Manage Photography the UNIX Way

After using UNIX for so many years you start to think the UNIX way. This article aims to automate and accelerate the flow of importing photos from camera and storing it for future use.

When I had a lot of time I shoot both RAW and JPEG images at the same time (RAW and JPEG file were written for every picture). Then I used one of the DxO Optics Pro/Raw Theraphee/Darktable applications to make these RAW files shine even more with mass conversion. Then I compared these to out of camera JPEG files and left only the one that suited me best. Its was probably the best way of having ‘the best version’ of each photo but it also took whole a lot of time. Now as I do not have that much time I needed to find a way to make this process fast and almost seamless.

Hardware

I use SONY cameras because they are superior to other brands when it comes to price/performance ratio and also have some important features that are absent in other brands. For example SONY A-mount based cameras – SONY a68 camera offers just so much more for very small amount of money then any near Nikon or Canon competitor. If you want to get grip on these differences take a look at my SONY a68 review at DPReview site – https://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/4152155 – available here.

Besides the price/performance ratio SONY cameras are just too fun/too comfortable to use something different – while providing similar or better results then Nikon/Canon competition. Take the viewfinder for example. Nikon/Canon cameras are ‘by default’ using the optical viewfinder and to switch to LCD panel you need to manually push a button and switch into the PAINFULLY SLOW (autofocus is actually unusable) mode called Live View … but if you want to use viewfinder again then you again need to switch that mode off with a button. How its implemented in SONY? SONY camera just automatically switches to EVF when you attach your eye to the viewfinder and switches back to LCD automatically when you take your eye off of it … and autofocus is same fast on both viewfinder and LCD. This is just one of the examples of course. For example Nikon cameras can not record movie when you are using viewfinder – you can only do it with LCD.

There is also SONY E-mount system which utilizes newer/different ideas – its generally much more expensive then older A-mount system but has even more features then Canon/Nikon cameras. One of the selling points of SONY E-mount cameras is also their small size – for which feature I recently switched from SONY a68 (A-mount) to SONY a5100 (E-mount) camera.

Approach

I basically use two SONY cameras.

The small and ultra portable SONY RX100 III which is probably the best pocket/compact camera in the world when it comes to price/performance ratio. As it has quite large 1 INCH sensor (2.7 crop factor) it allows to use high ISO values without that much noise which allows to shoot indoors in low light without much loss of quality. It also has tiltable flash which you can point to ceiling to get extra bounced light in low light situations indoors. This small gem generally has all the features that all SONY APS-C/Full Frame cameras have. Same menu interface with same features. Its not some small handicapped cripple like a lot of compact cameras. And its fast too. It even features EVF! It also features XAVC S 50 Mbit video codec which helps greatly in low light situations. Of course in good light conditions this camera shines even more. As it has 24-70mm f/1.8-2.8 light/fast lens it its very universal. The Full Frame depth of field equivalent is even better then most APS-C cameras because its f/4.9-7.6 Full Frame depth of field equivalent is better – for example – then SONY a6400 with its f/3.5-5.6 kit lens – which only has f/5.3-8.4 (because of 1.5 crop ratio for APS-C).

You can read more about depth of field equivalence here – https://www.dpreview.com/articles/2666934640/what-is-equivalence-and-why-should-i-care – a good article on DPReview explaining this.

The other SONY camera I used was SONY a68 with following lenses:

• TAMRON 18-270mm f/3.5-5.6 – all-rounder
• SONY 35mm f/1.8 – small bokeh low light friend
• SIGMA 50-150mm f/2.8 – large bokeh friend
• SAMYANG 85mm f/1.4 – manual focus bokeh master

… but as I checked my ‘habits’ it was that way most of the time:
– use/take small/portable SONY RX100 III because its convenient
– grab SONY a68 with 35mm f/1.8 at house for some bokeh pictures

If you are not sure what ‘bokeh’ means then please check Wikipedia article about it – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bokeh – available here.

I very rarely used other lenses. Which made me to think how to ‘optimize’ the SONY a68 A-mount camera. Also because SONY a68 built-in flash is not able to point up (to get extra light from ceiling indoors) I also needed dedicated external SONY HVL F20M flash on ISO hot shoe which made this large camera even bigger.

