Batch rename of photos using Gnome Commander

You can rename a large collection of photos very quickly by using Gnome Commander's built-in rename tool.

The filenames created by my Canon 1D are not very informative nor are they human friendly. I prefer to see the camera make and model, date and time of the photograph, ISO used and then finally the camera's image name.

This allows me to group the photos by year and date. By putting the ISO in the filename, I can group them by ISO. I can then run a specific script for noise reduction based on the ISO.

Before renaming the files:

After renaming the files:

Howto:
Navigate to the directory / folder that contains your photos. Select the ones you want to rename (use CTRL + A to select them all) and invoke the advance rename tool from the file menu.

Use the template field to format the output of the filename. You can use spaces, characters and best of all variables. As you build the template with variable names, the bottom of window will show you what the end result of the rename will look like.

The most useful field names are under the Metatag button. For photographers there are two sub options that offer photographic specific variables: image and Exif. Exif data is embedded within the image file itself when the photo is taken by the camera. With the Advanced Rename Tool you can extract any Exif tag and use it to build the filename.

Below is a subset of the tags you can use:

Image options	Exif options

In the example above, I used the rename tool to rename images but you can also use it rename audio files. Click here to see the full listing of Metatags supported by Gnome Commander's Advanced Rename Tool.