Image Rotation and How to Control It

A lot of folks have trouble with images not displaying properly on this forum (i.e., portrait oriented images display in landscape). It also happens with many other older software programs like older versions of MS Word. There is a reason for this behavior and it’s not an issue with the image itself. It’s not a problem with the camera used. It’s not a bug. It’s just old software.

There is a workaround.

Most modern cameras, operating systems and image software no longer rotate the actual source image. Rotating an image can cause loss of image quality. Rather they read the image orientation attribute from the image EXIF data and display the image in the proper orientation without actually modifying the source image. That’s why new OSs like Windows 10 do not rotate the image source files. It’s now the job of the software that displays the image to read the orientation data and display the image properly.

Older software, like this BBS, do not read the orientation data in order to rotate the displayed image. For the image to display properly in this older software, the source image file itself must first be rotated (something the older OSs used to do). Basically, the image contains the information to tell the software “when you display me, rotate me 90 degrees to the left, but don’t change me” but old software is not smart enough to do this properly

You can, however, force the source image to be rotated before posting it, either by using software specifically designed for it or with the utilities already included with the OS.

Here’s a quick how-to for Windows 10 users (this may work on earlier versions too). What we are going to do is force the software to re-render the source file in the orientation it displays.

We’ll start with this image which was taken in portrait mode, but displays in landscape on this BBS.

https://www.nachi.org/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=196956&d=1504449738

In order for it to display properly here, we need to actually re-render the file for the less intelligent software. We’ll start by right clicking the image and selecting “Edit with Photos”.

https://www.nachi.org/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=196957&stc=1&d=1504450921

This should open the image in the photos app.

https://www.nachi.org/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=196958&stc=1&d=1504450957

Next, we’re going to click on the “Crop and rotate” button which will open the crop dialog.

https://www.nachi.org/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=196959&stc=1&d=1504450975

Here you can crop and manipulate the image if you want, but you don’t have to. We are simply going to click the “Done” button without doing anything. That will take us back to the prior dialog, Where we will click “Save” or “Save a copy” depending on whether you want to retain the original unaltered image.

That will rewrite the image file with the image data itself rotated. Now the older software will display the image in rotated format. There may be some loss of quality, but that really is only going to matter to professionals who are producing very high-resolution prints.

Now our image will display the way we want it on this BBS.

https://www.nachi.org/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=196960&stc=1&d=1504451006

This may seem like a lot, but the whole process literally takes about 5 seconds.

Hope this helps.

Thanks for the explanation and workaround Chuck!

Chuck rules! Thanks, man.

Nice post, should be helpful to many. Thanks Chuck!

Nice Chuck, now I hope all see this, cause I am getting a pain in my neck from looking at pictures sideways. ;):stuck_out_tongue:

BUMP!!