recording a video with picamera

Question

I have this code which record a video when there is a motion, and the name of the video is the date that is the code:

import RPi.GPIO as GPIO
import time
import picamera
import datetime  # new

def get_file_name():  # new
    return datetime.datetime.now().strftime("%Y-%m-%d_%H.%M.%S.h264")

sensor = 4

GPIO.setmode(GPIO.BCM)
GPIO.setup(sensor, GPIO.IN, GPIO.PUD_DOWN)

previous_state = False

current_state = False

cam = picamera.PiCamera()

while True:

    time.sleep(0.1)

    previous_state = current_state
    current_state = GPIO.input(sensor)
    if current_state != previous_state:
        new_state = "HIGH" if current_state else "LOW"
        print("GPIO pin %s is %s" % (sensor, new_state))

        if current_state:
            fileName = get_file_name()  # new
            cam.start_preview()
            cam.start_recording(fileName)  # new
        else:
            cam.stop_preview()
            cam.stop_recording()  # new    

I want to save the video in another directory, can anyone help me?

Answer 1

SlySven's answer is good, but I'd suggest this might be more easily accomplished with the new gpiozero library too. For example:

import os
import datetime as dt
from gpiozero import MotionSensor
from picamera import PiCamera
from signal import pause

destination = '/home/pi/video'
camera = PiCamera()
sensor = MotionSensor(4)

def record_video():
    filename = os.path.join(destination, dt.datetime.now().strftime('%Y-%m-%d_%H.%M.%S.h264'))
    camera.start_preview()
    camera.start_recording(filename)

def finish_video():
    camera.stop_recording()
    camera.stop_preview()

sensor.when_motion = record_video
sensor.when_no_motion = finish_video
pause()

Disclaimer: I may be involved in the development of these libraries :)

Answer 2

Assuming that you specify the save location as a variable save_directory (and that the location exists before you use this) I think (I am not strong in Python!) this might work for you:

import RPi.GPIO as GPIO
import time
import picamera
import datetime  # new

save_directory = "/home/pi/video/"

def get_file_name():  # new
    return datetime.datetime.now().strftime("%Y-%m-%d_%H.%M.%S.h264")

sensor = 4

GPIO.setmode(GPIO.BCM)
GPIO.setup(sensor, GPIO.IN, GPIO.PUD_DOWN)

previous_state = False

current_state = False

cam = picamera.PiCamera()

while True:

    time.sleep(0.1)

    previous_state = current_state
    current_state = GPIO.input(sensor)
    if current_state != previous_state:
        if current_state:
            new_state = "HIGH"
        else:
            new_state = "LOW"

        print("GPIO pin %s is %s" % (sensor, new_state))

        if current_state:
            fileName = "%s%s" % (save_directory, get_file_name())
            cam.start_preview()
            cam.start_recording(fileName)
        else:
            cam.stop_preview()
            cam.stop_recording()