pi_video_looper

An application to turn your Raspberry Pi into a dedicated looping video playback device. Can be used in art installations, fairs, theatre, events, infoscreens, advertisment etc...

Easy to use out of the box but also has a lot of settings to make it fit your use case.

If you miss a feature just post an issue on github. (https://github.com/adafruit/pi_video_looper)

Changelog

new in v1.0.7

huge improvements to CPU utilisation with keyboard_control enabled
better randomness for random playback

new in v1.0.6

Support for OMXPlayer ALSA sound output.
Enabled by setting omxplayer.sound to alsa. A new config key alsa.hw_device can be used to specify a non-default output device.
Support for ALSA hardware volume control.
The new config keys alsa.hw_vol_file and alsa.hw_vol_control can be used to set the output device volume based on a text file provided with the videos.
The sound_vol_file functionality can now be disabled by leaving the config value empty.

new in v1.0.5

Support for M3U playlists.
To be enabled by specifying a playlist path in config key playlist.path. It can be absolute, or relative to the file_reader's search directories (directory: path given, usb_drive: all USB drives' root).
Paths in the playlist can be absolute, or relative to the playlist's path.
Playlists can include a title for each item (#EXTINF directive); see next point. If something goes wrong with the playlist (file not found etc.) it will fall back to just play all files in the file_reader directory. (enable console_output for more info)
Support for video titles (OMXPlayer only).
Can display a text on top of the videos.
To be enabled by config key omxplayer.show_titles. Without a playlist file, titles are simply the videos' filename (without extension).
If a M3U playlist is used, then titles come from the playlist instead.

An easy way to create M3U files is e.g. VLC. For an example m3u file see assets/example.m3u

new in v1.0.4

new keyboard shortcut "k"
skips the playback of current video (if a video is set to repeat it only skips one iteration)
new keyboard shortcut "s" stops the current playback. pressing s again starts the playback
reworked shortcut handling

new in v1.0.3

major new feature: copymode
files will be copied from the usb stick to the player (with fancy progress bar)
you can choose if the current files should be deleted beforehand (replace mode is default) or if files from the stick should be added (add mode)
the copymode is protected with a "password" which is represented with a file on the drive (set it via the video_looper.ini for more infos see "copymode explained below"
advanced playlist feature: add _repeat_Nx to any filename (N is a positive integer) and file will be looped that many times (additional infos see below)
added reload.sh to restart the looper and reload the settings from the ini

new in v1.0.2:

in directory mode the directory is now monitored; if the number of files changes the playlist is regenerated (usefull if the folder is filled e.g. via a network share)
some defaults have changed
new option for the countdown time (default is now 5 seconds)
new option for a wait time between videos (default is 0 seconds)
tweaks to the install script (skip the build of hello_video by using (sudo ./install.sh no_hello_video))
cleanup of the directory structure
added enable.sh analogous to disable.sh
added ntfs and exfat support for the usb drive

new in v1.0.1:

reworked for python3
keyboard control (quiting the player)
option for displaying an image instead of a blank screen between videos

how to install:

sudo ./install.sh

copymode explained:

when a usb drive with video files is plugged in, they are copied onto the rpi. (with progress bar)

to protect the player from unauthorised drives a file must be present on the drive that has a filename as defined in the password setting in the ini file (default: videopi)

there is also a setting that controls, if files on the drive should replace the existing files or get added. (replace means that the videofiles on the rpi get deleted) this ini setting can be overruled by placing a file named "replace" or "add" on the drive. the default mode is "replace"

Note: files with the same name always get overwritten

notable things:

you can have one video repeated X times before playing the next by adding _repeat_Nx to the filename of a video , where N is a positive number
- with hello_video there is no gap when a video is repeated but there is a small gap between different videos
- with omxplayer there will also be a short gap between the repeats
if you have only one video then omxplayer can also loop seamlessly (and wth audio)

trouble shooting:

nothing happening (screen flashes once) when in copymode and new drive is plugged in?
- check if you have the "password file" on your drive (see copymode explained above)

for a detailed tutorial visit: https://learn.adafruit.com/raspberry-pi-video-looper/installation

jamesdterry/pi_video_looper