How to load dat file from IR camera in python with specific structure

Question

I try to read a dat file with the structure given below. It is a video from an IR camera. I tried different methods, but I always get errors along the way. I would like to convert it in a different file format and load it in python, so I can do some analysis with it.

import csv
datContent = [i.strip().split() for i in open("./Test_s.dat",'rb').readlines()]
# write it as a new CSV file
with open("./Test_s.csv", "wb") as f:
    writer = csv.writer(f)
    writer.writerows(datContent)

Answer 1

Example to read the header fields excluding the data log, since no definition was provided:

I assumed little endian, change the first symbol in the pattern to '>' if the dat file used big endian.

import struct

# whitespace between definitions is ignored
# 's' is special: 16s means a byte string of length 16, not 16 single bytes
# 6H will return 6 seperate uint16 values
header_pattern = '< 4s 6H d 16s 16s 16s 16s 6f H 16s H 2B 4H'

# verifiyng size of our pattern: 2060-1918 => 142
print(struct.calcsize(header_pattern))

# read file
with open('./Test_s.dat' 'rb') as f:
    header_bytes = f.read(142)

    # unpack bytes
    header_values = struct.struct.unpack(pattern, header_bytes)
    print(len(header_values))  # we expect 27 values

    # skip data log, can also use f.seek()
    f.read(1918)

    # handle each image header and data
    ...

I hope this is enough to get you going, keep in mind you need calculate the image data size from some header values.

I cannot see a header for image count, so you probably have to read until the file ends.