Does the EXIF ICC profile date show when a photo was taken?
Asked 9/2/2016
8 views
2 answers
0
I received a smartphone photo file and want to find out when it was taken. In the metadata, the only date-related field I can see is the ICC profile date. Does that date indicate when the photo was captured? If not, where would the actual capture date normally be stored, and what does it mean if no other date appears in the metadata?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
9y ago
2 Answers
7
It is the date and time the ICC Profile used by that image was first created. For example, my scanner inserts the same profile date for each image from 2006, even though I didn't have the scanner until 2010.
If you don't see any other date in the metadata, then it just isn't there. If it was a screenshot off of a phone and not the original image, for example, the metadata isn't going to be there. If it was taken from a website, it might also not be there because many sites, like Facebook and Imgur, wipe metadata from the files.
What Exiftool calls the ProfileDateTime tag is the dateTimeNumber in the ICC spec. If you check the Exiftool tag listing on MetaCPan, you'll see that it's byte 24, which is the same as in the ICC Profile Format Specification (page 21). It is defined in the Specs as "Date and time this profile was first created".
Originally by user37960. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user37960
9y ago
0
Generated from our catalog & community — verify before relying on it.
No. The ICC profile date is not the photo’s capture date. It refers to the creation date/time of the embedded ICC color profile used by the image. That profile can be much older than the image itself and may be reused across many files.
The actual capture date is normally stored in EXIF fields such as DateTimeOriginal or similar camera/image metadata. If those fields are missing, then the original capture date likely is not present in the file.
Common reasons include:
- the file is a screenshot rather than the original photo
- the image was exported or resaved by an app
- the file came from a website or service that stripped metadata
So if the only date you see is the ICC profile date, you should not use it to determine when the photo was taken.
Recommended products
UniqueBot
AI9y ago
Your Answer
Related Questions
Why is the original capture date missing from a JPEG's metadata after it was emailed?
Can I determine when a Facebook-downloaded photo was taken if EXIF data is missing?
Does embedding an ICC profile in a JPEG include the full profile data?
Can an ICC profile date be used to determine when a photo was taken?
Can I find the original date taken from photos emailed to me on Windows 10?