Display a preview image from a video swift - ios

Question

I have a folder in my documents directory containing images and videos, In my app i have a collection view that displays the images in each cell.
I have accomplished this with a load image function that returns a UIImage
// Get the UI Image from the path passed in
let image = UIImage(contentsOfFile: path)
if image == nil
{
print("No Image at this path");
}
else
{
return image
}
However I can't seem to find something equivalent for videos, Ideally I want it to show as the video player thing like in photo album where you see a still of the video with a little play button on it that when clicked plays the video.
Failing that purely being able to get a still from the video at the specified path I have to be returned as a UIImage I can display would be ok.
I am new to iOS stuff so just wondering if there is some equivalent type like UIImage for videos that means I can just load and display it on the collection view.

Answer 1

You need a snapshot of the video and display it along with a play button. Here is my func in Swift 2 that can get you the video-snapshot for a video file at path filePathLocal:
func videoSnapshot(filePathLocal: String) -> UIImage? {
let vidURL = URL(fileURLWithPath:filePathLocal as String)
let asset = AVURLAsset(url: vidURL)
let generator = AVAssetImageGenerator(asset: asset)
generator.appliesPreferredTrackTransform = true
let timestamp = CMTime(seconds: 1, preferredTimescale: 60)
do {
let imageRef = try generator.copyCGImage(at: timestamp, actualTime: nil)
return UIImage(cgImage: imageRef)
}
catch let error as NSError
{
print("Image generation failed with error \(error)")
return nil
}
}

Answer 2

Swift 3 version
func videoPreviewUiimage(fileName:String) -> UIImage? {
let filePath = NSString(string: "~/").expandingTildeInPath.appending("/Documents/").appending(fileName)
let vidURL = NSURL(fileURLWithPath:filePath)
let asset = AVURLAsset(url: vidURL as URL)
let generator = AVAssetImageGenerator(asset: asset)
generator.appliesPreferredTrackTransform = true
let timestamp = CMTime(seconds: 2, preferredTimescale: 60)
do {
let imageRef = try generator.copyCGImage(at: timestamp, actualTime: nil)
return UIImage(cgImage: imageRef)
}
catch let error as NSError
{
print("Image generation failed with error \(error)")
return nil
}
}
Based on Nishant answer above.

Answer 3

Using a URL for your path is better than using String:
func videoPreviewImage(url: URL) -> UIImage? {
let asset = AVURLAsset(url: url)
let generator = AVAssetImageGenerator(asset: asset)
generator.appliesPreferredTrackTransform = true
if let cgImage = try? generator.copyCGImage(at: CMTime(seconds: 2, preferredTimescale: 60), actualTime: nil) {
return UIImage(cgImage: cgImage)
}
else {
return nil
}
}

Answer 4

For swift 3.0
func generateThumbnailForVideoAtURL(filePathLocal: NSString) -> UIImage? {
let vidURL = NSURL(fileURLWithPath:filePathLocal as String)
let asset = AVURLAsset(url: vidURL as URL)
let generator = AVAssetImageGenerator(asset: asset)
generator.appliesPreferredTrackTransform = true
let timestamp = CMTime(seconds: 1, preferredTimescale: 60)
do {
let imageRef = try generator.copyCGImage(at: timestamp, actualTime: nil)
return UIImage(cgImage: imageRef)
}
catch let error as NSError
{
print("Image generation failed with error \(error)")
return nil
}
}