Overlaying an image's filename using ImageMagick (or similar)

Question

I know ImageMagick's annotate command can superimpose some text over an image, but can it use the image's filename as this text? I would've assumed so, but can't seem to find direct documentation that confirms this.

No doubt some combination of parameters can manage this, or is there a better way of doing this in a script?

Answer 1

Eric L.'s answer is correct -- +1 from me for it! -- but -annotate doesn't give you much control over the appearance of the text.

If you look for prettyness, then rather go for something that uses -composite. You can use an IM command to construct an overlay image first (which uses a semi-transparent background) and then overlay it over the original image.

Here is an example how to do it with -composite instead of -annotate, using a scripted approach that processes every PNG file in the current directory. This one even automatically adapts the font size and fits it into the available "width * 90%" -- it is a Bash script (see comments for Win equivalent):

for img in *.png; do

   width=$(identify -format %W ${img})
   width=$(( ${width} * 9 / 10 ))

   convert                  \
     -background '#0008'    \
     -gravity center        \
     -fill white            \
     -size ${width}x100     \
      caption:"${img}"      \
      "${img}"              \
     +swap                  \
     -gravity south         \
     -composite             \
      "with-caption-${img}"

done

An example illustration for one original and the respective output are below:

 !

Here is a command that uses -annotate, trying to set a few things beyond the default parameters:

for img in so#12231624-right.png; do

   convert                   \
      "${img}"               \
     -fill red               \
     -undercolor '#0008'     \
     -pointsize 24           \
     -gravity south          \
     -annotate +0+5 "${img}" \
      "with-annotate-${img}"

done