QGIS - Geotagging Photos

By David Crowther

Question:

Is it possible to show geotagged photos within QGIS?

Answer:

Yes, there is a QGIS plugin called Import Photos which will automatically create a Points layer based on your geotagged photos. Follow the steps below to create your own geotagged layers.

Step 1: Capture a Photograph

You can geotag one or multiple images in the same folder at the same time. These images could be from the same geographic location or from multiple locations. In this example we will take a photograph of the Cadline Head Office in Staines Upon Thames.

Depending on the device being used, and the Location Settings on that device, your photograph may already be geotagged with metadata collected about the location the photo was captured from. If not then you can import your photos into PICASA as this provides a geotagging tool for you.

Step 2: Use Picasa and Google Earth to geotag the image

Having download and installed PICASA.

Open your image/photograph into the main canvas.

Select the image (or multiple images) and then choose Tools > Geotag > Geotag with Google Earth.

Note - Google Earth will need to already be open.

In Google Earth search for and then zoom into the location where the photograph was taken. Now use the Yellow Crosshairs to choose the location of the photo and using the PICASA popup window (bottom right) press Geotag (for each of the photos) and when finished press Done.

In PICASA the image will now have coordinates (GPS Longitude and GPS Latitude) added to its Metadata Properties.

The image in PICASA will also be updated with a red pin in the bottom right corner to denote that the image is now geotagged.

Step 3: Import Photos plugin for QGIS

In QGIS use the Plugins tool to install the Import Photos Plugin.

This adds two new buttons into QGIS.

Choose the Import Photos icon (the one on the left) and in the Import Photos window, choose:

• Input Folder – to be the folder where the images/photos are stored.
• Output Folder – a location and file name to save the GIS points file e.g. Shapefile.

Press OK and the Import Photos tool will process the images in the Input folder and give a summary of the geotagging process.

A new GIS layer will be added into the project and points for each of the Geotagged photos will be created in that layer.

Using the Layer Settings you can change the style of the geotagged points and add labels. Then use the Click Photos tool….

to click on the geotag point and the tagged photograph will open in a new popup window.

If you now Save and Share your QGIS project you can provide your users with an interface that allows them to view geotagged photos for your assets and site locations.