Why is image metadata stripped when applying transformations to my images?

When working with images, embedded metadata in the image file can provide useful context and other semantic information but this is often not relevant when delivering images to your website or application. Metadata may include ICC profile information, EXIF, IPTC, etc.

When images are uploaded to Cloudinary, image metadata is generally retained and is included when delivering the original version of the image without any transformation applied.

When transformations are applied, Cloudinary strips most of this metadata to reduce the storage usage for the derived versions of your files, and so that the images are delivered more quickly to your users.

To request that metadata is preserved when delivering derived versions of your files, you can use the "keep_iptc" flag: 
http://res.cloudinary.com/demo/image/upload/fl_keep_iptc,w_500,h_500/test%20-%20folder/animals/exif_sample.jpg

To request that certain copyright-related fields are preserved, you can use the "keep_attribution" flag: 
https://res.cloudinary.com/demo/image/upload/fl_keep_attribution,w_500,c_limit,h_500/couple.jpg

When using an Incoming Transformation to transform newly-uploaded files before they're saved to your account, we'll try to preserve the metadata unless your requested transformation options aren't compatible with keeping the metadata values. You can specifically request that metadata is removed by specifying the "force_strip" flag. 

There is additional information about each of these flags available in our Transformation Flags documentation