Transwiki:Labeling family photos

Labeling family photos is a process of identification of persons and objects captured on family pictures. Identification lets a family historian get to know ancestors’ faces and record information about family members for future generations.

Identification of paper photos can be relatively easy since identification notes can be written on the back side and therefore are an integrated part of picture content. On the other hand, writing names and additional information on the back side does not necessarily ensure identification clarity, and especially on group photos.

Now, in the information age, digital photography brings new challenges:
 * Digital photos do not have a back side. It is unlikely that someone would want to spoil paper family photos by writing identification notes directly on an image. Similarly, placing labels that cannot be hidden, if necessary, on digital pictures can be hardly a solution for a family historian.
 * Digital photos are shared through different means, including blogs and email, so identification labels should be distributed together with the pictures.
 * Growing number of digital photos requires search capabilities so a specific person can be found quickly.

There are a plenty of photo annotation software programs that enable users to place identification labels on digital photographs in a variety of ways. They can be divided into the following categories:


 * Tools that let a user locate and put on a photo identification labels that are “imprinted” into the image and therefore become an integrated part of the picture. The photos can be shared through various means, such as email or blogs, together the identification labels. On the other hand, since the labels are treated as a part of the image, they cannot be used for search purposes. In addition, there is no way to disjoint from the photo meaning the identification labels cannot be hidden so an original family picture view can be spoiled.


 * Tools that allow a user to place identification labels stored in an application’s internal database. Users can use search capabilities. However, when a picture is shared or published in the Web, identification labels are lost because they remain in the internal database and cannot be distributed with the photo.


 * Online tools that enable a user to upload an image and put identification labels online. They provide features for sharing through blogs and communities. However, if such picture is downloaded to a local computer, identification labels are lost and cannot be seen.


 * Desktop tools that store identification labels in the special metadata section of the same file. This ability enables distribution of the labels together with the file regardless of how exactly it is shared – email, blogs, or publishing on a Website – and search across them. On the other hand, the identification labels can be hidden in order to view an original pure photo. The main disadvantage is support for JPEG files only so identification labels cannot be placed on GIF, BMP, and PNG files.