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Using the Properties Pane

The Properties pane displays all the metadata about your files. It also displays file properties such as file size, creation date, and read-only or hidden status. You can use the Properties pane to add, change, or delete the metadata for image and media files.

The Properties pane is open in Manage mode on the right of the File List pane by default. The Properties pane is available in all modes except 365 mode and Photos mode.

To Open the Properties Pane in Any Mode:

Click View | Properties.

The Metadata panel offers adjustable width for metadata fields. Simply hover between a corresponding label and field to display the double arrow cursor. Click and drag to adjust width. Double-click to toggle between the width of the longest label in the group or the longest label in the pane.

Properties Pane Areas

The Properties pane is divided into 3 tabs: Metadata tab, Organize tab, and File tab.

Use the overlay icons, which appear as you hover over a thumbnail, to tag, rate and add color labels to your images. Alternatively, you can display these setting in the Properties pane by clicking Tools | Options | Properties Pane and selecting Show Tagged, Rating, and Color Labels.

Metadata Tab

The Metadata tab displays the rating, category, IPTC, EXIF, and ACDSee Metadata stored with a photo. The ACDSee Metadata fields are available for you to enter the caption for your photographs as well as date, author, and notes. The keywords field is display-only and can be entered in the Organize tab. The label field can be entered here or selected from the Labels section in the Catalog pane. IPTC information is automatically embedded into your image, while ACDSee Metadata is not embedded in your files, but instead is held in the database. ACDSee Metadata can be embedded into all your files (or just selected ones) by clicking the Tools | Metadata | Embed ACDSee Metadata command.

The IPTC data fields provide a standard means for entering and storing information about your photographs such as description, creator, and copyright information. ACDSee supports fields defined in IPTC Core 1.1.

The EXIF data fields hold information captured by your camera such as shutter speed, camera model, and GPS information.

Certain EXIF fields are no longer visible by default. The EXIF Artist, Copyright, Image Description, and Date/Time Original fields are automatically modified when their matching IPTC fields are modified, (see table below). This change reflects the recommendations of the Metadata Working Group (MWG). If you need to have these fields visible in the EXIF section you can adjust your settings by clicking Tools | Options | Properties Pane and clicking the Manage Metadata Views button.

Matching IPTC and EXIF Fields

IPTC		EXIF
Description	writes to	Image Description
Creator	writes to	Artist
Copyright Notice	writes to	Copyright
Date Created	writes to	Date/Time Original

When ACDSee parses metadata from a file, the content of the field is displayed without mapping.

Organize Tab

The Organize tab displays a tree of categories and a tree of keywords. The Category tree context-menu (right-click) allows you to add and delete categories and sub-categories. You can create category sets to quickly categorize your files. Right-clicking the Keyword tree also allows the same options. Use the keyword tree to create a hierarchy to easily organize your files in a way that holds meaning for you.

File Tab

The File tab displays detailed file information and image attributes for a selected file or files. You can set or change the Read-Only and Hidden properties of a file or folder, and view a summary of any EXIF information contained in a file.

Embedding ACDSee Metadata into Files

If you have metadata in your files and they are copied, moved, or renamed, outside of ACDSee, the link between the file and the database will be broken, but you can rebuild the database using the embedded data in the file.

ACDSee uses XMP to embed ACDSee Metadata into each file. Only some file formats and file extensions support XMP. These include GIF, JPEG, DNG, PNG, PSD, and TIF. In the case of these file formats, the ACDSee Metadata is embedded inside the file and so you can rename or move the file outside of ACDSee and still be able to retrieve the ACDSee Metadata. For formats that currently do not support XMP, including RAW and ABR, the ACDSee Metadata is written to a sidecar file that is stored in the same folder as its file. Because a sidecar file is separate from the file itself, you need to rename or move them together, or you could lose the ACDSee Metadata permanently.