Making the Case for Embedded Metadata in Digital Images

This paper discusses the standards, methods, use cases, and opportunities for using embedded metadata in digital images. In this paper we explain the past and current work engaged with developing specifications, standards for embedding metadata of different types, and the practicalities of data exchange in heritage institutions and the culture sector. Our examples and findings support the case for embedded metadata in digital images and the opportunities for such use more broadly in non-heritage sectors as well. We encourage the adoption of embedded metadata by digital image content creators and curators as well as those developing software and hardware that support the creation or re-use of digital images. We conclude that the usability of born digital images as well as physical objects that are digitized can be extended and the files preserved more readily with embedded metadata.