Get metadata from media files using ffprobe and Python

get_media_file_metadata.py

"""
MIT License

Copyright (c) 2019 Zev Averbach

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy
of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal
in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights
to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell
copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is
furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all
copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR
IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY,
FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE
AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER
LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM,
OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE
SOFTWARE.
"""
import json
import shlex
import subprocess
from typing import List

def get_metadata_with_ffprobe(filepath) -> List[dict]:
    """
    adapted from https://gist.github.com/oldo/dc7ee7f28851922cca09

    Note that it returns a list of dictionaries, and the keys are not necessarily
    all unique across the dictionaries.
    """
    cmd = "ffprobe -v quiet -print_format json -show_streams"
    args = shlex.split(cmd)
    args.append(filepath)
    ffprobe_output = subprocess.check_output(args).decode("utf-8")
    return json.loads(ffprobe_output)["streams"]