I checked the SONY portfolio and got older SONY a5100 E-mount camera instead. It has nice and fast autofocus from SONY a6000 camera along with XAVC S video codec and useful tiling LCD screen. It even has a touch screen which allows you to take a photo on the place when you touched the screen! It works similar in movies – just touch when you want it to focus. Its probably smallest SONY APS-C body – very close in size to SONY RX100 III … and I got SONY E-mount 35mm f/1.8 lens to it. I also missed 85mm f/1.4 lens so I take different route now. As E-mount system allows one to adapt older lenses with Lens Turbo adapters (about 0.7 ratio) I get an old used Minolta MD 56mm f/1.4 lens and E-mount to MD Lens Turbo adapter from ALIEXPRESS. This way I got small ultimate bokeh machine – with only one downside – manual autofocus – but SONY a5100 provides very nice implementation of Focus Peaking so its still a pleasure to use.

Of course SONY a5100 has its limitations – no viewfinder for example – but I VERY rarely used it anyway – of course intensive outdoor light can be problematic sometimes without EVF – but if someone wants to have EVF then one should get one of the SONY a6000/a6300/a6400/a6500 cameras – they are not much more larger and provide both EVF and hot shoe.

Generally SONY RX100 III when powered on its comparable in size with SONY a5100 with SONY 35mm f/1.8 lens. Its the powered off state and lens range (24-70mm on SONY RX100 III) that make a difference – the SONY RX100 III even fits in the pocket – SONY a5100 does not – maybe with SONY 20mm f/2.8 lens.

If you have quite more budget to spend I also recommend the SONY RX100 V/VA which also incorporates very fast phase detection autofocus and 4k video. The SONY RX100 IV only offers 4k video but still has slower contrast autofocus – thus its IMHO pointless to get it. For the record – the SONY RX100 III also uses slower contrast based autofocus and has video up to FullHD (1080p).

These cameras also share nice feat – they can be charged directly by attaching USB micro cable to them – very convenient – no need to provide dedicated external chargers for batteries. I really liked SONY a68 grip and lots of direct controls but I really like the size/compactness of SONY a5100. While SONY a5100 body weights 283 grams the SONY a68 is 690 grams – for the body alone. Add flash and larger lens to it and you get the idea.

Comparing to the other side the SONY RX100 III weights 290 grams while SONY a5100 wights 437 grams with SONY 35mm f/1.8 lens attached, not bad.

Gear Summary

I have settled on these two cameras for now.

• SONY RX100 III – gives 24-70mm f/4.9-7.6 depth of field Full Frame equivalent
• SONY a5100 with these lenses:
  • Sony 35mm f/1.8 OSS – gives 53mm f/2.7 depth of field Full Frame equivalent
  • Minolta MD 56mm f/1.4 with Lens Turbo 0.7x adapter – gives 59mm f/1.5 depth of field Full Frame equivalent

Scripts

I switched off shooting RAW+JPEG images and now I only shoot EXTRA FINE JPEG images with Vivid profile and -0.7 EV (to not have over-burned images).

The 1st part is copying the images to new directory. That means pictures from DCIM directory and movies from PRIVATE directory.

Now the first two scripts come to play – to rename images to something useful. Each Picture and Video will have YYYY.MM.DD.HHMM(x) name.

These are made by these two scripts:

• photo-rename-images.sh
• photo-rename-movies.sh

Links to the scripts will be posted later in the article.

The photo-rename-images.sh uses jhead as dependency.

Now as we have everything named as it should be the size needs to be addressed. The videos will be converted using ffmpeg and images will be compressed to 92% JPEG quality with convert utility from ImageMagick suite.

• photo-requality.sh
• photo-movie-audio-ac3.sh

One may ask why convert JPEG from 99% to 92% and lose more quality even more? Well, you should check the differences – and one have to try really hard with very large zoom to find any. For most purposes these differences are negligible. You can also use larger value to have quite better quality and less storage savings -take photo-requality.sh 95 for example as consensus.

This is the comparison between original out of camera JPEG file and the same file compressed to 92% quality using convert utility. I was not able to stop any differences – maybe you will.

One may be also worried about quality loss in the videos as the size savings are that big. I also tried to find these differences and if its really hard to find them then storage savings are justified – at least for me.

