How do I make the date stamp visible in pictures taken with an iPhone?
May 21, 2014 8:10 PM Subscribe
One year ago, I moved into my current apartment, and found that the dryer vents were clogged with lint, mold spots in the bathroom etc. I took a series of pictures on my move-in day with the camera on my iPhone 4S. Now that I'm leaving, I want to print them for my move-out inspection. However, there is currently no date stamp visible on the photos. How can I make it appear?
If necessary, all of the pictures are still saved on my iPhone. Thanks to all in advance.
If necessary, all of the pictures are still saved on my iPhone. Thanks to all in advance.
iPhoto has a view that shows the photo with metadata alongside -- would a screenshot of that view be sufficient?
posted by irrelephant at 8:16 PM on May 21, 2014
posted by irrelephant at 8:16 PM on May 21, 2014
Best answer: "How can I make it appear?" kind of implies that you think there is a hidden date/time layer in the photograph that's just invisible in normal viewing. That's not the case: the built-in camera app has no facility to alter the pixels of a photograph to put a timestamp in the visual frame.
The information is contained in the photo's EXIF information, though. It's visible in iPhoto on your Mac, and you can find several iOS apps in the store that will extract it and add it to existing photos (search the App Store for "time stamp" and you'll find a bunch, both free and paid). Make sure you have backups of the original photos before altering any of them, just to be on the safe side.
posted by mdeatherage at 8:24 PM on May 21, 2014
The information is contained in the photo's EXIF information, though. It's visible in iPhoto on your Mac, and you can find several iOS apps in the store that will extract it and add it to existing photos (search the App Store for "time stamp" and you'll find a bunch, both free and paid). Make sure you have backups of the original photos before altering any of them, just to be on the safe side.
posted by mdeatherage at 8:24 PM on May 21, 2014
When moving into a new place, I always send the photos to the landlord on move in day by email. Email record is dated, and will hold up in court if there's a dispute on move out.
Sorry this is not helping you immediately invisible ink, but thought I'd put this out there.
posted by belugacat at 9:40 PM on May 21, 2014
Sorry this is not helping you immediately invisible ink, but thought I'd put this out there.
posted by belugacat at 9:40 PM on May 21, 2014
Ideally the photos should have been added to the move-in inspection along with a note about the vents, mold, etc, so there is a record from when you moved in. Photos you have now that were not included in the original inspection aren't as useful as that (because there's no way to prove when they were taken) but may still work to convince them the problem was there already, if you're lucky.
Any date stored in the EXIF can be faked anyway (I think you can edit the EXIF data to say whatever you want, or doctor a screenshot or whatever), so it's kind of up to how much technical know-how they have and/or how hard they are going to try to squeeze every last penny they can out of you.
posted by EndsOfInvention at 7:13 AM on May 22, 2014
Any date stored in the EXIF can be faked anyway (I think you can edit the EXIF data to say whatever you want, or doctor a screenshot or whatever), so it's kind of up to how much technical know-how they have and/or how hard they are going to try to squeeze every last penny they can out of you.
posted by EndsOfInvention at 7:13 AM on May 22, 2014
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posted by invisible ink at 8:14 PM on May 21, 2014