Author Topic: Lens info shows up in NEF but not the saved JPG  (Read 3680 times)

Offline RonD200

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Lens info shows up in NEF but not the saved JPG
« on: December 28, 2020, 09:02:04 PM »
I was using PM+ to Filter for Lens used and have a bunch of JPG photos returned with NONE, so I looked at a couple of the NEF files and they all had the lens listed in the info panel, however if I used the PM save command to save as a JPG the lens info was missing?  I noticed that all the lenses that show up as NONE in the jpg files are Fmount lenses used on a Nikon Z6 with the FTZ adapter, what I can't figure out is why do these lenses still show up in the Info panel for the NEF files but not do not show up when saving the NEF as a jpg.  I have Preserve EXIF if possible checked in the Save dialog box. 
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Offline Kirk Baker

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Re: Lens info shows up in NEF but not the saved JPG
« Reply #1 on: December 29, 2020, 10:40:34 AM »
Ron,

I was using PM+ to Filter for Lens used and have a bunch of JPG photos returned with NONE, so I looked at a couple of the NEF files and they all had the lens listed in the info panel, however if I used the PM save command to save as a JPG the lens info was missing?  I noticed that all the lenses that show up as NONE in the jpg files are Fmount lenses used on a Nikon Z6 with the FTZ adapter, what I can't figure out is why do these lenses still show up in the Info panel for the NEF files but not do not show up when saving the NEF as a jpg.  I have Preserve EXIF if possible checked in the Save dialog box.

Could you share one of these NEFs with us, please?

Thanks,

-Kirk

Offline RonD200

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Re: Lens info shows up in NEF but not the saved JPG
« Reply #2 on: December 29, 2020, 12:02:12 PM »
Here's the NEF file
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Offline Kirk Baker

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Re: Lens info shows up in NEF but not the saved JPG
« Reply #3 on: December 29, 2020, 01:16:31 PM »
Thanks for the file, Ron.

We will examine it soon.  We also suggest that if your source image is a RAW file, that you use your favorite RAW converter to produce JPEGs from them.  You'll get better results that way.

-Kirk

Offline dennis

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Re: Lens info shows up in NEF but not the saved JPG
« Reply #4 on: December 29, 2020, 02:26:01 PM »
Ron,

Okay this is somewhat complicated so please bare with me.

There is a standard Exif tag for lens model (0xa434) that typically has manufacturer's full description of lens, written by the camera.  If this is present we use this to report lens used.  Unfortunately by using FTZ adapter with whatever lens you had (8-15mm), the Z6 isn't able to read or create the normal full model name for the lens that was used.  So the Z6 writes this tag (0xa434) but the value is empty (might as well not write the tag at all but an empty value means something different than the absence of the tag itself  ::)).

If this standard lens model tag is missing, then PM tries to use various Exif Maker Note fields to construct what the lens used would be (not as good as the official lens model from camera).  When saving a RAW file to JPG, PM (and other software) removes the Exif Maker Note.  Henceforth when viewing the saved JPEG, PM (or any other software I suspect) has no idea what lens was used (no 0xa434 tag and no maker note to "create" lens used).

It turns out that there is a "bug" in that PM isn't preserving any Exif lens model when saving JPEG (IOW if you used a standard Z mount lens without FTZ adapter).  We will put this on list to fix.  But with that special lens and FTZ adapter, there isn't much that can be done other than perhaps put the lens used variable in some unused IPTC field like special instructions (some folks put all sorts of Exif info in that field because it sticks regardless of the existence of any Exif data whatsoever).

HTH...

--dennis

Offline RonD200

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Re: Lens info shows up in NEF but not the saved JPG
« Reply #5 on: December 30, 2020, 07:31:34 AM »
Hi Kirk, I usually use ON1 to convert to JPG and it doesn’t show the lens info when using the FTZ either, that’s why I tried using PM to convert to jpg to see if it would identify the lens.  Thanks for looking into this.

Thanks Dennis for your explanation on what’s going on,  I was curious about why the NEF file saw the lens but the JPG didn’t, your explanation cleared that up. I mostly use the Z lenses on the Z6, but for certain lenses like the fisheye and the 500mm PF and macro lenses that don’t exist in the Z version yet I have to resort to using the FTZ.  As I noted above other software has the same problem identifying the lens when converting to jpg when using Fmount lenses with the FTZ.
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