I also recently added photo-flow.sh which takes two arguments. First is the device under which the camera SD card is mounted – its mmcsd0s1 on FreeBSD for most of the times. The second is directory ~/photo.NEW in which the pictures and videos will be dumped, renamed and (re)compressed.

I have put these scripts to my external (from WordPress) account on GitHub – https://github.com/vermaden/scripts – here they are:

• photo-rename-images.sh
• photo-rename-movies.sh
• photo-requality.sh
• photo-movie-audio-ac3.sh
• photo-flow.sh

Flow

As I attached the SD card from one of my cameras to my laptop it was automounted by my automount solution – described here – Automount Removable Media – as /media/mmcsd0s1 directory – that will be first argument for the import scripts. As I import new pictures to ~/photo.NEW directory – that will be the second argument for the import scripts.

Below you will find example output of such import/convertion process. It took about half an hour on 2011 dual-core laptop (ThinkPad T420s). I omitted/cut large parts of the same output with (…) chars in the output.

% photo-flow.sh /media/mmcsd0s1 ~/photo.NEW
/media/mmcsd0s1/DCIM/100MSDCF/DSC00390.JPG -> /home/vermaden/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP/DSC00390.JPG
/media/mmcsd0s1/DCIM/100MSDCF/DSC00391.JPG -> /home/vermaden/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP/DSC00391.JPG
/media/mmcsd0s1/DCIM/100MSDCF/DSC00393.JPG -> /home/vermaden/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP/DSC00393.JPG
(...)
/media/mmcsd0s1/DCIM/100MSDCF/DSC00462.JPG -> /home/vermaden/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP/DSC00462.JPG
/media/mmcsd0s1/DCIM/100MSDCF/DSC00463.JPG -> /home/vermaden/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP/DSC00463.JPG
/media/mmcsd0s1/DCIM/100MSDCF/DSC00464.JPG -> /home/vermaden/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP/DSC00464.JPG
/media/mmcsd0s1/PRIVATE/M4ROOT/CLIP/C0015.MP4 -> /home/vermaden/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP/C0015.MP4
/media/mmcsd0s1/PRIVATE/M4ROOT/CLIP/C0015M01.XML -> /home/vermaden/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP/C0015M01.XML

