WARNING: iOS Canon Camera Connect 3.0.1x puts same location in every photo.

[allenhuffman]

5/6/2023 Update: I did more testing today. The location stored in every photo is the location where the phone was when you "Start recording." Every photo taken that day will have that GPS coordinate, and though the photos have the correct time, the GPS timestamp will be the same as well. (3.0.11.24 build 1341 was used today, same issue.)

I tried the updated Camera Connect last week. I was running the 3.0.10 (or it might have updated to 3.0.11 by then) on an iPhone 14 Pro with 1TB storage. When I used the version available in October 2022 (probably 2.9.22), it still had the issues where it would often just stop logging during the day. I had days on that trip where I forgot to keep checking it, and lost half a day or more of GPS data.

The new version looked like it was working better, since it was always still logging each night when I went to shut it off and upload GPS data in to my Canon G5X.

Unfortunately, tonight I found out it only put in SEVEN (7) GPS locations in the 4300 photos I took over the five days. They ALL have GPS data, but it's one of the seven locations repeated through thousands of photos.

4/12 UPDATE: Using ‘exiftool’ it now appears that the SAME GPS date/time and lat/lon is embedded in every image taken the same day, so my 7 locations were from the 7 days I used the camera, it seems.

I confirmed this using the 'exiftool' command line, and a script I had ChatGPT help me write (https://github.com/allenhuffman/EXIFPhotoScripts/)

This is a huge failure. Fortunately, due to all the problems I've had with Camera Connect over the past five years, this trip I ran a "Geotag Photos 2" app as well, though I did not have it logging as frequently as I would have liked. I hope to be able to use it's data to at least get my photos in the general area they were taken.

This is a big disappointment, since I recently created a script that lets me draw out regions in a Google Map, export it out as a KML file, then let the script sort photos in to subfolders based on the areas drawn on the map. This turned a sorting process of photos from Knott's Berry Farm in to a half hour process instead of spending a week or more working on it by hand.

Anyone had this problem? It shows 3.0.1 came out 5 months ago (no note on GPS changes), then 3.0.10 1 month ago (new camera support) and then 3.0.11 a week ago.

[allenhuffman]

First photo (9:27am)Last photo (1:23pm)

[allenhuffman]

Notice the UTC time (5 hours different from where I am) is the same; this is 9:20am, when I tapped "Start recording" in the app. My first photo was taken about 7 minutes later, and all the photos taken that day use the GPS coordinate from when I did "Start recording."

[shadowsports]

Just humor me for a minute.  The camera does not have GPS, it relies on the phone for this data.  Bug in the CC App...  is it?

Is it possible the phone is not updating for power saving measures?  I know what you're thinking..  when I take photos on my phone GPS data is captured properly.  If you aren't taking pictures, or using maps for directions, etc, maybe the phone is updating on demand instead of real time.  Here's another example.  When I stream music, tracks continue to play.  If the screen has gone to sleep, and I wake it up, the picture of the album jumps from the track that was streaming when the screen went off to the current track in the blink of an eye.  

You'll have to test this manually, Test by opening maps.  Set a start and end destination (walking).  Then walk that route and take photos.  Verify the results.  You'll never get Apple to admit it.  

[allenhuffman]

---

@shadowsports wrote:

Just humor me for a minute.  The camera does not have GPS, it relies on the phone for this data.  Bug in the CC App...  is it?

Correct. I have been using the Camera Connect app with the G5X since I got it in 2017. Previously, the bug (which appeared on three different phones during that time) was that it would randomly just shut off logging. This required me to constantly check the app to make sure it hadn't been switched to "off".

This new bug, where it says it works all day but then doesn't log anything but the location where I first enabled logging, is different. It appeared with the new v3 release.

Is it possible the phone is not updating for power saving measures?  I know what you're thinking..  when I take photos on my phone GPS data is captured properly.  If you aren't taking pictures, or using maps for directions, etc, maybe the phone is updating on demand instead of real time.  Here's another example.  When I stream music, tracks continue to play.  If the screen has gone to sleep, and I wake it up, the picture of the album jumps from the track that was streaming when the screen went off to the current track in the blink of an eye.  

You'll have to test this manually, Test by opening maps.  Set a start and end destination (walking).  Then walk that route and take photos.  Verify the results.  You'll never get Apple to admit it.  

---

Yes, it could be, but not in this case. I posted earlier in this topic, running a separate GPS app at the same time worked fine. This is just a bug in Camera Connect. Since I know I cannot trust this app currently, I ran the backup app today. Unlike my April trip where I had the backup app set to log infrequently, this time I set it to log with any change. I was able to use the GPX file it created to correctly update my photos just like I used to do with external hardware loggers in the Stone Age of geotagging.

It logged everything just fine, per the photo of that log opened. This is just an issue with the current Camera Connect app. Since I haven't had any confirmation it works on other phones, it may be an issue with it and the G5X. Canon support has been provided all the data, but I never heard anything back on a solution.

[allenhuffman]

Update:

3.1.1, released two weeks ago, still places the same GPS coordinates in every photo taken during the time the logging was on.

I continue to run "Geotag Photos 2" as a backup, then I embed the GPS EXIF data using Graphics Converter for Mac.

[echadden]

Same problem here. CC version is 3.1.10.50 (build 1385), installed on an iPhone 13, and camera is a Canon G5X. All was well with my old iPhone 6, and the latest version of CC that it could install.
GPS data recorded for the first picture, but then repeated on every other picture in that session.

[allenhuffman]

I received email alerts of two replies to this topic this weekend, but I do not find them when I go look. Did someone comment then delete or is the forum not showing me everything?

[JML02118]

I'm having the same issue with the G3X. I haven't done any recent testing, but I want to hopefully get this working properly before my next trip! A couple things that come to mind to try out are 1) Location Services - is it set to 'While Using the App' or 'Always' and 2) Is Lower Power Mode on or off? If it is off, is background app refresh on or off?

I have a habit of keeping lower battery mode on to get more use from a single charge (though I also always carry a power bank with me to charge my phone when I'm mobile). The next time I take my camera out for a spin I'm going to make sure location services is always - lower power mode is off and background refresh is on. 

[JML02118]

Tried this out today - and gues what - it didn't help 😞 First photo and last photo (2 miles difference) all tagged with the initial location of where I started the log capture. This is frustrating to say the least!

[allenhuffman]

I haven’t even bothered running it my past few trips. Using the other GPS log program and putting them in the photos with GraphicsConverter on Mac is an annoying extra step, but it works.