GeoSetter

These days, you can document your travels by sorting your digital photos by location. Many cell phones and a few specialty cameras can geotag your location, embedding the data in your pics. If you don’t have such a camera, you can use a GPS imaging accessory, like Sony’s $150 GPS-CS3KA, to add location into after the fact. if you don’t have a GPS device, you can manually enter location details at your PC with the free GeoSetter (www.geosetter.de/en/index.html). After you do, the application shows your images as pins in a Google Maps pane built into the program. The process updates the EXIF (exchangeable image file format) details so that locations will appear in other apps. Geotag data is stored in your pictures for you to browse in GeoSetter or other in your pictures for you to browse in GeoSetter or other tools, including Flickr, SmugMug and Picasa.

Removing EXIF data: If you upload your images to the Web, the geotag data usually stays intact. To protect your privacy, you can stip the data out. GeoSetter and many photo editors can modify or erase EXIF details, but a specialized utility can do so more quickly. I like Exif Farm because it’s accessible via the right-click menu; the demo is free, but batch processing is available only in the $20 paid app. Note that clearing the EXIF profile erases all potentially identifying data, including your camera model, the date, and the time.