DSC00390.JPG --> 2019.05.08.0732.jpg
DSC00391.JPG --> 2019.05.08.0732a.jpg
DSC00393.JPG --> 2019.05.08.0732b.jpg
(...)
DSC00462.JPG --> 2019.06.07.2110c.jpg
DSC00463.JPG --> 2019.06.07.2110d.jpg
DSC00464.JPG --> 2019.06.07.2110e.jpg
C0015.MP4 -> 2019.06.01.2140.MP4
C0015M01.XML -> 2019.06.01.2140.XML
File './2019.05.22.0543.jpg' converted to '92' quality.
File './2019.06.07.0508a.jpg' converted to '92' quality.
File './2019.06.01.2141.jpg' converted to '92' quality.
(...)
File './2019.05.23.0124c.jpg' converted to '92' quality.
File './2019.06.01.2140e.jpg' converted to '92' quality.
File './2019.05.22.0548a.jpg' converted to '92' quality.
ffmpeg version 4.1.3 Copyright (c) 2000-2019 the FFmpeg developers
(...)
Guessed Channel Layout for Input Stream #0.1 : stereo
Input #0, mov,mp4,m4a,3gp,3g2,mj2, from '2019.06.01.2140.MP4':
  Metadata:
    major_brand     : XAVC
    minor_version   : 16785407
    compatible_brands: XAVCmp42iso2
    creation_time   : 2019-06-01T19:40:52.000000Z
  Duration: 00:00:21.60, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 52049 kb/s
    Stream #0:0(und): Video: h264 (High) (avc1 / 0x31637661), yuv420p(tv, bt709/bt709/iec61966-2-4), 1920x1080 [SAR 1:1 DAR 16:9], 50101 kb/s, 50 fps, 50 tbr, 50k tbn, 100 tbc (default)
    Metadata:
      creation_time   : 2019-06-01T19:40:52.000000Z
      handler_name    : Video Media Handler
      encoder         : AVC Coding
    Stream #0:1(und): Audio: pcm_s16be (twos / 0x736F7774), 48000 Hz, stereo, s16, 1536 kb/s (default)
    Metadata:
      creation_time   : 2019-06-01T19:40:52.000000Z
      handler_name    : Sound Media Handler
    Stream #0:2(und): Data: none (rtmd / 0x646D7472), 409 kb/s (default)
    Metadata:
      creation_time   : 2019-06-01T19:40:52.000000Z
      handler_name    : Timed Metadata Media Handler
      timecode        : 83:01:01;02
Stream mapping:
  Stream #0:0 -> #0:0 (h264 (native) -> h264 (libx264))
  Stream #0:1 -> #0:1 (pcm_s16be (native) -> ac3 (native))
Press [q] to stop, [?] for help
[libx264 @ 0x80ddfb400] using SAR=1/1
[libx264 @ 0x80ddfb400] using cpu capabilities: MMX2 SSE2Fast SSSE3 SSE4.2 AVX
[libx264 @ 0x80ddfb400] profile High, level 4.2, 4:2:0, 8-bit
[libx264 @ 0x80ddfb400] 264 - core 157 - H.264/MPEG-4 AVC codec - Copyleft 2003-2018 - http://www.videolan.org/x264.html - options: cabac=1 ref=3 deblock=1:0:0 analyse=0x3:0x113 me=hex subme=7 psy=1 psy_rd=1.00:0.00 mixed_ref=1 me_range=16 chroma_me=1 trellis=1 8x8dct=1 cqm=0 deadzone=21,11 fast_pskip=1 chroma_qp_offset=-2 threads=1 lookahead_threads=1 sliced_threads=0 nr=0 decimate=1 interlaced=0 bluray_compat=0 constrained_intra=0 bframes=3 b_pyramid=2 b_adapt=1 b_bias=0 direct=1 weightb=1 open_gop=0 weightp=2 keyint=250 keyint_min=25 scenecut=40 intra_refresh=0 rc_lookahead=40 rc=crf mbtree=1 crf=23.0 qcomp=0.60 qpmin=0 qpmax=69 qpstep=4 vbv_maxrate=25000 vbv_bufsize=25000 crf_max=0.0 nal_hrd=none filler=0 ip_ratio=1.40 aq=1:1.00
Output #0, matroska, to '2019.06.01.2140.MP4.mkv':
  Metadata:
    major_brand     : XAVC
    minor_version   : 16785407
    compatible_brands: XAVCmp42iso2
    encoder         : Lavf58.20.100
    Stream #0:0(und): Video: h264 (libx264) (H264 / 0x34363248), yuv420p(progressive), 1920x1080 [SAR 1:1 DAR 16:9], q=-1--1, 50 fps, 1k tbn, 50 tbc (default)
    Metadata:
      creation_time   : 2019-06-01T19:40:52.000000Z
      handler_name    : Video Media Handler
      encoder         : Lavc58.35.100 libx264
    Side data:
      cpb: bitrate max/min/avg: 25000000/0/0 buffer size: 25000000 vbv_delay: -1
    Stream #0:1(und): Audio: ac3 ([0] [0][0] / 0x2000), 48000 Hz, stereo, fltp, 160 kb/s (default)
    Metadata:
      creation_time   : 2019-06-01T19:40:52.000000Z
      handler_name    : Sound Media Handler
      encoder         : Lavc58.35.100 ac3
frame= 1080 fps=4.1 q=31.0 Lsize=   30522kB time=00:00:21.59 bitrate=11578.4kbits/s speed=0.0815x    
video:30086kB audio:422kB subtitle:0kB other streams:0kB global headers:0kB muxing overhead: 0.046764%
(...)

This is how the pictures look like imported and converted after running the import flow. We still have original 2019.06.01.2140.MP4 movie but we can delete it of course.

