Change the date and time of files

You can change the date and time in the file information of your photo, video, project, PDF, or audio file. For example, you can change the date and time that your digital camera records for a photo. You might need to do this if your camera’s clock is set incorrectly. People often change the date of scanned photos because it reflects the date the photo was scanned rather than originally taken.

Note: You can also set the date for a file in Date view.
  1. Select one or more files in the Photo Browser. Shift-click to select a series of files. Ctrl-click to select nonadjacent files.
  2. Choose Edit > Adjust Date And Time or Edit > Adjust Date And Time Of Selected Items. (You can also right-click and choose this command.)
    Note: If you frequently change dates, you can set a preference that lets you simply click the date in a thumbnail to open the Adjust Date And Time dialog box. Choose Edit > Preferences > General and select Adjust Date And Time By Clicking On Thumbnail Dates.
  3. In the Adjust Date And Time dialog box, select one of the following, and then click OK (options vary depending on the type of file selected):
    Change To A Specified Date And Time
    Lets you manually change the date and time. Select the option, and then click OK. In the Set Date And Time dialog box, type or choose a year in the Year text box. Choose a month and day, or choose the question marks from the menu, if unknown. Under Time, select Known and type or choose a time in the text box, or select the Unknown option.

    Change To Match File’s Date And Time
    Changes the time to the Modified Date of the file. Select the option, and then click OK.

    Shift To New Starting Date And Time
    Lets you adjust the time of multiple selected photos in relation to the oldest photo in the set. For instance, if you change the time to one month, one day, and one hour earlier, all the photos are adjusted back by the same amount. Select the option, and then click OK. In the Set Date and Time dialog box, specify a new date and time for the earliest item in the group by selecting a new year, month, day, and time. Then click OK. This option is useful when your camera’s date and time are not set accurately.

    Shift By Set Number Of Hours (Time Zone Adjust)
    Lets you adjust the time ahead or back by a certain number of hours. Select the option, and then click OK. In the Time Zone Adjust dialog box, select either Ahead or Back, and then either type or click the up or down arrows to specify the number of hours you wish to adjust. Then click OK.

    Photoshop Elements adjusts the Timeline to reflect the changes and saves the new date and time to the photo’s file in your catalog.

Note: Photoshop Elements displays the imperial-era year, Gregorian year (Japanese), or Gregorian year (English), depending on what is selected in the control panel. To change the settings in Windows XP, open the Regional and Language Options control panel, click the Regional Options tab, and specify dates as desired. For more information, see your Windows documentation.