer. Actually, we all do. My Lightroom cataloge
had more than 100,000 photos that had accumulated over the past 15+ years and dumped
into an external hard drive. They were added
to the catalog without thinking through my file management strategy and
purging bad shots and duplicates as it grew.
Time to clean out some files and make room!
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| Whaleback Lighthouse, Kittery Point, Maine |
Okay, Bill. What’s that have to do with GPS settings on your
camera? My memories, like old prints, faded with time. I came across a file
folder with these seaside photos and could not remember where they were
taken. It led me on a quest to figure
out where it was. I knew it was somewhere along the New England coast. But
where? Hmmm. It had to be near where I travelled for business. The lighthouse
was a big clue so I searched for photos of lighthouses in each of the candidate
states to no avail. None of them had that building attached. More frustration.
Finally, I blew up one of the photos and saw a town name of
Kittery Point, Maine on one of the boats. Eureka! Or so I thought. But the
lighthouse in the photo didn’t match the lighthouse photos I found on the
internet. After looking at Google Maps, I discovered the reason. The building
wasn’t next to the lighthouse. It was on an island between where I shot from
and the lighthouse!
My point? I could have saved myself a lot of effort and frustration if the metadata for the files included the GPS coordinates! And you could too. Lesson learned.
