# Groups photos by timestamp on upload **URL:** \ **Category:** Feature Requests\ **Created:** [February 8, 2019, 4:41pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/groups-photos-by-timestamp-on-upload/143 "2019-02-08T16:41:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![jwidness](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9d8465/32.png) [@jwidness](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/jwidness)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2019, 4:41pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/groups-photos-by-timestamp-on-upload/143/1 "2019-02-08T16:41:21Z")
Edited post: Many users post multiple photos of the same organism as separate observations. It’s a common issue with camera traps that take multiple images on a single trigger, but it’s also frequent with regular photo uploads too. Can iNat offer a way to group photos based on timestamp when uploading new observations? The most basic algorithm would be something like “all photos taken within 1 minute belong to a single observation”, but maybe the time frame could be adjustable? Obviously the user could manually move the photos around after the algorithm runs. ---
**Author:** ![taitsougstad](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/taitsougstad/32/1247_2.png) [@taitsougstad](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/taitsougstad)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2019, 6:23pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/groups-photos-by-timestamp-on-upload/143/2 "2019-02-08T18:23:06Z")
I’ve been wanting to start using camera traps, but haven’t had the time, yet. This is a little curious to me. I figured manually work the items of concern, not only to sort it out, but to apply a little human-powered quality control. When I take pictures of animals, I usually end up taking a dozen but only posting the most useful handful. I figured it would be the same for a camera trap. Same for deployment, that each time I visit the site to swap cards, each card would be a “batch” that could share the same location data. How long do these operations actually take? Long enough for a feature request, at least. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![kueda](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/kueda/32/20_2.png) [@kueda](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/kueda)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2019, 6:25pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/groups-photos-by-timestamp-on-upload/143/3 "2019-02-08T18:25:41Z")
These are two different feature requests, so you might consider separating them into their own threads so people can vote on them separately. Here, I fully support better tools for merging and splitting observations, but I don’t love the idea of system-level support for metadata that only pertains to one kind of observational practice, e.g. camera trapping. That’s what observation fields are for. ---
**Author:** ![jwidness](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9d8465/32.png) [@jwidness](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/jwidness)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2019, 12:11am UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/groups-photos-by-timestamp-on-upload/143/4 "2019-02-13T00:11:20Z")
I don’t love using observation fields for the purpose of keeping track of metadata. I’m really thinking about a way to keep track of deployments independent of the photos recorded in the deployment. At any rate, I took that part out of the request, now it’s just for a group-by-timestamp algorithm. ---
**Author:** ![henrydelange](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/henrydelange/32/122_2.png) [@henrydelange](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/henrydelange)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2019, 12:55pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/groups-photos-by-timestamp-on-upload/143/5 "2019-02-18T12:55:15Z")
> [@jwidness](#): > > “all photos taken within 1 minute belong to a single observation”, but maybe the time frame could be adjustable This is essentially what I do in my own observation database program when importing new photographs and it works really great. I almost never use the iNat web import so I can’t comment on how that works, but I can agree that this feature is extremely useful - not only for camera trapping, but in general. PS. Don’t do “new observation after 2 minutes”, but instead do “new observation after a 2 minute _gap of inactivity_”. ---
**Author:** ![tony\_wills](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/tony_wills/32/1094_2.png) [@tony\_wills](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/tony_wills)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2019, 10:00am UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/groups-photos-by-timestamp-on-upload/143/6 "2019-03-17T10:00:20Z")
> [@jwidness](#): > > Can iNat offer a way to group photos based on timestamp when uploading new observations? If we are talking about uploads through the website upload page, then I really don’t want something to change the order of the photos that I drag across. I carefully select the order I want to present the photos in the observation and upload them in that order. It would be counter productive to have them re-ordered. –Tony ---
**Author:** ![jwidness](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9d8465/32.png) [@jwidness](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/jwidness)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2019, 12:21pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/groups-photos-by-timestamp-on-upload/143/7 "2019-03-17T12:21:00Z")
I’d want something that either you have to opt in to, or at least that you could opt out of. ---
**Author:** ![tiwane](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/tiwane/32/54612_2.png) [@tiwane](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/tiwane)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2019, 10:13pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/groups-photos-by-timestamp-on-upload/143/8 "2019-07-10T22:13:57Z")
I don’t think this is something we’ll be moving forward on, so I’m going to close this request. ---
**Author:** ![tiwane](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/tiwane/32/54612_2.png) [@tiwane](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/tiwane)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2019, 10:14pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/groups-photos-by-timestamp-on-upload/143/9 "2019-07-10T22:14:01Z")