Removing tags in Vista Windows photo gallery

Posted by Gail Bjork on Monday, September 10th, 2007 | 6 Comments

Hard drive partition I’m quite pleased with the Vista Windows photo gallery but had a heck of a time with unwanted tags.

The first time you open the gallery it reads and records all tags associated with images in your pictures folder. Well, I didn’t know this and hundreds of tags appeared from stock photos I keep in the folder.

To my chagrin, I discovered I could only delete the tags manually…one at a time. UGH, hours of work. I began the time consuming task of deleting the tags, only to have them reappear. Evidently, the metadata from the stock photos was read again.

I spent hours over several days researching how to remove the tags in bulk, including searching the Microsoft Database. Nada! Finally, someone in a digital photography forum explained how.

For others who find themselves in the same predicament, there are two basic steps:

Remove the tags from the image files.
Delete two hidden files.

Removing tags from images in Windows Vista

Select all pictures that you want to remove tags.
Right-click with the mouse on any one of the photos and select properties.
Next select details, click on tags and remove tag information and then press OK. The tags will be removed from the selected photos.
Exit the Windows photo gallery. This is important!

Delete two hidden Windows photo gallery files

First, turn on the folder option so hidden folders become visible. Don’t forget to make them invisible again after you complete the process.

Control Panel > Folder Options > View Tab > Hidden Files and Folders > Show hidden files and folders

The two files that have to be deleted are pictures.pd4 and NavTree.state. They are located in a hidden folder.

[drive letter]:Users[user name]AppDataLocalMicrosoftWindows Photo Gallery

Delete both files and then open Windows photo gallery again. Windows will re-generate all photo thumbnails and tag information for those images that have tags.

Now, wasn’t that fun?!

I realize that not everyone uses stock photos but if you do, hope you’re reading this BEFORE you first open Vista Windows Photo Gallery. If you don’t want to delete the tags, store the photos in a zipped folder or on a separate partition on your hard drive.

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On 13 April 2009 at 9:30 am Dott Baumann said:

Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! This is what I have been looking for. DB

On 19 July 2009 at 3:35 pm Mary Hoskins said:

I have tags where the pictures have been deleted so I can’t select the picture to remove tags. When I looked in “show hidden files and folders” there was no “pictures.pd-4″ nor “NavTree.state” so I still have lots of tags that I can’t get rid of no matter how may times I delete them.

On 19 July 2009 at 4:09 pm Gail Bjork (author) said:

In that case, you may have to remove them manually. If you still have the images with tags on the hard drive the tags will remain listed. I’ve removed all images that I don’t want the tags to show on a portable hard drive. I also made a partition on my hard drive for stock photos, move the ones I need to the desktop (they are copies). then delete them. If however, you open them with Windows Photo Gallery, the tags will be listed again. I’m not sure why the files you mention are not showing. You may be able to get some additional help in this forum.

On 5 September 2009 at 2:49 pm Harlan said:

This was driving me nuts when I found your blog. Here’s what worked for me: create a new tag, like “OLD TAGS”. Then in the left pane, select all the other tags (unfortunately you have to click on each with the control key pressed) and move them en masse under OLD TAGS. Then select OLD TAGS, right click and choose delete. Hey Presto!

On 5 September 2009 at 4:55 pm Gail Bjork (author) said:

Thanks for the additonal tip! Since I buy a good deal of stock photos, the problem often presents itself again. I’m going to try your tip too!