Actors don't get scraped for NFO imported content

[Emby Tower 33]

Hi,

 

some days ago I imported some content which have already customized NFOs (they were created by Emby Server!) and detected that the "Cast & Crew" part doesn't get scraped and refreshed. The "Refresh People" task doesn't help, only a refresh (with metadata replacing!) on every single person!

 

Is it a bug or a correct behavior?

[Luke 37100]

Hi there, can you please discuss the details of a specific example? thanks !

[Happy2Play 8296]

Currently Emby does not create person.xml or read existing person.xml.  All actor metadata is written directly to the database.

[Emby Tower 33]

@@Luke

 

2 examples: If I import a movie which has already a NFO file from a previous scraping session, no one from the "Cast & Crew" section in this movie will get metadata and / or a picture! Then I have only metadata and pictures from persons who gets already correctly scraped via other content! Visual example: http://prntscr.com/eied7k

If I import the same movie without the NFO file, the scraper will collect all the metadata and pictures for Cast & Crew!

[Happy2Play 8296]

Well some of that points your options.

Download images in advance
By default, most images are only downloaded when requested by an Emby app. Enable this option to download all images in advance, as new media is imported. This may cause significantly longer library scans.

Do you have this enabled?  If not then they will not be downloaded until you click on the Actor.

[Luke 37100]

No that isn't true in this case. If that were happening you would see an image placeholder that would get filled in.

[Happy2Play 8296]

@@Luke

 

2 examples: If I import a movie which has already a NFO file from a previous scraping session, no one from the "Cast & Crew" section in this movie will get metadata and / or a picture! Then I have only metadata and pictures from persons who gets already correctly scraped via other content! Visual example: http://prntscr.com/eied7k

If I import the same movie without the NFO file, the scraper will collect all the metadata and pictures for Cast & Crew!

 

No that isn't true in this case. If that were happening you would see an image placeholder that would get filled in.

 

Okay so this is a matter of reading vs writing.  Doesn't this apply across the board?  If metadata exist Emby will only read what it is presented with and if no metadata is present it will fetch all media. 

[Emby Tower 33]

@Happy2Play: No, I never hadn't activated to download images in advance. And it never was a disadvantage for me.

 

Like you can see on my screenshot above, it all depends if the media folder contains a NFO file during the initial scraping or not. If not, all metadata and images from the actors and the crew will be fetched. And if there is a NFO file, nothing happens with cast and crew!

 

And to get some additional clearance: Actors and crewmen which gets correctly scraped via another content, will be shown (in the screenshot you can see John Goodman, which was fetched via my non-NFO scan of "The Monuments Men", but not Piper Perabo)!

[Happy2Play 8296]

 

And to get some additional clearance: Actors and crewmen which gets correctly scraped via another content, will be shown (in the screenshot you can see John Goodman, which was fetched via my non-NFO scan of "The Monuments Men", but not Piper Perabo)!

Was he fetched or did you already have him in your people folder?

[Happy2Play 8296]

@@Luke doesn't existing metadata rely of the Refresh people task and new metadata gets fetched?

Edited March 10, 2017 by Happy2Play

[Emby Tower 33]

Was he fetched or did you already have him in your people folder?

The move was the first with John Goodman!

[WannaTheater 0]

New user here, but I am having the same issue:

1) I have NFOs created from KODI, with links to all of the actors embedded in NFO.  These were created by using Kodi scrapers, and exporting individual files.

 

For example, in an NFO:

    <actor>

        <name>Michael Fassbender</name>

        <role>Callum Lynch / Aguilar de Nerha</role>

        <order>0</order>

        <thumb>http://image.tmdb.org/t/p/original/oexNPLumoFpazzzUqzBSDDYiUg1.jpg</thumb>

    </actor>

 

I also have .actor directories in each movie directories with the images all stored locally.  I have been unable to reliably display Cast & Crew images.  I have been doing some testing, and here is what I've found (using a sample of 10 movies)

 

1) With NO nfos in the individual movie directories, all actor images populate pretty much immediately.  If the "Download Immediately button is checked," the People directory will also populate pretty much immediately.

2) With nfos in the individual movie directories, the actor images are mostly blank... with a few scattered here and there.  Population of the People directory doesn't seem to be impacted by the "Download Immediately" checkbox... it doesn't populate until a single actor is selected.  Once an actor is selected, the photo will display, and also be added to the People directory.

 

For the missing Cast and Crew photos, I have verified the links in the NFOs are valid (clicking on them displays the correct photo).

 

Is there any workaround which allows existing Kodi NFOs to be used, or a setting I am missing?

[Luke 37100]

We DO read actors from NFO files, but only the actor list. Emby handles images on it's own and does not support the .actors folder at this point in time.

 

It is a possibility for the future though. Does that answer your question?

[WannaTheater 0]

Thanks Luke-  It sort of answers my question.  It appears that Emby DOES read the actor list from the NFO, and puts a placeholder for where a picture should be in the Emby web interface.  But it does not fill in the photo of the actor...  Or at least not consistently.  Even if "download immediately" is checked.  It appears to only pull the photo from the URL listed in the NFO only when I click into the individual actor page... Once I click in, it will display the photo, and also copy it to the People directory.  

