EXIF metadata & licences

Goal: embed copyright details invisibly into your delivered photos, and attach licence terms and marketing files that go out with every gallery download.

Prerequisites

  • These are admin-only, company-wide settings — not per-gallery. Configure them once and they apply to every gallery and video collection automatically.
  • Both live under Settings in the sidebar (admins only).

EXIF metadata

This tucks your copyright and contact details invisibly inside each photo file at upload time. It doesn't change how the picture looks — the information travels with the file, so if it's shared or downloaded later, your ownership stays attached.

  1. Go to Settings → Photo Metadata.
  2. Check Embed metadata into uploaded photos to turn it on.
  3. Fill in Copyright, Artist / Creator, and/or User comment. Each field accepts the tokens {year} and {company}, which are expanded automatically (for example © {year} {company} becomes © 2026 Acme Studio).
  4. Click Save Metadata Settings.

Once enabled, every new JPEG or TIFF upload gets these fields written in automatically as a background job (the same process queue described in How thumbnails are built). An Image Description field is always set to the photo's gallery name — that one isn't configurable.

RAW files and PDFs are always skipped — only JPEG and TIFF images support embedded EXIF metadata here.
Turning this on only affects new uploads. To apply your current settings to photos you already uploaded, use Apply to existing photos at the bottom of the tab — it queues a low-priority background job for every eligible existing photo so it doesn't slow down new uploads.

Licences & marketing files

Go to Settings → Licences & Marketing to attach up to three files, each optional and independent:

  • Photo licence — a plain-text (.txt) licence document. Clients can read it from a "View Licence" link on your galleries, and it's automatically bundled into every gallery zip download.
  • Video licence — the same idea, for video collections.
  • Marketing material — any file type up to 25 MB, tucked into every gallery zip download as an extra. Studios use this for a print/album price list, a referral or discount voucher, a thank-you note, or a review request.

Upload a new file to a slot to replace what's there, or check Remove current file and save to clear it.

Don't have licence wording ready? Tools includes a licence builder that generates plain-English photo and video licence text from a short questionnaire (licensee, commercial/personal/editorial scope, exclusivity, term, permitted uses, credit requirement). You can download the draft or save it straight into the photo/video licence slot here.

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