For photographs, the XMP is created on the camera at the time of capture or is entered afterward in batch actions
by the professional photographer. Your DAM can be programmed to take information from specific XMP fields and
walk it directly into your metadata model on asset ingest. Some photographers will talk about programming the IPTC
extensions in their cameras or for photo shoots; this is simply another format for the metadata within the XMP layer
of a digital asset. Talk with your professional photographers, video-camera crew, or audio engineers before the event,
and ask them to add in as much information as they possibly can to the files they plan to generate, no matter which
file type or standard they plan to use.
Building Tunnels to Agencies and Other Systems
If you are working with a large advertising or publishing agency, odds are they will have their own DAM, with its own
metadata models and file-sharing methods. While just picking up the files from the agency’s site may seem like a good
idea at first, this method means that the metadata for the asset are being entered twice: once in the agency DAM, once
in yours. Efficiencies can be realized by connecting DAMs through custom tunnels and/or PPTPs. The building of this
type of tunnel will require real programming knowledge and IT support from both DAM owners, but the investment
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