 

I assumed the behavior would be the same as if Emby didn't find an NFO in the individual movie directory - When no NFO is available, Emby appears to scrape the metadata, and if "download immediately" is checked it appears to populate the actor images on the Emby page, and also write to the images to the People directory immediately.  Is this how the reading of the NFO should happen also?  Or is the behavior different?

 

I have read some threads about waiting for the images to populate... I have waited an hour and did not see any changes.  I also read about "Refresh People," under settings, but I did not see a "refresh now" button. 

[Luke 37100]

hi @@WannaTheater, what version of Emby Server are you running? I checked into this and it was already somewhat recently addressed.

 

@@Happy2Play can you reproduce this - add a new movie with a pre-existing nfo. After the subsequent library scan, verify that people on the movie detail screen have images.

 

Thanks !

[WannaTheater 0]

I was using 3.2.7.0.  I see version 3.2.12 is available.  I will upgrade and if it makes a difference.

[WannaTheater 0]

I upgraded to 3.2.12.  There does not appear to be any difference.  Actor images are not populated until I click into an actor.  Once I click back out the photo is populated.

 

Perhaps I should be asking the question differently-

If Emby does not use the .actors directory created by Kodi, which boxes do I need to have checked to have Emby only scrape for actor images to populate the Emby database, without overwriting anything in my Kodi media directories? 

[Emby Tower 33]

@WannaTheater: Emby doesn't use the .actors folder.

 

@Luke: I tested my problem with a completely fresh Emby server and content without (and also with) a NFO file: The actor images are present and with an existing NFO there are only placeholders!

[Happy2Play 8296]

 

@@Happy2Play can you reproduce this - add a new movie with a pre-existing nfo. After the subsequent library scan, verify that people on the movie detail screen have images.

 

Thanks !

All my movies are added by MCM with preexisting xml files.  And I don't see any issue with actors.  Will have to do some testing on nfo files.

[Happy2Play 8296]

New user here, but I am having the same issue:

1) I have NFOs created from KODI, with links to all of the actors embedded in NFO.  These were created by using Kodi scrapers, and exporting individual files.

 

For example, in an NFO:

    <actor>

        <name>Michael Fassbender</name>

        <role>Callum Lynch / Aguilar de Nerha</role>

        <order>0</order>

        <thumb>http://image.tmdb.org/t/p/original/oexNPLumoFpazzzUqzBSDDYiUg1.jpg</thumb>

    </actor>

 

I also have .actor directories in each movie directories with the images all stored locally.  I have been unable to reliably display Cast & Crew images.  I have been doing some testing, and here is what I've found (using a sample of 10 movies)

 

1) With NO nfos in the individual movie directories, all actor images populate pretty much immediately.  If the "Download Immediately button is checked," the People directory will also populate pretty much immediately.

2) With nfos in the individual movie directories, the actor images are mostly blank... with a few scattered here and there.  Population of the People directory doesn't seem to be impacted by the "Download Immediately" checkbox... it doesn't populate until a single actor is selected.  Once an actor is selected, the photo will display, and also be added to the People directory.

 

For the missing Cast and Crew photos, I have verified the links in the NFOs are valid (clicking on them displays the correct photo).

 

Is there any workaround which allows existing Kodi NFOs to be used, or a setting I am missing?

 

@@Luke does Emby use the <thumb>http://image.tmdb.org/t/p/original/oexNPLumoFpazzzUqzBSDDYiUg1.jpg</thumb> tag when reading the imported nfo? 

 

If I am correct and if you don't already have the actor image, this scenario above is correct.

Edited April 20, 2017 by Happy2Play

[pünktchen 1259]

@@Luke does Emby use the <thumb>http://image.tmdb.org/t/p/original/oexNPLumoFpazzzUqzBSDDYiUg1.jpg</thumb> tag when reading the imported nfo?

 

If I am correct and if you don't already have the actor image, this scenario above is correct.

I don't have image url tags for actors in my nfo and suffer from the same problem.

[Happy2Play 8296]

@@Luke

 

To me this is still by Emby design.  Emby has never downloaded anything if information has been presented.  I tested nfo importing on stable version and All actors I already had images for were populated and any actor I didn't have a image for had to be clicked on to get image.

 

Emby has always been a read only with existing metadata.

Edited April 20, 2017 by Happy2Play

[pünktchen 1259]

@@Luke

 

To me this is still by Emby design. Emby has never downloaded anything if information has been presented. I tested nfo importing on stable version and All actors I already had images for were populated and any actor I didn't have a image for had to be clicked on to get image.

 

Emby has always been a read only with existing metadata.

Never downloaded anything isn't true. Back in the days where the refresh people task was a remote server hammering beast, all was fine. I also don't expect Emby to download the actor images right at the media import, but it should do it when looking at the details screen of a movie, not by clicking on each and every actor inside!

[Happy2Play 8296]

Never downloaded anything isn't true. Back in the days where the refresh people task was a remote server hammering beast, all was fine. I also don't expect Emby to download the actor images right at the media import, but it should do it when looking at the details screen of a movie, not by clicking on each and every actor inside!

 

Well tasks are a different story then importing data from nfo file though.  And @@Luke would have to explain exactly what the "Refresh people" does now as we can see it doesn't do anything for imported movie actors.

 

Now they are a on demand, so it force the user to click on the actor, from a imported stand point.

Edited April 21, 2017 by Happy2Play

[Luke 37100]

Correct, we do not use the .actors folder, and no, we don't use within nfo files.