X-Ray

X-Ray reads every photo and video in your Library, whether you uploaded it or made it on Shotz. It writes what’s in it, finds the people in it and marks the moments that matter, and lets you search your footage by what it looks and sounds like, so you can find the shot you mean instead of scrolling for it.

X-Ray comes with every paid plan: Starter, Pro and Team.

What it finds

Open a file in Library to see what X-Ray found, under the file’s tools.

• Description: a sentence or two on what the file shows. It sits under the file’s details.
• People: the faces in it. The same person is recognised across your workspace’s files. Choose a face to name them, and search finds every file they’re in by that name.
• Tags: the subjects, actions, setting and mood. Owners and editors can remove a tag with its ×, or add one with + Tag.
• Moments (videos): each distinct shot or moment, with the time it happens. On a desktop, choose one and the video plays from there.
• What’s said: the transcript of any video or audio with speech. Transcripts come with every plan, Free included, since captions and transcript editing use them.

X-Ray starts once a file has processed and usually takes a minute or two. Long videos take longer.

Search by meaning

Type what you’re after in the Library’s search box the way you’d describe it, such as “someone laughing on a rooftop at night” or “a car door slamming”. X-Ray finds the moments in your videos that look or sound like it, even when nobody wrote those words down, and shows each with the time it happens. Searches also match file names, descriptions, tags, transcripts and people’s names. See Find files in your Library.

A video is searchable this way a few minutes after X-Ray has read it. Videos under 4 seconds are found by their description and tags instead.

People

When X-Ray has found people, Library shows them in a People row above your recent files. Choose someone to see every file they’re in. From there:

• Name or Rename gives them a name that search finds.
• Same person as puts two people together when X-Ray has split one person in two, for example across very different lighting.
• Forget takes them out of People and deletes their faces. The files stay. If they’re in a file added later, X-Ray finds them again.

Write your own description

Choose Edit beside the description (or Add, if there isn’t one) to write your own. Yours stays: X-Ray won’t write over it. To go back to X-Ray’s, choose Edit, then Use X-Ray’s. Search looks at whichever description the file has.

To rename a file, choose ⋯ → Rename.

Owners and editors can write descriptions, rename files and name people. People who can only comment see what X-Ray found.

On Free

Files you add on Free still get their transcripts, but X-Ray waits. Owners see Get X-Ray with a plan on each file. When the workspace moves to a paid plan, X-Ray reads every file that waited over the next few minutes; a big Library takes longer.

Faces and privacy

Faces are matched only within your workspace, never across workspaces. Shotz keeps a template of each face to recognise the person again, not a copy of the picture. Deleting a file deletes its faces, and deleting a workspace deletes them all.

An owner can turn face recognition off in Settings → Workspace → Recognise faces. Turning it off deletes every face X-Ray found in the workspace, and the names you gave them, straight away. X-Ray still describes, tags and indexes your files. Turn it back on and X-Ray looks for faces again. Read more in our privacy policy.