17 Jul 2012 Rename AVCHD files using Exiftools

Posted by Hans-Henry Jakobsen

Simple bash script to rename AVCHD/MTS/MOV files to match their recording date and time.

#!/bin/bash
if [ -z "$1" ]; then
echo "Usage: ./rename_video.sh FILETYPE" 1>&2
echo "Example: ./rename_video.sh *.MTS" 1>&2
exit 1
fi
for x in "$@"
do
exiftool '-FileName<DateTimeOriginal' -d %Y%m%d_%H%M%S_%%f.%%e "$x"
done
The resulting files will be named like YYYYMMDD_HHMMSS.ext ie 20120703_005600.MTS

Exiftools can also be used to perform the renaming process in Windows as well using a command window

# exiftool "-FileName<DateTimeOriginal" -d %Y%m%d_%H%M%S_%%f.%%e *.MTS

This script has been tested on Canon Legria and on Panasonic HDC-SD800 video camera MTS-files and Nikon D7000 MOV-files with great success.

Tags: avchd, bash, exiftools, rename