imgmeta

Personal CLI tool for extracting, exporting, and removing EXIF metadata from photos.

Note: This tool uses Piexif internally — it is not related to the Perl-based exiftool. The name reflects its functionality, not the underlying library.

Features

• Interactive Mode: Menu-driven interface with native macOS file explorer
• Extract EXIF: Display metadata in a readable table format
• Export: Save metadata to JSON or CSV files
• Remove: Strip EXIF data while preserving image quality
• Batch Process: Handle entire folders with progress display
• Native File Picker: Uses macOS file/folder dialogs

Installation

macOS (Homebrew) - Recommended

brew install polidisio/tap/imgmeta

pip / uv

uv tool install imgmeta

From Source

git clone https://github.com/polidisio/exiftool-cli.git
cd imgmeta
uv tool install -e .

Usage

Interactive Mode (Recommended)

Simply run imgmeta without arguments to launch the interactive menu:

imgmeta

You'll see:

╔══════════════════════════════════════════╗
║        EXIFTOOL-CLI v1.0.0              ║
╚══════════════════════════════════════════╝

Main Menu
────────────────────────────────────────
  Selected: None

  [1] Select photos (file explorer)
  [2] Show EXIF preview
  [3] Export EXIF
  [4] Remove EXIF
  [0] Exit

Select option:

Flow:

1. Press 1 to open the macOS file explorer and select photos
2. Press 2 to preview EXIF data
3. Press 3 to export (choose JSON or CSV, use file explorer for output folder)
4. Press 4 to remove EXIF (optionally use file explorer for output folder)
5. Press 0 to exit

Command Line Mode

Extract EXIF

imgmeta extract photo.jpg

Output:

──────────────────────────────────────────────────
  photo.jpg
──────────────────────────────────────────────────

Camera
────────────────────
  Camera Make        Canon
  Camera Model       EOS R5
  Software           Digital Photo Professional

Date/Time
────────────────────
  Date/Time         2024:03:15 10:30:00
  Date Taken        2024:03:15 10:30:00

GPS
────────────────────
  Latitude           40.500000
  Longitude          -74.000000
  Altitude           100.0

Exposure
────────────────────
  Exposure           1/250
  F-Number           2.8
  ISO                400
  Focal Length       50.0

Export to JSON

imgmeta export photo.jpg -o output.json

Export to CSV

imgmeta export photo.jpg -o output.csv

Remove EXIF

imgmeta remove photo.jpg -o clean_photo.jpg

Remove EXIF but keep GPS

imgmeta remove photo.jpg --keep-gps -o clean_photo.jpg

Batch Process

# Extract EXIF from all photos in a folder
imgmeta batch --folder /path/to/photos --extract

# Remove EXIF from all photos
imgmeta batch --folder /path/to/photos --remove

# Export metadata to CSV
imgmeta batch --folder /path/to/photos --export csv -o metadata.csv

# Process recursively
imgmeta batch --folder /path/to/photos --recursive --remove

Command Line Options

Command	Option	Description
(interactive)	-	Launches interactive menu mode
extract	<file>	Image file to extract EXIF from
export	-o, --output	Output file path (.json or .csv)
remove	-o, --output	Output file path
remove	--keep-gps	Preserve GPS data only
batch	--folder, -f	Folder containing images
batch	--recursive, -r	Process subfolders
batch	--extract	Extract EXIF display
batch	--export	Export format (json/csv)
batch	--remove	Remove EXIF metadata

Supported Formats

• JPEG (.jpg, .jpeg)
• PNG (.png)
• TIFF (.tif, .tiff)

Development

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/polidisio/exiftool-cli.git
cd imgmeta

# Install dependencies
pip install -e ".[dev]"

# Run tests
pytest tests/ -v

# Run with coverage
pytest tests/ --cov=src/exiftool_cli --cov-report=html

License

MIT License - see LICENSE for details.

Author

Jose Audisio