Create thumbnail from a video url in IPhone SDK - ios

Question

I am trying to acquire a thumbnail from a video url. The video is a stream (HLS) with the m3u8 format.
I've already tried requestThumbnailImagesAtTimes from the MPMoviePlayerController, but that didn't work. Does anyone have a solution for that problem? If so how'd you do it?

Answer 1

If you don't want to use MPMoviePlayerController, you can do this:
AVAsset *asset = [AVAsset assetWithURL:sourceURL];
AVAssetImageGenerator *imageGenerator = [[AVAssetImageGenerator alloc]initWithAsset:asset];
CMTime time = CMTimeMake(1, 1);
CGImageRef imageRef = [imageGenerator copyCGImageAtTime:time actualTime:NULL error:NULL];
UIImage *thumbnail = [UIImage imageWithCGImage:imageRef];
CGImageRelease(imageRef); // CGImageRef won't be released by ARC
Here's an example in Swift:
func thumbnail(sourceURL sourceURL:NSURL) -> UIImage {
let asset = AVAsset(URL: sourceURL)
let imageGenerator = AVAssetImageGenerator(asset: asset)
let time = CMTime(seconds: 1, preferredTimescale: 1)
do {
let imageRef = try imageGenerator.copyCGImageAtTime(time, actualTime: nil)
return UIImage(CGImage: imageRef)
} catch {
print(error)
return UIImage(named: "some generic thumbnail")!
}
}
I prefer using AVAssetImageGenerator over MPMoviePlayerController because it is thread-safe, and you can have more than one instantiated at a time.

Answer 2

Acquire a thumbnail from a video url.
NSString *strVideoURL = #"http://www.xyzvideourl.com/samplevideourl";
NSURL *videoURL = [NSURL URLWithString:strVideoURL] ;
MPMoviePlayerController *player = [[[MPMoviePlayerController alloc] initWithContentURL:videoURL]autorelease];
UIImage *thumbnail = [player thumbnailImageAtTime:1.0 timeOption:MPMovieTimeOptionNearestKeyFrame];
player = nil;
Replace your video URL string with strVideoURL.
You will get thumbnail as a output from video.
And thumbnail is UIImage type data !

Answer 3

-(UIImage *)loadThumbNail:(NSURL *)urlVideo
{
AVURLAsset *asset = [[AVURLAsset alloc] initWithURL:urlVideo options:nil];
AVAssetImageGenerator *generate = [[AVAssetImageGenerator alloc] initWithAsset:asset];
generate.appliesPreferredTrackTransform=TRUE;
NSError *err = NULL;
CMTime time = CMTimeMake(1, 60);
CGImageRef imgRef = [generate copyCGImageAtTime:time actualTime:NULL error:&err];
NSLog(#"err==%#, imageRef==%#", err, imgRef);
return [[UIImage alloc] initWithCGImage:imgRef];
}
Add AVFoundation framework in your project and don't forget to import <AVFoundation/AVFoundation.h> and you have to pass the path of your video saved in document directory as a parameter and receive the image as UIImage.

Answer 4

you can get the thumbnail from your video url with the use of below code
MPMoviePlayerController *player = [[[MPMoviePlayerController alloc] initWithContentURL:videoURL]autorelease];
UIImage *thumbnail = [player thumbnailImageAtTime:0.0 timeOption:MPMovieTimeOptionNearestKeyFrame];

Answer 5

Maybe this is useful for someone else who faces the same problem. I needed an easy solution for creating a thumbnail for Images, PDFs and Videos. To solve that problem I've created the following Library (in Swift).
https://github.com/prine/ROThumbnailGenerator
The usage is very straightforward:
var thumbnailImage = ROThumbnail.getThumbnail(url)
It has internally three different implementations and depending on the file extension it does create the thumbnail. You can easily add your own implementation if you need a thumbnail creator for another file extension.

Answer 6

Swift 3 Version :
func createThumbnailOfVideoFromFileURL(videoURL: String) -> UIImage? {
let asset = AVAsset(url: URL(string: videoURL)!)
let assetImgGenerate = AVAssetImageGenerator(asset: asset)
assetImgGenerate.appliesPreferredTrackTransform = true
let time = CMTimeMakeWithSeconds(Float64(1), 100)
do {
let img = try assetImgGenerate.copyCGImage(at: time, actualTime: nil)
let thumbnail = UIImage(cgImage: img)
return thumbnail
} catch {
// Set a default image if Image is not acquired
return UIImage(named: "ico_placeholder")
}
}

Answer 7

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)
let frameImg : UIImage = UIImage(cgImage: imageRef)
return frameImg
} catch let error as NSError {
print("Image generation failed with error ::\(error)")
return nil
}
}

Answer 8

For Swift 5 you can get it this way:
First import AVKit or AVFoundation to ViewController
import AVKit
Code:
// Get Thumbnail Image from URL
private func getThumbnailFromUrl(_ url: String?, _ completion: #escaping ((_ image: UIImage?)->Void)) {
guard let url = URL(string: url ?? "") else { return }
DispatchQueue.main.async {
let asset = AVAsset(url: url)
let assetImgGenerate = AVAssetImageGenerator(asset: asset)
assetImgGenerate.appliesPreferredTrackTransform = true
let time = CMTimeMake(value: 2, timescale: 1)
do {
let img = try assetImgGenerate.copyCGImage(at: time, actualTime: nil)
let thumbnail = UIImage(cgImage: img)
completion(thumbnail)
} catch {
print("Error :: ", error.localizedDescription)
completion(nil)
}
}
}
Usage
#IBOutlet weak imgThumbnail: ImageView!
and then call getThumbnailFromUrl method and pass URL as a Sting
self.getThumbnailFromUrl(videoURL) { [weak self] (img) in
guard let `self` = self else { return }
if let img = img {
self.imgThumbnail.image = img
}
}
Thank you

Answer 9

Swift 2 code with AVAssetImageGenerator:
func thumbnailImageForVideo(url:NSURL) -> UIImage?
{
let asset = AVAsset(URL: url)
let imageGenerator = AVAssetImageGenerator(asset: asset)
imageGenerator.appliesPreferredTrackTransform = true
var time = asset.duration
//If possible - take not the first frame (it could be completely black or white on camara's videos)
time.value = min(time.value, 2)
do {
let imageRef = try imageGenerator.copyCGImageAtTime(time, actualTime: nil)
return UIImage(CGImage: imageRef)
}
catch let error as NSError
{
print("Image generation failed with error \(error)")
return nil
}
}