How to search for videos/images by aspect ratio with Windows 7 Explorer Search

Question

I know I can search for files (pictures, videos) having specific dimensions, using width:1920, height:1080.

But how do I search for files having, say, 16:9 aspect ratio, in Windows 7?

Answer 1

This is not possible with Windows 7 Explorer search

---

However, here is an alternative relying on integral Windows parts

For images (PowerShell 2.0)

It reads in every image from a given root folder, divides images height through width, compares the result with e.g 16/10 and outputs the full path when the ratio matches

Get-Childitem "D:\MyPictures" -include @("*.jpg","*.png") -recurse | Where {
    $img = New-Object System.Drawing.Bitmap $_.FullName

    if ($img.Width / $img.Height -eq 16/10 -or 
        $img.Height / $img.Width -eq 16/10) {
        Write-Host $_.FullName
        }           
  }

For images (PowerShell 2.0) - Improved version for cropped / non-standard aspect ratios

$folder      = "C:\Users\Public\Pictures\Sample Pictures"
$searchRatio = 4/3
$AllRatios   = (16/10),(16/9),(4/3),(5/4),(21/10),(21/9)
$filetypes   =  @("*.jpg","*.png","*.bmp")

Clear-Host
Get-Childitem $folder -include $filetypes -recurse | foreach {
    $img = New-Object System.Drawing.Bitmap $_.FullName        
    if ($img.Width -gt $img.Height){ $fileRatio = $img.Width / $img.Height }
    else {$fileRatio = $img.Height / $img.Width}

    $differences = $AllRatios | %{  [math]::abs($_ - $fileRatio) } 
    $bestmatch = $differences | measure -Minimum
    $index = [array]::IndexOf($differences, $bestmatch.minimum)
    $closestRatio = $($AllRatios[$index])

    if ($closestRatio -eq $searchRatio) {
        Write-Host $fileRatio `t`t $_.FullName        
        }           
  }

Explanation

1. Say, you have a folder with pictures where most of them were cropped. So they don't have a standard aspect ratio like 16:9. For them, this script always searches the closest match of a standard aspect ratio. You can expand them at $AllRatios = (16/10),(16/9),(4/3),(5/4),(21/10),(21/9) if you want

2. The other 3 variables should be self-explaining. $folder is your folder where you want to search in. $searchRatio is the aspect ratio you are looking for and $fileTypes defines which picture types you are interested in

---

For videos (PowerShell 2.0 + ffprobe)

$folder      = "D:\My Videos\*"
$ffprobe     = "D:\ffmpeg\ffprobe.exe"
$searchRatio = "13:7"
$filetypes   = @{"*.avi","*.mp4"}

Clear-Host
Get-ChildItem $folder -include $filetypes -recurse | foreach {
    $details = & $ffprobe -loglevel quiet -show_streams -print_format flat=h=0 $_.Fullname
    $fileratio = $details | Select-String '(?<=stream.0.display_aspect_ratio=")\d+:\d+' |
       Foreach {$_.Matches} | ForEach-Object {$_.Value}

    if ($fileratio -eq $searchRatio ) {
        Write-Host $fileratio `t`t $_.FullName
    }   
}  

Explanation

1. You can utilize ffmpeg's ffprobe to retrieve all informations from videos

   Command

   ffprobe -loglevel quiet -show_streams -print_format flat=h=0 input.mp4
   

   Example Output

   stream.0.index=0
   stream.0.codec_name="mpeg4"
   stream.0.codec_long_name="MPEG-4 part 2"
   stream.0.profile="Advanced Simple Profile"
   stream.0.codec_type="video"
   stream.0.codec_time_base="911/21845"
   stream.0.codec_tag_string="XVID"
   stream.0.codec_tag="0x44495658"
   stream.0.width=624
   stream.0.height=336
   stream.0.has_b_frames=1
   stream.0.sample_aspect_ratio="1:1"
   stream.0.display_aspect_ratio="13:7"
   stream.0.pix_fmt="yuv420p"
   stream.0.level=5
   

2. Next, we use Regex to filter out the aspect ratio (13:7 in our example)

3. At last, we compare the video ratio with your search ratio and output the file path if they match