shoots cull

shoots cull <path> [options]

This is classic computer vision, not ML: Laplacian variance plus a tile-based focus map. It is fast, deterministic and needs no model.

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Arguments#

Options#

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How the scoring works#

The global score#

Each frame is reduced to a single Laplacian variance — a standard measure of edge energy. Lots of crisp edges → high variance → sharp. Motion blur or missed focus smears edges → low variance → blurry.

RAW files are scored from their embedded JPEG preview (extracted with exiftool), so no demosaicing is involved. The JSON reports which pixels were used as pixelSource.

Why a global score alone is wrong#

A single global number misjudges wide-aperture work. A shallow-depth-of-field portrait at f/1.4 is mostly bokeh — the global variance is low even though the eyes are tack-sharp. Cull naively and you throw away your best frames.

The focus rescue#

Alongside the global score, cull builds a focus map over a tile grid and takes a robust peak: the sharpness of the sharpest region in the frame.

A frame whose global score is below --threshold is still kept as sharp (marked sharp*, rescued: true) when that focus peak clears --focus-threshold.

The reasoning is simple: a motion-blurred or missed-focus frame is soft everywhere. If any region is genuinely sharp, focus landed somewhere on purpose.

The rescue only ever moves a frame blurry → sharp, never the reverse. Disable it with --no-focus-rescue.

Aperture context#

When exiftool is available, the report carries each frame's FNumber. A low global score at f/11 means something very different than at f/1.4. This is report context only — it never influences the verdict. If exiftool is unavailable the column is simply omitted rather than failing the cull.

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What moves where#

Keepers — including sharp* rescues — are never touched. Nothing is ever deleted.

Marking instead of moving#

Relocating rejects reorganizes your catalog to record a decision. --mark records the decision and leaves the catalog alone:

shoots cull ./shoot --mark --mark-keepers select

482 analyzed @ threshold 100: 431 sharp (18 rescued), 51 blurry, 0 failed
marked 482 files (rejects 'reject', keepers 'select') — `shoots develop edit` or `shoots triage apply` writes them into sidecars

Nothing is written next to the photographs. The verdict waits under ~/.shoots/triage until a sidecar writer picks it up and renders it as a colour label in your editor's own vocabulary — see triage.

This is what composes: rate --mark afterwards adds stars to the same records instead of fighting over the same sidecar, and develop edit writes all of it out at once.

The two are not exclusive. --mark --dest <dir> both records the verdict and moves the rejects; the marks follow the files to their new location.

Structure is mirrored, not flattened#

<catalog>/2026-07-19/x.cr3   →   <dest>/2026-07-19/x.cr3
<catalog>/2026-07-20/y.cr3   →   <dest>/2026-07-20/y.cr3

A catalog/date layout survives into the rejects pile, so you can inspect (or restore) rejects with their context intact.

--dest is excluded from the scan#

If --dest sits inside the target folder, it is filtered out of the scan — a second run will not re-analyze already-relocated rejects.

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Tuning the thresholds#

Thresholds are camera-, lens- and subject-dependent. There is no universal value. The workflow is: report first, look at the numbers, then set a threshold.

# 1. Report only, as CSV, so you can look at the distribution
shoots cull ./raw --format csv --out scores.csv

# 2. Inspect
sort -t, -k2 -n scores.csv | head -30     # the softest frames

# 3. Pick a threshold that puts the boundary where you'd put it, then apply
shoots cull ./raw --threshold 85 --dest ./rejects --dry-run

Rough starting points:

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Examples#

Report only#

shoots cull ./raw

verdict       score       focus    aper  file
sharp        412.83      891.20    f/2.8  D:/raw/IMG_0001.CR3
sharp*        78.14      623.55    f/1.4  D:/raw/IMG_0002.CR3
blurry        31.02       44.18    f/2.8  D:/raw/IMG_0003.CR3

482 analyzed @ threshold 100: 431 sharp (18 rescued), 51 blurry, 0 failed
  sharp* = subject in focus despite a soft frame (shallow DoF), kept via --focus-threshold 250

