How to rotate JPEG images based on the orientation metadata?

Question

I have some server code that is generating thumbnails when an image is uploaded. The issue is that when the image was taken and the camera/device was rotated, the thumbnail

Answer 1

My solution is a combination of @PerLindberg's answer as well as @AntoineMartin's. I tried the other answers with Java 8 on Windows 10 and none seemed to do the trick. @AntoinMartin's com.drew.imaging solution was slow and image turned out black and white and full of artifacts. @PerLindberg's JavaXT solution did not read Exif 2.2 data.

1) Use com.drew.imaging to read exif information:

// Inner class containing image information
public static class ImageInformation {
    public final int orientation;
    public final int width;
    public final int height;

    public ImageInformation(int orientation, int width, int height) {
        this.orientation = orientation;
        this.width = width;
        this.height = height;
    }

    public String toString() {
        return String.format("%dx%d,%d", this.width, this.height, this.orientation);
    }
}

public ImageInformation readImageInformation(File imageFile)  throws IOException, MetadataException, ImageProcessingException {
    Metadata metadata = ImageMetadataReader.readMetadata(imageFile);
    Directory directory = metadata.getFirstDirectoryOfType(ExifIFD0Directory.class);
    JpegDirectory jpegDirectory = metadata.getFirstDirectoryOfType(JpegDirectory.class);

    int orientation = 1;
    if (directory != null) {
        try {
            orientation = directory.getInt(ExifIFD0Directory.TAG_ORIENTATION);
        } catch (MetadataException me) {
            logger.warn("Could not get orientation");
        }
        int width = jpegDirectory.getImageWidth();
        int height = jpegDirectory.getImageHeight();

        return new ImageInformation(orientation, width, height);
    } else {
        return null;
    }
}

2) Use JavaXT to perform the rotation based on Exif data.

public void rotateMyImage(String imageDownloadFilenme);
    File imageDownloadFile =  new File(imgageDownloadFilenme);
    Image image = new Image(imgageDownloadFilenme);
    ImageInformation imageInformation = readImageInformation(imageDownloadFile);
    if (imageInformation != null) {
        rotate(imageInformation, image);
    }
    image.saveAs(imgageDownloadFilenme);
}

public void rotate(ImageInformation info, Image image) {

    switch(info.orientation) {
        case 1:
            return;
        case 2:
            image.flip();
            break;
        case 3:
            image.rotate(180.0D);
            break;
        case 4:
            image.flip();
            image.rotate(180.0D);
            break;
        case 5:
            image.flip();
            image.rotate(270.0D);
            break;
        case 6:
            image.rotate(90.0D);
            break;
        case 7:
            image.flip();
            image.rotate(90.0D);
            break;
        case 8:
            image.rotate(270.0D);
    }

}