How do I fetch metadata for people only?

[Electrical_problems 0]

Hello:

 

Issue:

Cast and crew images do not display in Emby.

 

I am wondering if there is a way to only fetch the metadata for the cast and crew (people)? 

 

I am reluctant to try anything since all of my other metadata is mostly customized and would appreciate an expert opinion.

 

Experience:

I have looked through the library settings for metadata and I am unsure which options would apply to resolve only the cast and crew metadata.  I currently have all down-loaders and fetchers disabled/turned-off.

 

I have read this post and understand there is issues with importing from older storage structures:
https://emby.media/community/index.php?/topic/63331-how-to-backup-people-images-with-beta-going-onwards/

 

Other information:

I am running windows 10 / Kodi (build 18.4) / Emby Server 4.3.1.0.

[Deathsquirrel 743]

Look in Scheduled Tasks.  There should be one for Refresh People.

[levander 96]

I am also interested is there a way to fetch (not refresh) dates for actors that are without it. There are lots of it and I haven’t noticed this issue before. 

 

Look in Scheduled Tasks.  There should be one for Refresh People.

I am aware of this but I am not sure what will happen to those people metadata which I edited. 

[levander 96]

Also I noticed there are certain amount of people with same name which are mismatched during metadata fetching and the only way to fix this is: 

1. edit metadata of the movie

2. click on the actor which is mismatched

3. rename it — example: ‘Harrison Ford’ > ‘Harrison Ford (I)’

4. identify ‘Harrison Ford (I)’ with exact Harrison Ford

Done. 
 

(It took me a while till I found the right way to do it so in case anyone needs it there it is)

Unfortunately there is no way telling if next metadata fetching with one of the Harrison Ford will be the right one. As well as there is no way telling if the actor metadata will be fetched at all (even if there is data for it on tmdb). 

[Luke 38956]

The scheduled task only relates to individual person metadata. The actual actor list for each media title comes from the media metadata providers and there's currently no way to configure them for people only.

 

You might be able to come close to what you want by locking fields but that is a lot of manual work.

[Electrical_problems 0]

Look in Scheduled Tasks.  There should be one for Refresh People.

Thanks for the reply

 

I tried this and it doesn't seem anything happened. Do I need to enable a metadata fetch service? Which one do you recommend?

 

If I do enable a metadata fetcher will it replace any of my customized movie details and art?

[Luke 38956]

What were you expecting the scheduled task to do?

[Electrical_problems 0]

The scheduled task only relates to individual person metadata. The actual actor list for each media title comes from the media metadata providers and there's currently no way to configure them for people only.

 

You might be able to come close to what you want by locking fields but that is a lot of manual work.

Thanks Luke!

[Electrical_problems 0]

What were you expecting the scheduled task to do?

Honesty, I didn't expect it to do anything without any metadata fetcher enabled. I just did as Deathsquirrel suggested.

[niallobr 9]

On 04/01/2020 at 16:29, Deathsquirrel said:

Look in Scheduled Tasks.  There should be one for Refresh People.

I remember seeing the 'Refresh People' option but can't find it in Scheduled Tasks on server version 4.6.0.31 beta, has it been removed?

[Happy2Play 9213]

10 minutes ago, niallobr said:

I remember seeing the 'Refresh People' option but can't find it in Scheduled Tasks on server version 4.6.0.31 beta, has it been removed?

It was changed as it did not do what everyone thought it did.  There is no way to refresh all people, at the same time TMDB would not be happy with you spamming their api either for say 100,000+ people

[niallobr 9]

6 minutes ago, Happy2Play said:

It was changed as it did not do what everyone thought it did.  There is no way to refresh all people, at the same time TMDB would not be happy with you spamming their api either for say 100,000+ people

Thanks and no worries. I assume if you choose 'Refresh metadata' on the library and 'Replace existing images' it will use cached people images rather than hitting their API then?

The reason I wanted to refresh is my cast thumbs seem to be getting picked incorrectly by the scraper in the latest beta. I've opened a separate topic here

 

Edited March 10, 2021 by niallobr

[MBSki 1090]

@niallobr Did you ever get a solution for this? I'm finding a lot of missing images. Some mismatches, but mostly just images that don't appear when viewing a show or movie. If I click the person, then go back to the detail page and refresh, the image will appear. I don't see why I have to click 100's of people just to get their images to show though. 