CSV report to a file#

shoots cull ./raw --format csv --out cull-report.csv

file,score,focus_peak,verdict,rescued,aperture,pixel_source
D:/raw/IMG_0001.CR3,412.83,891.2,sharp,false,2.8,embedded-preview
D:/raw/IMG_0002.CR3,78.14,623.55,sharp,true,1.4,embedded-preview
D:/raw/IMG_0003.CR3,31.02,44.18,blurry,false,2.8,embedded-preview

Mark instead of moving (composes with rate and develop)#

shoots cull ./shoot --mark
shoots rate ./shoot --mark
shoots develop edit ./shoot        # writes crs + label + stars in one sidecar

Clean the catalog: move rejects out#

shoots cull ./catalog --dest ./rejects --dry-run

(dry run) 51 rejects would be moved into D:\rejects (mirroring structure); keepers stay put

shoots cull ./catalog --dest ./rejects

moved 51 rejects into D:\rejects (mirroring structure); keepers left in place

Copy instead of move (keep the catalog complete)#

shoots cull ./catalog --dest ./review-blurry --copy

Tuned for wide-open portrait work#

shoots cull ./portraits --threshold 70 --focus-threshold 220 --dest ./rejects

Strict: no rescue, global score only#

shoots cull ./raw --no-focus-rescue --threshold 150 --dest ./rejects

Fast, on many cores#

shoots cull ./raw --concurrency 12 --json --out cull.json

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Interactive review (--review)#

Available only inside the interactive shell — it drives a live UI. In batch mode it exits 2 with a pointer to the shell.

❯ /cull ./catalog --review --mark
❯ /cull ./catalog --review --dest ./rejects

The flow is designed to not waste your time:

1. The focus-aware analysis runs over the whole folder.
2. Confident rejects are disposed of immediately — marked, or relocated. Keepers stay in place either way.
3. You are handed only the uncertain shallow-DoF rescues — one card at a time.

Each review card shows the global score, the focus peak, the aperture, and a focus heatmap with a legend (soft → sharp) marking where focus actually landed.

Marks made here carry reviewed: true, so a decision you actually looked at is distinguishable from one a threshold produced.

Requirements and flags:

• --mark or --dest is required — the review has to do something with the discards. --mark records them and moves nothing; --dest relocates them. --mark-label and --mark-keepers work here exactly as in batch.
• --copy copies discards instead of moving them. Only meaningful with --dest.
• --dry-run walks the entire flow without touching a single file — ideal for learning the interface.

Every other flag behaves identically in batch, so shoots cull stays fully scriptable. Only the review UI is interactive.

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JSON output#

{
  "command": "cull",
  "threshold": 100,
  "focusThreshold": 250,
  "focusRescue": true,
  "dryRun": false,
  "results": [
    {
      "file": "D:/raw/IMG_0002.CR3",
      "score": 78.14,
      "focusPeak": 623.55,
      "verdict": "sharp",
      "rescued": true,
      "aperture": 1.4,
      "pixelSource": "embedded-preview"
    }
  ],
  "errors": [],
  "relocated": {
    "dest": "D:\\rejects",
    "mode": "move",
    "count": 51,
    "planned": false
  },
  "summary": { "total": 482, "sharp": 431, "blurry": 51, "rescued": 18, "failed": 0 }
}

Useful queries#

# List the rejects
shoots cull ./raw --json | jq -r '.results[] | select(.verdict=="blurry") | .file'

# List only the rescues — the frames worth eyeballing
shoots cull ./raw --json | jq -r '.results[] | select(.rescued) | "\(.score)\t\(.focusPeak)\t\(.file)"'

# Reject rate as a CI gate
rate=$(shoots cull ./raw --json | jq '.summary.blurry / .summary.total')

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Exit codes#

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See also#

• triage — where --mark puts the verdict, and how it gets out
• rate — aesthetic and star ratings (ML), complementary to blur culling
• Interactive shell — where --review lives
• Recipes — culling inside a full workflow