We appreciated our good friend Nick Didlick’s PetaPixel post about his success at demonstrating an authentic workflow at the Olympics, and the broader conversation about authenticity in photojournalism. These are important discussions, not just for major sporting events, but for the future of photography as a profession.
We’d like to offer a bit more context about the Content Authenticity features currently in development for Photo Mechanic.
Who We Think This Will Help
We anticipate Content Authenticity in Photo Mechanic being useful for:
- Photographers who want to demonstrate that their work originated in-camera. In an era of generative AI and synthetic imagery, provenance matters. It’s time to get back to capturing reality instead of inventing it.
- Press outlets and wire services that need confidence in the chain of custody of visual assets in order to establish trust in their readership.
- Photo contests and awards organizations seeking reliable tools to confirm that submissions are not AI-generated.
- Brands and agencies that want to protect identity and reputation by proving that product photos, sponsorship images, and campaign visuals are authentic.
- Large organizations who want to maintain authentic imagery for their own purposes.
Our goal is not to change how photographers work, but to make authenticity part of their normal workflow when they need it.
C2PA Is Complex! Our Job Is to Simplify It
The underlying technology here is based on the C2PA (Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity) standard. C2PA is powerful, but it is also technically complex. There are manifests, signatures, trust chains, cryptographic verification layers, and interoperability considerations.
Working photographers should not need to understand all of that in order to use it!
At Camera Bits, our role is to translate that complexity into something practical, reliable, and fast, just like we’ve done for metadata workflows for decades. We are building the interface and workflow so that image provenance can be managed inside Photo Mechanic in a way that feels familiar and efficient.
Still in Active Development
A few important clarifications:
- The Content Authenticity feature in Photo Mechanic is not yet in public beta.
- We do not have a public release timeline at this point.
- The workflow and interface are still being refined in collaboration with members of the Content Authenticity Initiative (CAI) as well as various professional photographers.
The C2PA SDK itself that will be used by Photo Mechanic is not yet final. It is an open-source project originated by the Content Authenticity Initiative (CAI). The important thing to understand here is that C2PA defines the standards. CAI promotes and provides tools that implement those standards. As the SDK evolves, so will our implementation. We are building carefully and are meticulously reviewing new changes to the SDK before integrating them to ensure stability and long-term compatibility. We are still refining the final pieces of this puzzle, which are the all-important timestamps missing from most cameras that sign photos with C2PA. This is crucial in our opinion.
Camera Compatibility
This feature is not limited to a single camera manufacturer.
Photo Mechanic’s implementation will work with any camera that supports the C2PA standard. The standard itself is defined by the C2PA, and we are building around that open specification. As more manufacturers adopt C2PA-compatible signing in-camera, Photo Mechanic will support those files.
Our aim is interoperability, not exclusivity.
Moving Forward
Authenticity and verification are becoming part of the modern photographer’s professional toolkit. We see this not as a replacement for trust in photographers, but as an additional layer of confidence in an environment where synthetic media is increasingly common.
We are excited about where this is headed, and we are committed to making the process as seamless as possible for working professionals and any photographer interested in proving the provenance of their photos.
For those of you who want a deep dive into the hardcore technical challenges of implementation, give Dennis’ Camera Bits Image Authenticity and Provenance (CBIAP) white paper a read. It describes the patent-pending Provenance Locker™ solution in detail.
To read more on Content Authenticity, here aresome background links:
This is the Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity’s main site with background on the standard, links to specifications, and resources for implementers and adopters.
Official Content Authenticity Initiative (CAI) site
This site explains CAI’s goals in promoting the adoption of C2PA’s Content Credentials and contains explainers, FAQs, and community details.
Content Credentials educational hub
A useful resource focused specifically on the “Content Credentials” concept — how provenance works, who’s involved, and why it matters.
We’ll share more details as the SDK stabilizes and the workflow matures.
— The Camera Bits Team