[bigrndahouse 0]

4 hours ago, mbarylski said:

@niallobr Did you ever get a solution for this? I'm finding a lot of missing images. Some mismatches, but mostly just images that don't appear when viewing a show or movie. If I click the person, then go back to the detail page and refresh, the image will appear. I don't see why I have to click 100's of people just to get their images to show though. 

I'm having the same issue. 

[Happy2Play 9213]

Unfortunately they are a one and done, only fetched at item import.  As the only provide request this be leashed.  So fetching a movie that has 100 people can be done but continued attempts to get any of the people that are missing something is not.

But there does need to be a way other then manually one by one to get and update people missing metadata and/or image.  

I know we will get a little more assistance here with TVDB v4 api.

Now for @mbarylskiissue of entering a person and it getting image, that to me suggest you do/did not have the "Download images in advance" enabled per library at the time the item was imported so they are gotten on demand.

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.

 

[MBSki 1090]

1 hour ago, Happy2Play said:

Now for @mbarylskiissue of entering a person and it getting image, that to me suggest you do/did not have the "Download images in advance" enabled per library at the time the item was imported so they are gotten on demand.

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.

 

I'm pretty sure I did, but if for some reason I didn't, am I completely out of luck at this point?

[Happy2Play 9213]

13 minutes ago, mbarylski said:

I'm pretty sure I did, but if for some reason I didn't, am I completely out of luck at this point?

From my understand yes as they are a one and done.  Everything after that is manual. Minus nuking the library and reimporting it but may have to be a new database as people are not removed.

 

Edited October 5, 2021 by Happy2Play

[MBSki 1090]

14 hours ago, Happy2Play said:

From my understand yes as they are a one and done.  Everything after that is manual. Minus nuking the library and reimporting it but may have to be a new database as people are not removed.

 

So what if I'm adding new movies and I have "download images in advance" checked in my existing library? Shouldn't the people images be added for any new movies that are added? If so, it isn't working.

[Happy2Play 9213]

7 hours ago, mbarylski said:

So what if I'm adding new movies and I have "download images in advance" checked in my existing library? Shouldn't the people images be added for any new movies that are added? If so, it isn't working.

Depends on whether the person already exists in your database or not.  If I add 50 movies from Denzel Washington, how many times do you think he will be fetched? Only once. 

[MBSki 1090]

8 minutes ago, Happy2Play said:

Depends on whether the person already exists in your database or not.  If I add 50 movies from Denzel Washington, how many times do you think he will be fetched? Only once. 

Got it. I don't think it's working then. I have some pretty obscure people that aren't getting fetched. I'll look closer and grab some examples.

[Carlo 4499]

One thing you can do is look at the detail page for one of the media the person is in.  Down toward the bottom of the detail page will be the links to the meta-providers for that media.  Click on it and it should open a new windows.  You'll be able to compare your cast to what the provider has.

This way you can see if they have pics for the people you don't.

[Happy2Play 9213]

1 minute ago, cayars said:

One thing you can do is look at the detail page for one of the media the person is in.  Down toward the bottom of the detail page will be the links to the meta-providers for that media.  Click on it and it should open a new windows.  You'll be able to compare your cast to what the provider has.

This way you can see if they have pics for the people you don't.

But remember all people come from first provider fetcher.  So opening TMDB when you have TVDB as first provider is irrelevant.  Same issue you see when OMDB is before TMDB when it comes to people.

[MBSki 1090]

11 minutes ago, cayars said:

One thing you can do is look at the detail page for one of the media the person is in.  Down toward the bottom of the detail page will be the links to the meta-providers for that media.  Click on it and it should open a new windows.  You'll be able to compare your cast to what the provider has.

This way you can see if they have pics for the people you don't.

The pics are there, they just don't show up until I open the person's page. 

[Happy2Play 9213]

3 minutes ago, mbarylski said:

The pics are there, they just don't show up until I open the person's page. 

Most of the time issues like these are unsolvable.  If you installed a portable and tested with a couple items do they get all cast and crew upon imports?

[Luke 38956]

Try refreshing the metadata of the movie, series or episode containing the person.