How to geotag photos from any camera using iPhone with iOS 4.0+

One of the best features of the latest iPhone OS is ability to run apps in the background. As you already know you can use a variety of applications in the background. So by using a background application which records GPS coordinates all the time and combining it with a time-synced camera, you can geo tag photos taken with any camera.

Here are the tools you will need:

1. Any camera of your choice
2. An iPhone with iOS 4.0+
3. The MotionX app installed on your iPhone
4. Geosetter software installed on your PC (you can download this here)

How to combine all these:

First and most important step is that your camera and your iPhone are synchronized and have the exact same time. So find the time at your camera settings and make sure it’s the same as on your iPhone.

Next, launch the MotionX app and start recording a track. You can put MotionX in background and the track will still be recorded. While you record your track you can take any photo with your camera. Once you finish your track, click on “Save track” on MotionX app and then use the “Share” feature to send the track to your email (You will need to set this up first at the settings of MotionX app).

Going back to your base, you will need to save the “GPX” file that MotionX sent you through email to a folder on your PC. Also, download the photos from your camera.

Final step is to launch the Geosetter software. You will need to browse to the folder where your photos reside and select them all. Then click on the icon that says “Synchronize geo data of selected images with GPS data files”. Simply select the GPS track and click to synchronize images.

Don’t forget to save your images again through Geosetter so that the GPS coordinates and embedded into the EXIF data of the images.

After all these, you can upload your images to Flickr and your images will be automatically featured on the map. Moreover, Geosetter will figure out the name of each area you visited by using a Geonames service with your coordinates.

Here is an example of an images geotagged with that way (notice the map at the right column in Flickr and also the camera I used (Panasonic DMC-LX3 which has no GPS).

p.s. GPS will drain your iPhone’s battery really fast. In my recent trip I was also using Dexim Bluepack iPhone charger from Amazon. Doing so I achieved about 12 hours of continuous GPS track recording each day.