Simple way to remove EXIF data from a JPEG with .NET

Question

How can I remove all EXIF data from a JPEG image?

I found lots of examples on how to read and edit the EXIF data with various libraries, but all I would need is a simple example on how to remove it.

It is just for testing proposes, so even the ugliest and hackished approach would be helpful :)

I already tried searching for the EXIF start/end markers 0xFFE1 & 0xFFE2. The last one does not exist in my case.

Answer 1

I first wrote about this using WPF libs in my blog, but this sort of failed since Windows backend calls are a bit messed up.

My final solution is also much quicker which basically byte patches the jpeg in order to remove the exif. Fast and simple :)

[EDIT: Blog post has more updated code]

namespace ExifRemover
{
  public class JpegPatcher
  {
    public Stream PatchAwayExif(Stream inStream, Stream outStream)
    {
      byte[] jpegHeader = new byte[2];
      jpegHeader[0] = (byte) inStream.ReadByte();
      jpegHeader[1] = (byte) inStream.ReadByte();
      if (jpegHeader[0] == 0xff && jpegHeader[1] == 0xd8)
      {
        SkipExifSection(inStream);
      }

      outStream.Write(jpegHeader,0,2);

      int readCount;
      byte[] readBuffer = new byte[4096];
      while ((readCount = inStream.Read(readBuffer, 0, readBuffer.Length)) > 0)
        outStream.Write(readBuffer, 0, readCount);

      return outStream;
    }

    private void SkipExifSection(Stream inStream)
    {
      byte[] header = new byte[2];
      header[0] = (byte) inStream.ReadByte();
      header[1] = (byte) inStream.ReadByte();
      if (header[0] == 0xff && header[1] == 0xe1)
      {
        int exifLength = inStream.ReadByte();
        exifLength = exifLength << 8;
        exifLength |= inStream.ReadByte();

        for (int i = 0; i < exifLength - 2; i++)
        {
          inStream.ReadByte();
        }
      }
    }
  }
}