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Get filenames for photos from camera roll
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cvp,
Thanks for the input. I used your script from above and I get the same problem that I've grown to expect. It seems that get_image_data only returns the first frame (or something). A file with the correct name is created on the FTP server just as expected, however, the contents are not that of a valid video (.MOV). In fact the file size is approximately 110Kb on my Windows machine and that is rather small for a 30 second video.
This brings me back to the original problem.
I will try copying the video file from the photo assets to a sandbox/local directory and then pass that on to the FTP server.
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The problem is that you DO NOT GET even read access to video files unless you specifically request it. The following fails
p = photos.pick_asset(assets=photos.get_assets(media_type='video')) file_name = str(ObjCInstance(p).valueForKey_('filename')) P=ObjCInstance(p) try: print(str(P.pathForOriginalFile())) open(str(P.pathForOriginalFile()),'rb') except PermissionError: print('Could not open')
(The other examples people used above tried to read files in the script folder, which will certainly fail unless you have already created such a file!)
Now, it turns out you can get read access to the file, but it takes a few extra steps:
https://gist.github.com/de01d929d3477a4c8e7ae9517d5b3d70With this I was able to read a few dozen moviews taken in my ipad. Note video files are big, so if you want to read to a file (though not needed...) you should read in chunks.
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@billbris sorry, I did not understand your real problem of only one frame, and I did not check the size of my file on FTP server, shame on me
@jonb and one more time, Thanks to the biggest guru of this forum. I'm not sure that I will still try to help here 😢
In my example, I never read a file, I write it, thus I did not get any error, it I agree that only one frame has been written. -
@cvp: No problem, I appreciate the time and effort.
@jonb: The linked code worked just as advertised. I have no experience, yet, with the real internals of iOS, nor with video files. I'm sure that there is a very good reason why videos are handled so much differently than pictures, but at some level they are all just files. Regardless, the code works and I can incorporate it into my existing solution. Thanks for the mind share! -
So... in the end, how long does it take to ftp the 1600 files?
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@ccc: Once I get everything for the video transfer in place, I will let you know. At this point, I have made no attempt at anything other than functionality. Also, of the 1600+ files, only 32 or so are videos. I will post results when I'm finished.
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I have the video copy code in my ftp app. It now copies video files (MOV) over ftp to the server and the videos play perfectly.
So, thank you for the pointer. It works.
Two questions:
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While attempting to understand the code I found myself stumbling on what was happening with the asset. A group of videos is sent to the script, they are then each processed by standard PHIImageManager into what appears to be an AVAsset rather than a Photos.Asset. I am guessing that is required to get at the video data. What is missing on the server side are the other meta-data (video creation date, etc.) that the AVAsset seems to imply should be there. So, the video data is copied, and nothing else. Ideas on improving this to get everything across, including meta-data.
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This seems to work for a block of video assets, it would be nice to have it handle a single video file as well. Other than packing up a single video file asset into a collection (having only one element) and passing that to the script, does anyone understand what is happening in the OS enough to make the sample gist above work for just one file at a time?
Those are picky "wishlist" things, but I am investigation them for completion sake.
Finally, once again, thanks to everyone for their amazing pointers and help.
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@billbris Are you willing to publish your code on GitHub? It is easier to debug Python code than English prose. My bet is that it would be easier for folks to add their code to your code rather than start from scratch.
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The original asset list could instead be passed to pick_asset to choose a single asset, which would then be passed the
request....
. method. The fundamental method operates on a single asset at a time.As i mentioned in the comments, it would be possible to do the work inside the request handle, though it might be necessary to have a threading lock (not sure).
As for metadata, AVAsset has a
metadata
method, also a `creationDate’. -
@ccc: Sorry for the long delay.
I finally had some time to work on this and just finished running a full batch from my iPad mini.
I copied 1803 files, 32 of which are videos. The total time (not overly scientific, but with a simple take a time at the beginning and end to calculate the delta) was 28minutes and 34 seconds.
I've done nothing to optimize this, but it does work and that's not awful for a first attempt.
Thanks again for the help!