EXIF data and AppleScript?

[Jeremy Lee]

Hi all,

I did a binaural recording of an event while taking a few hundred pictures on my DSLR. I'd like to align the images with the audio track. Is there any way to write an AppleScript that looks at the EXIF metadata in an image and creates a simple slideshow based in that timing data?

Thanks!

- Jeremy Lee's mobile device

[Rich Walsh]

This form will return a text variable along the lines of "2015:04:17 11:51:33":

tell application "Image Events"

launch

set eachImage to open eachFile

tell eachImage to set exifDate to value of metadata tag "creation"

close eachImage

end tell

Although this probably works just as well:

tell application "Image Events" to set exifDate to (value of metadata tag "creation" of (open eachFile))

Then I guess you need to parse that text into a time, maybe like this:

set {h, m, s} to {word 4, word 5, word 6} of exifDate

set daySeconds to 60 * 60 * h + 60 * m + s

You could then deduct the smallest time from all of them and use the remainder to set pre waits, or whatever?

Rich

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[micpool]

Ha 

I had come up with roughly the same method. Be aware though that EXIF tag "creation" can change  if you batch edit the original photos. I can't find an exif tag for Date and Time (original) that works.

This attached workspace  is 90 percent complete in terms of generating the whole slideshow. At the moment you need to move all the group cues into the master fire all group manually. I haven't got time at the moment to make this automatic but it shouldn't be too difficult

Mic

[micpool]

With attachment

[Jeremy Lee]

Mic and Rick- I bow in humbleness to the masters of the script! I'll try this first thing when I get back to my computer. 

There's apparently also an EXIF tag for "sub second time". This would make the creation of the timeline even more accurate if it actually works!

I'll say it again- this is the most amazing listserve on the planet.

Best,

Jeremy

- Jeremy Lee's mobile device

<EXIF DATA Slideshow.cues>

[micpool]

Attached is a complete solution which does everything with a single click of a button.

Image events is quite limited in the data types it reads.

Attached is a list of recognised tags

Mic

[luckydave]

Do you use Aperture? If so, it has AppleScript hooks for EXIF key/value pairs. You could experiment with what you find there, and then apply your findings to pre-waits for a QLab slide show.

-- 
luckydave

[Jeremy Lee]

Thanks Mic!

That is definitely a reduced set of exif data. Good to know what's accessible. 

- Jeremy Lee's iSlab

<Tags recognised by Image events.jpg>

<EXIF DATA Slideshow v0.95.zip>

[Jeremy Lee]

Hi all,

So, with some further digging, I found that an application called "A Better Finder Rename" can use more EXIF data than the Image Events in OS X.  I was able to automatically change all of the file names to HH.MM.SS.msc.JPG for example: "02.06.35.000.JPG".  It appears that the millisecond parameter recorded by the Canon 7D is not actually milliseconds, but hundredths of a second.

So I'm going to try and take Mic's scripts and parse out the new fils names for the times.  I'll let you know how it goes.

Thanks again!

jeremy

[John Leonard]

I’ve been using this program for years: it’s very versatile and very fast. Highly recommended.

John

> On 30 Jun 2015, at 19:11, Jeremy Lee <jerem...@jjlee.com> wrote:
>
> Hi all,
>

[micpool]

For those following along at home….

Here's my previous solution adapted to use Jeremy Lee's inspired discovery, to rename the files  by 'A Better File Rename' to recover the original camera date and times, instead of using image events which can only recover the last modified date and time.

First you take your image files and process them using A Better Finder Rename.

In my example you will see that the original files all ended up with the same time when they were converted from RAW.

ABFR has recovered the original camera EXIF dates and times. In my example I am formatting them to HH MM SS 

The renamed files are now dragged into the attached QLab workspace.

Press Key 1 and the workspace generates a  slideshow using the original camera times as pre waits.

Using this script, which could probably more elegant (being a cut and shunt of 3 previous projects with clever bits by Rich Walsh ) but does the job.

set userUpTime to 2 -- Time for images to fade up in

set userDownTime to 2 -- Time for images to fade down in

set userHoldTime to 0 -- Time to wait between starting fade down and starting fade up

-- Declarations

set notFirstCue to false

-- Main routine

tell application id "com.figure53.qlab.3" to tell front workspace

set selectedCues to every cue whose q type is "video" as list

set thecue to first item of selectedCues

set thetime to the q default name of thecue

set thehour to word 1 of thetime

set theminute to word 2 of thetime

set thesecond to word 3 of thetime

set thefirsttime to ((thehour * 3600) + (theminute * 60) + thesecond) as number

repeat with eachcue in selectedCues

set thecue to eachcue

set thetime to the q default name of thecue

set thehour to word 1 of thetime

set theminute to word 2 of thetime

set thesecond to word 3 of thetime

set thetime to ((thehour * 3600) + (theminute * 60) + thesecond) as number

set thetime to thetime - thefirsttime

set the pre wait of thecue to thetime

-- Make a fade out cue (not for the first cue)

if notFirstCue then

make type "Fade" -- Cue numbers and names not altered from QLab defaults

set fadeOutCue to last item of (selected as list)

