Matlab: labeling images stored in a single file based on image name - matlab

Question

I was assigned a matlab assignment where I was given 25000 pictures of cats and dogs all stored in one folder. My question is how can I use the imagedatastore function on matlab to store these files into one single variable containing two labels (cats and dogs). Each image stored in the file follow the following format:
cat.1.png,
cat.2.png,
.....,
cat.N.png,
dog.1.png,
dog.2.png,
.....,
dog.N.png,
Ideally I think labeling them based on image name would probably be the best approach to this. How ever I've tired doing this using various implementations methods but I keep failing. Any advice on this would be greatly appreciated!

Answer 1

The steps for both image data stores are the same:
Find all the image files with a matching name with dir.
Rebuild the full path to these files with fullfile.
Create the image data store with the files.
My code assumes that you are running the script in the same folder in which images are located. Here is the code:
cats = dir('cat.*.png');
files_cats = fullfile({cats.folder}.', {cats.name}.');
imds_cats = imageDatastore(files_cats);
dogs = dir('dog.*.png');
files_dogs = fullfile({dogs.folder}.', {dogs.name}.');
imds_dogs = imageDatastore(files_dogs);
You could also use the short path:
imds_cats = imageDatastore('cat.*.png');
imds_dogs = imageDatastore('dog.*.png');
If you want to use a single image data store and split files into categories within it (without using folder names, since all your files seem to be located in the same directory):
cats = dir('cat.*.png');
cats_labs = repmat({'Cat'},numel(cats),1);
dogs = dir('dog.*.png');
dogs_labs = repmat({'Dog'},numel(dogs),1);
labs = [cats_labs; dogs_labs];
imds = imageDatastore({'cat.*.png' 'dog.*.png'},'Labels',labs);