I imagine everybody thinks about this – I’ve got thousands of pictures on my computer, and they are taken with a variety of devices.  Each device has its own way to name files and most of the time the file names are relatively meaningless.

If there was a way to name all the files in a consistent fashion, then it would be easier to search and find the files you are looking for.

My proposal is this:

YYYYMMDD,HHMMSS,{Camera model},{original filename},{optional description}.[ext]

This makes for a longer name, but the files are sorted correctly, regardless of the device that took the picture.  This naming convention is very similar to the IEEE C37.232 Comnames convention.

So the obvious question now is how to accomplish this.  I use Total Commander with the EXIF plugin.  There’s also a program called Stamp that will accomplish this.  Stamp hasn’t been updated in years, but it still works.

Update:  Here are a couple more programs that will rename the photo files for you:

• Advanced Renamer – The best and easiest to use of the bunch that I have tried.
• Bulk Rename Utility – A comprehensive rename utility.  It will rename anything.
• NameEXIF – A rename utility specifically for digital camera files.