Metadata panel Metadata panel

The Metadata panel is a multi-functional panel for inspecting and editing information about the contents of photos.

In the Photo Persona it hosts Histogram, Scope charts (for examining image luminance/chrominance) and metadata for camera images. Most metadata is editable here.

In the Develop Persona, it displays GPS location about a photo's shooting location, which can be edited.

About histograms

The histogram gives a valuable 'heads up' of the Red, Green, and Blue values present in your image, layer, or current selection, which is useful for deciding if colour or tonal correction is needed.

The light blue values indicate the overlap of the RGB channels (not the luminosity). Purple represents where the red and blue channel representations overlap.

Metadata panel

Panel Preferences To display specific channels:
Panel Preferences To show the histogram for a selected layer or selection:
  1. Select a layer or make a selection.
  2. From Panel Preferences, select Current layer only or Marquee selection only, respectively.

About Scope charts

The Metadata panel also provides a variety of charts which allow you to examine the distribution of luminance and chrominance in an image, allowing you to judge whether tonal or colour correction is needed. It can be used as an alternative to, or in combination with, the histogram in the same panel.

Scope chart and photo
The Scope chart displaying the Intensity Waveform for the adjacent photo.
Panel Preferences To choose a Scope chart: Resource Manager panel

About Metadata

You can use the Metadata panel to add new metadata to an image or edit existing metadata, and import metadata from/export metadata to an external file.

The contents of the panel's fields are saved as part of Affinity Photo 2 documents and optionally included when exporting to other image file formats.

Additionally, you can use the panel to inspect EXIF metadata that describes the hardware and shooting settings used to take a photo. Some EXIF metadata is editable in Affinity Photo 2, i.e. Camera, Make, Model, Date shot. All EXIF data can be removed in one operation.

Metadata panel showing general image description and author details Metadata panel showing EXIF fields describing camera hardware and settings when an image was shot

The Metadata panel showing the File and EXIF categories, left and right respectively.

Metadata categories

The panel's fields are organised into several categories. Use the pop-up menu to switch between them. The following categories are available:

Metadata panel showing IPTC fields describing image contents, source and credit Metadata panel showing rights information about an image

The Metadata panel showing the IPTC (Image) and Rights categories, left and right respectively.

For additional guidance about each field's expected contents, refer to the IPTC Photo Metadata User Guide's Field Reference Table. Many fields in the Metadata panel accept freeform text; the guide contains examples of common practice.

Choosing what metadata to record

Setting metadata is optional. The following properties are recommended as the minimum to be populated:

1 Image-based searches conducted using Google can display this metadata. Further details are available online at this IPTC article.

Ask your organisation or client whether it has its own guidance on which metadata it requires to be recorded and how the data should be expressed.

Metadata in exported images

To include metadata from all the panel's editable fields when exporting a PNG, JPEG, TIFF, PSD or EPS file using the Export command on the Document menu, turn on Embed metadata.

Most EXIF data will also be included; in particular, some lens information may be omitted.

Exported PDFs include the contents of the Title, Author and Keywords fields, which you can set in the panel's File category.

To remove camera and GPS location metadata from an Affinity Photo 2 document:
To export metadata to a sidecar XMP file:
  1. (Optional) Strip GPS location and/or EXIF metadata from your document.
  2. From the Panel Preferences menu, select Export to XMP and then do one of the following:
    • Choose All to include all metadata in the resulting file.
    • Choose EXIF to include only metadata in the eponymous category in the resulting file.
    • Choose File, IPTC and Rights to export all metadata shown in those panel categories.
  3. Set the filename and choose where to save the XMP file.
  4. Tap Save.
To import metadata manually from a sidecar XMP file:
  1. From the Panel Preferences menu, select Import from XMP>File, IPTC and Rights.
  2. Browse to and select the sidecar XMP file.
  3. Tap Open.

About Locations

For raw files only (in Develop Persona), the Location section of the panel allows you to review and set the GPS metadata of your raw image if needed.

Raw images from cameras with built-in GPS capability will show the recorded image location automatically. For all other cameras, the image location can be set manually from the panel instead.

Location

Options

The following options are available:

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