% exa ~/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP
2019.05.08.0732.jpg   2019.05.22.0548.jpg   2019.05.25.2111.jpg   2019.06.01.0914.jpg   2019.06.01.2140.jpg      2019.06.07.0509.jpg
2019.05.08.0732a.jpg  2019.05.22.0548a.jpg  2019.05.25.2111a.jpg  2019.06.01.0915.jpg   2019.06.01.2140.MP4      2019.06.07.0509a.jpg
2019.05.08.0732b.jpg  2019.05.22.0548b.jpg  2019.05.25.2111b.jpg  2019.06.01.2043.jpg   2019.06.01.2140.MP4.mkv  2019.06.07.0509b.jpg
2019.05.08.0733.jpg   2019.05.22.0549.jpg   2019.05.25.2111c.jpg  2019.06.01.2043a.jpg  2019.06.01.2140.XML      2019.06.07.2110.jpg
2019.05.22.0541.jpg   2019.05.22.0550.jpg   2019.05.27.0712.jpg   2019.06.01.2043b.jpg  2019.06.01.2140a.jpg     2019.06.07.2110a.jpg
2019.05.22.0541a.jpg  2019.05.22.0551.jpg   2019.05.27.0712a.jpg  2019.06.01.2043c.jpg  2019.06.01.2140b.jpg     2019.06.07.2110b.jpg
2019.05.22.0542.jpg   2019.05.23.0124.jpg   2019.05.27.0712b.jpg  2019.06.01.2043d.jpg  2019.06.01.2140c.jpg     2019.06.07.2110c.jpg
2019.05.22.0542a.jpg  2019.05.23.0124a.jpg  2019.05.27.0712c.jpg  2019.06.01.2043e.jpg  2019.06.01.2140d.jpg     2019.06.07.2110d.jpg
2019.05.22.0542b.jpg  2019.05.23.0124b.jpg  2019.05.27.0712d.jpg  2019.06.01.2043f.jpg  2019.06.01.2140e.jpg     2019.06.07.2110e.jpg
2019.05.22.0542c.jpg  2019.05.23.0124c.jpg  2019.05.27.0712e.jpg  2019.06.01.2043g.jpg  2019.06.01.2141.jpg
2019.05.22.0543.jpg   2019.05.23.1831.jpg   2019.05.27.0712f.jpg  2019.06.01.2043h.jpg  2019.06.01.2141a.jpg
2019.05.22.0543a.jpg  2019.05.25.2110.jpg   2019.05.27.0713.jpg   2019.06.01.2043i.jpg  2019.06.07.0508.jpg
2019.05.22.0543b.jpg  2019.05.25.2110a.jpg  2019.05.27.0713a.jpg  2019.06.01.2044.jpg   2019.06.07.0508a.jpg

These are differences in size before and after conversion – both for example picture and video.

% ls -lh ~/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP/2019.06.01.2140.MP4*
-rw-r--r--  1 vermaden  vermaden   134M 2019.06.01 21:41 /home/vermaden/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP/2019.06.01.2140.MP4
-rw-r--r--  1 vermaden  vermaden    30M 2019.06.10 22:57 /home/vermaden/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP/2019.06.01.2140.MP4.mkv

% ls -lh /media/mmcsd0s1/DCIM/100MSDCF/DSC00430.JPG ~/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP/2019.05.27.0712f.jpg
-rw-r--r--  1 vermaden  vermaden   4.4M 2019.06.10 22:53 /home/vermaden/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP/2019.05.27.0712f.jpg
-rw-r--r--  1 vermaden  vermaden   6.4M 2019.05.27 07:12 /media/mmcsd0s1/DCIM/100MSDCF/DSC00430.JPG

The best savings are in the video – more then 4 times smaller file. The pictures are about 30% smaller.

Totals of the size differences for the whole import are below. First the original dump from camera SD card.

% du -scm /media/mmcsd0s1/DCIM /media/mmcsd0s1/PRIVATE/M4ROOT/CLIP
400     /media/mmcsd0s1/DCIM
135     /media/mmcsd0s1/PRIVATE/M4ROOT/CLIP
534     total

… and converted/imported size.

% rm ~/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP/2019.06.01.2140.MP4

% du -scm /home/vermaden/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP/*jpg | tail -1
265     total

% du -scm /home/vermaden/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP/*mkv | tail -1
30      total

% du -scm ~/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP
295     /home/vermaden/photo.NEW/2019.06.10.DUMP
295     total

So after import and conversion the pictures went from 400 to 265 MB and movies (actually one movie) went from 135 to 30 MB. The most important thing is that I can import and convert this convent without any interactive and lengthy process.

These scripts (definitely the video renamer one) may be SONY related but nothing stops you from modifying them to the files provided by your camera manufacturer.

Feel free to share your photography flow 🙂

EOF