topic Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123 in ArcGIS Survey123 Questions

Multiple Photos in Survey123

TonyStrothers — Wed, 16 Sep 2015 15:28:23 GMT

Hello,

We are wanting to use Survey123 for a field inspection form and we were wondering if Survey123 can be set to take multiple pictures without having to set each picture as its own field. Either one picture or 12 pictures. Does anyone know if this is possible? If so, how is it done?

Thanks!

Tony

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

IsmaelChivite — Wed, 16 Sep 2015 20:21:19 GMT

[Updated September 1 2020]

Please refer to this blog post for details: https://community.esri.com/groups/survey123/blog/2020/08/07/survey123-tricks-of-the-trade-photos In short, you can use the multiline appearance on an image question to enable multiple photos on a single image question.

Hi Tony,

there are two approaches here that you can take:

1- Add multiple image questions in your form. Please note that Survey123 for ArcGIS will store your photos always as attachments, so technically no multiple fields are created in the feature service. I like this option the best because the photos get attached to your survey123 feature layer, making it very easy for you to look at your photos in web map popups. You can add as many image questions to a Survey as you like.

2- Use a repeat. You can add an image question within a repeat. Repeats are not my favorite approach, because photos are attached to a related table, making it very difficult to access the photos: you need ArcGIS Pro or ArcMap. However, with repeats you can let people take an unlimited number of photos.

Looking at upcoming enhancements, we want to support capturing multiple photos with a repeat without pushing the attachments to a related table. This will get the bests of repeats (unlimited photos) and adding image questions to your survey. We are looking at adding this functionality in either the September or October updates.

Ismael

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

TonyStrothers — Mon, 21 Sep 2015 13:10:10 GMT

Thank you sir!!! I really appreciate your hands on approach to helping all of us. The Survey123 application is amazing and I hope Esri sees it all the way through because the potential is enormous.

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

ErnestoCarreras3 — Tue, 26 Jan 2016 21:13:37 GMT

Is there anything else that needs to be done for the pictures to get attached to the collected feature? I followed the instructions as described above and in the help, but when I send the survey back to the feature service, and download the layer as a SHP or FGDB, the images are not being downloaded with it. Also they won't display in AGOL.

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

IsmaelChivite — Tue, 26 Jan 2016 21:48:25 GMT

Hi Ernesto,

here are a couple of things to look at:

Images get persisted as geodatabase attachments. As such, you should be able to see them related to the features you create. If you add the Survey feature service into a web map, you should be able to see the attachments when you click on them to bring the popup. The exception to this rule is images within a repeat. The issue in this case is that the ArcGIS.com Map Viewer does not support displaying attachments on related tables. ArcMap however is able to see the images in this case (through the identify tool), once you download the data in FileGeodatabase format.
When you add your feature service to the Web Map in ArcGIS.com, make sure you add it from your 'Contents' ta rather than through the link in the survey123 web site.
When you download the data, you should use FileGeodatabase format, because otherwise the attachments do not get downloaded.
If you do not see the attachments anywhere, then check with folks capturing data as they may be getting errors while sending the images from their phone. If the connection is not strong, large image uploads may fail. This is a common problem people have reported and we are working on a fix.

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

KevinRobert1 — Thu, 26 Jan 2017 20:15:43 GMT

I am using the first solution oulined. Is there a way to put a relevant clause that will show the "image2...3...4.." only when an image has been added? Instead of seeing 5 image question on the suvey?

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

IsmaelChivite — Thu, 26 Jan 2017 20:19:48 GMT

I am guessing you could do something like this:

Q0: Take a Photo (image question)

Q1: More photos? (yes no question. Default to NO)

Q:2 Take Photo 2 (use relevant statement to show only if Q1 is yes)

Q3: More photos? (yes no question. Default to NO) (use relevant statement to show only if Q1 is yes)

Q:4 Take Photo 3 (use relevant statement to show only if Q3 is yes) etc

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

KeithHupperts — Tue, 16 May 2017 15:14:50 GMT

Was this enhancement ever completed and released (allowing for multiple photos with a repeat without pushing the images to a related table)?

Thanks,

Keith

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

JamieKelly1 — Mon, 06 Nov 2017 12:54:13 GMT

It seems like a change has been made to Survey123 when it comes to image questions in a repeat to capture multiple attachments for a record. At version 1.8 I'm pretty sure all the images were stored as attachments to the main record, now at version 2.4 it seems that all the images are stored as a related table containing a row that contains an attachment field for each individual image.

Is there a way to set up a survey to allow users to add multiple attachments to a single feature layer without having to generate a schema with a related table?

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

JamesTedrick — Mon, 06 Nov 2017 19:29:27 GMT

Hi Jamie,

There hasn't been a change in behavior- images that are in a repeat (as this Ismael's answer describe) appear in separate table as attachments of a repeated row. Other images are stored as attachments of the parent form.

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

BenjaminBlackshear — Thu, 18 Jan 2018 18:08:47 GMT

is a solution to have images in repeats stored as attachments still part of the product plan? we could really use this functionality!

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

JohnWalls2 — Wed, 07 Mar 2018 17:58:29 GMT

Hi Ismael,

Has there been any progress on this update? If not, when can we expect something?

Thank you!

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

IsmaelChivite — Wed, 07 Mar 2018 19:57:38 GMT

Hi John. No progress so far.

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

JohnWalls2 — Wed, 07 Mar 2018 20:09:00 GMT

Thank you Ismael.

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

JevitaWebster — Wed, 28 Mar 2018 15:29:36 GMT

you said using a repeat in your survey makes it hard to view the photos. In order to view the photo ArcGIS Pro or ArcMap is needed. can you explain that more please.

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

JamesTedrick — Wed, 28 Mar 2018 15:35:52 GMT

Hi Jevita,

Multiple photos will be stored as attachments to a related table of the Survey row- when you show the popup/identify window on a row, you would need to click on the related records, and then view that record's attachments

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

TonyStephens1 — Mon, 02 Apr 2018 23:53:41 GMT

I too would like to add my voice to getting the repeat photos, stored as attachments rather than in a table, built in to the product. Thanks, and keep up the good work ESRI.

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

MatthewFox — Tue, 08 May 2018 17:48:06 GMT

Kevin-

I've successfully created a formula for the relevant column that will hide multiple photo fields unless the previous photo field is completed - here is a screenshot of my XLS Form

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

irishadar — Wed, 18 Jul 2018 10:13:44 GMT

Hi,

What would be you suggestion If I need the user to writ caption for the images they take.

Thanks in advanced ,

Iris hadar

Re: Multiple Photos in Survey123

JevitaWebster — Wed, 18 Jul 2018 13:33:33 GMT

I would suggest a description field

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