How to edit/customize the exiftool tags? Eg. using info to create custom format YYYY MM DD?

As title says, I'm trying to use exif info available using the exiftool, to create custom patterns for renaming folders.

Essentially, I want to take a collection of files from a folder, and move them into folders named according to date (format: YYYY MM DD). The problem arises because the dates could be all different: date modified, date created, etc. I've found that the IMG tags (with Date digitized ticked in settings) work well for most images. However, images which don't have such an entry, and video files, run into problems. I've found that the Exif Tag "CreateDate" provides correct results for all my files (pictures, videos, etc), and would like to use that, but I have no way to edit the folder renaming pattern.

Output folder paths:

This works sometimes, but gives the desired format:
D:\Media\<Img Year>\<Img Year> <Img Month:00> <Img Day>

This always works, but has a terrible, fixed format:
D:\Media\<Year Modified>\<ExifTool:CreateDate>

So, how can I edit the <ExifTool:CreateDate> tag to yield a desired date pattern when moving/copying files to folders?

---

Reply to #1:

Take a look at this script:

http://pastebin.com/mTwwQxtP

it does 95% of what you want, would only need minor changes to match your exact format

the script does uses the CreateDate tag (used for videos) and DateTimeOriginal (more standard for images) in the exif metadata of the file

you need to have python 2.7 installed and exiftool somewhere on your system

let me know if that works for you / interest you and needs further instructions or script changes

[email protected]

cheers!

---