set cue target of fadeOutCue to previousCue

set duration of fadeOutCue to userDownTime

set do opacity of fadeOutCue to true

set opacity of fadeOutCue to 0

set stop target when done of fadeOutCue to true

end if

-- Make a fade in cue

make type "Fade" -- Cue numbers and names not altered from QLab defaults

set fadeInCue to last item of (selected as list)

set opacity of eachcue to 0

set cue target of fadeInCue to eachcue

set pre wait of fadeInCue to userHoldTime

set duration of fadeInCue to userUpTime

set do opacity of fadeInCue to true

-- Make a Group Cue (have to do this here to get round QLab's auto-grouping of selections ≥ 2 cues)

make type "Group" -- Cue numbers not altered from QLab defaults

set groupCue to last item of (selected as list)

set mode of groupCue to fire_all

set q name of groupCue to "Crossfade to " & q list name of eachcue

set pre wait of groupCue to pre wait of eachcue

set pre wait of eachcue to 0

-- Move cues into right place

move cue id (uniqueID of eachcue) of parent of eachcue to end of groupCue

if notFirstCue then move cue id (uniqueID of fadeOutCue) of parent of fadeOutCue to end of groupCue

move cue id (uniqueID of fadeInCue) of parent of fadeInCue to end of groupCue

-- Setup variables for next pass

set previousCue to eachcue

set notFirstCue to true

end repeat

set thecuelist to current cue list

set selectedCues to every cue

repeat with eachcue in selectedCues

if q type of eachcue is in {"Group", "Video", "Fade"} then

set the q number of eachcue to ""

end if

end repeat

set thecuenumber to 1

set selectedCues to every cue in front cue list whose q type is "Group"

repeat with eachcue in selectedCues

set the q number of eachcue to thecuenumber

set thecuenumber to thecuenumber + 1

end repeat

set selectedCues to every cue of cue list 1 whose q type is "Group"

if (count selectedCues) is not 0 then

make type "Group"

set groupCue to last item of (selected as list)

set groupCueIsIn to parent of groupCue

repeat with eachcue in selectedCues

if contents of eachcue is not groupCueIsIn then -- Skip a Group Cue that contains the new Group Cue

set eachCueID to uniqueID of eachcue

move cue id eachCueID of parent of eachcue to end of groupCue

end if

end repeat

end if

set groupCue to last item of (selected as list)

set mode of groupCue to fire_all

set q name of groupCue to "EXIF Timed Sequence"

end tell

Mic

[Jeremy Lee]

Hi all,

Just to finish up the thread, here's my final version of the Applescript that I used, modified from Mic's.  I found that with over 350 still images, that QLab would absolutely choke when they were contained in a "Fire All" group.  So I ended up using Mic's script to do the heavy lifting, then running Rich Walch's script to translate the "Fire All" prewaits into "Fire First" with individual waits between cues.

The final video is here: https://youtu.be/d1Y0DJ5AXfU?t=1195

I captured it with Screenflow.  The timings didn't totally line up exactly.  I'm not sure if that's because the EXIF data is slightly off, the calculations I made are somewhat off,  QLab lost sync somehow (not too likely), or what.  But for the purpose of this video, they are just fine.

Script Below:

-- Assumes that file name is in the format: HH.MM.SS.msc.JPG (the last bit is actually hundredths of a second)- this can be performed using the application A Better Finder Rename

set userUpTime to 0.1 -- Time for images to fade up in

set userDownTime to 2 -- Time for images to fade down in

set userHoldTime to 0

-- Time to wait between starting fade down and starting fade up

-- Declarations

set notFirstCue to false

-- Main routine

-- Find out the time of the first cue based on the file name

tell application id "com.figure53.qlab.3" to tell front workspace

set selectedCues to every cue whose q type is "video" as list

set thecue to first item of selectedCues

set thetime to the file target of thecue as string

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to {":"}

-- Extract filename from full path

set thetime to the last text item of thetime as string

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to {"."}

set thehour to text item 1 of thetime

set theminute to text item 2 of thetime

set thesecond to text item 3 of thetime

set themilisecond to text item 4 of thetime

set thefirsttime to ((thehour * 3600) + (theminute * 60) + thesecond + (themilisecond / 100))

-- display dialog "The starting time is: " & thefirsttime & " seconds."

-- Start creating the sequence

repeat with eachcue in selectedCues

set thecue to eachcue

--set the prewait to the time based on the file name

set thetime to the file target of thecue as string

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to {":"}

-- Extract filename from full path

set thetime to the last text item of thetime as string

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to {"."}

set thehour to text item 1 of thetime

set theminute to text item 2 of thetime

set thesecond to text item 3 of thetime

set themilisecond to text item 4 of thetime

set thetime to ((thehour * 3600) + (theminute * 60) + thesecond + (themilisecond / 100))

set thetime to thetime - thefirsttime

set the pre wait of thecue to thetime

-- display dialog "The Prewait of this cue is " & thetime & " seconds."

start cue "NUMB"

end tell

[Jeremy Lee]

PS- there's an amazing terminal command for the batch processing of image files. "sips".  Go to the Terminal and type "man sips" for the lowdown.

Jeremy