EXIFcare™ Technology

Taking care of your metadata

Metadata in digital photos has always been something fragile. Ever since the beginning of digital photography camera manufacturers tried to add useful photo information to the image files. However, this data was not recognized by common photo editing programs. In order to view the data included in the files special software had to be used. In most cases only the manufacturer’s own software could read it, and sometimes did not even exist any.
But even worse, because common software tools did not recognize the metadata, they were not able to save it either. As soon as a picture was saved after editing, all the metadata had been gone.

The situation improved after the introduction and broad adoption of the EXIF standard. All professional photo editing programs nowadays read and save EXIF metadata. The EXIF standard has its weak spot, though. Because it was impossible to include each and every tag that manufacturers wanted, the specification left room for so-called Makernote data. Each manufacturer can include their own data block which does not comply to any standard.
With Makernote data, the same problems as before are returning. Editing with imaging applications, even software with official metadata support, will likely destroy the Makernote. Even just editing standard EXIF tags, for example using the file properties dialogue in the Windows Explorer, will leave the file without this manufacturer specific data.

In order to protect your metadata from being altered or erased, Picmeta introduces the EXIFcare™ technology. This technology enables our products to not only read Makernote data from almost any digital camera, but also save it correctly after each operation. This means it is possible to edit EXIF tags, adjust the date/time of picture taken, execute lossless rotations and update embedded thumbnails, while retaining all the other metadata.
If you are in need of using software that is not as metadata-friendly as ours, EXIFcare™ allows you to backup complete metadata headers. This way, you can restore the data after editing your photos in other programs. This also prevents from standard EXIF tags being added or changed as it happens with many applications.

With EXIFcare™ you can trust in the best possible protection of metadata in your photos. The technology is included in our products Picture Information Extractor and PIE Studio and will also be the basis for our future development.

File Browser Enhancements

Release roundup for better navigation

The latest release roundup include an address bar with autocomplete feature as well as back, next and history functions for the file browser, along with a neater interface and other improvements and fixes.

Current versions are PIE 4.2 (history), PrintStation 2.7 (history) and PIE Studio 3.2 (history).

If you are evaluating PIE, this update will reset your trial period.

Photoshop PSD file support

Browsing, viewing and printing of .psd files

The latest versions PIE 4.1, PIE Studio 3.1 and PrintStation 2.6 include support for the Adobe Photoshop PSD format. Now, also those who do post processing with Photoshop fully benefit from our tools. PrintStation directly outputs images and portfolios of ongoing Photoshop projects whereas PIE can be a lean alternative to Adobe Bridge.

In addition, we have refined the handling of layout presets in the print applications. Presets are no longer overwritten automatically and it is easier to maintain basic presets for multiple repeating tasks.

Integrated PDF Creation

Versatile output options in PrintStation 2.4 and PIE Studio 2.8

The latest versions PrintStation v2.4 and PIE Studio v2.8 allow you to create photo albums, catalogues and documentations as PDF files for easy viewing, archiving and sharing. No need to have a PDF printer driver installed – PDF files are created directly from within the application with optimum output control for the selected page size and resolution.

In addition it is now possible to save complete layout pages as images such as .jpg or .tif-files.

We also added an option to display soft shadows below the pictures which dramatically enhances the look of your photo sheets.

See the complete list of improvements at the download page.

PIE 3.94, PrintStation 2.26, PIE Studio 2.66

Improvements and fixes

PIE, PIE Studio

  • New option for auto rename using file creation date
  • Transfer now preserves file creation date
  • New options to disable confirmation query and report for auto rename
  • Optimized Tab position in Advanced Information
  • Panasonic mts/m2ts files support for transfer and renaming
  • New option to enable/disable image preview during transfer
  • Transfer file progress bar more exact under Vista
  • Fixed crash when reading Pentax Makernote
  • Fixed bug that could cause crash if transfer was aborted
  • Fixed bug when transferring .wav files assigned to pictures files

PrintStation, PIE Studio

  • New print macro for file creation date
  • If psl-files are located in the same folder as the pictures, pictures will always be found even after moving or renaming the folder
  • Displays path names of broken links to pictures
  • Fixed update of marked pictures in the file browser after opening psl-file

All programs

  • Included Ascending/Descending option in menu View/Arrange By
  • Fixed bug that would cause sort column not restored correctly

Idioma Español

All products now include support for spanish language

We have included spanish language support in all our products. It is available in PIE 3.91, PIE Studio 2.61 and PrintStation 2.22.

Hemos incluido el idioma español en todos los productos que ofrecemos. Ademas es posible comunicar con nosotros en español.

Date/Time Hotfix

Fixed EXIF date/time in PIE 3.9 and PIE Studio 2.6

PIE 3.9 and PIE Studio 2.6 would read the wrong date/time tag after editing with applications that write the modified timestamp into the EXIF header, e.g. Photoshop. That is why it would show the modified date instead of date taken. This has been fixed.