VHSFileNamesToStrings(IOHelpers)

Video Helper Suite's Video Combine saves your video and hands back a VHS_FILENAMES output - but that value is a tuple, not something you can read at a glance. If you're automating (render, then upload, post, or move the file), you need to know exactly what the save step wrote. VHSFileNamesToStrings(IOHelpers) takes that opaque VHS_FILENAMES and dumps the filenames into the UI where you can actually see them.

That's the entire job. It's an output node with no wireable outputs - it exists to make the filenames visible, not to route them elsewhere. If you've ever had VHS silently write video_00001.mp4 somewhere and had to go hunting, this is the node that stops the hunting.

How it works

A VHS VHS_FILENAMES value is a tuple of two parts: the directory, and the list of filenames the save step produced. This node ignores the directory half and returns the filename list - vhs_filenames[1] in the code - into the UI's results as file_paths. The UI shows it as plain text right in the node's output area, and if you're driving ComfyUI from a script, the names appear in the API response's ui.file_paths for you to parse.

Inputs and outputs

• vhs_filenames - the only input, and it has to be a genuine VHS_FILENAMES wire. In practice that means the output of a VHS Video Combine node. You can't fake one with a string.

Output: none, as wires go. The filenames render in the node's output display. One list entry per saved file, in order.

Installing it

It's part of the same single-file, dependency-free pack from GitHub user Ryuukeisyou - no requirements.txt, no model downloads. But there's a second requirement hiding in plain sight: this node only works if you also have Video Helper Suite installed, since that's where the VHS_FILENAMES input type comes from. ComfyUI Manager → search "comfyui_io_helpers" → install → restart, plus install VideoHelperSuite the same way if you don't have it:

cd ComfyUI/custom_nodes
git clone https://github.com/Ryuukeisyou/comfyui_io_helpers

Restart ComfyUI; nodes appear under "io_helpers".

Common issues

• Can't connect anything to the input? You don't have VideoHelperSuite installed. The VHS_FILENAMES type simply doesn't exist as a socket without it - this node is useless as a standalone.
• You get filenames, not paths. The directory half of the VHS tuple is ignored here, so if you need the full path for a downstream script, this node alone won't give it to you - join the name to the directory yourself (or use a VHS path/load node for that part).
• It's read-only by design. No output wire, so you can't feed the names into another node for string processing. If you expected a routable STRING, this isn't that node - it's a window into what VHS did, not a data source.

Tiny, single-purpose, and dependent on VHS being around - but for anyone scripting around Video Helper Suite's output, it turns an invisible value into something you can actually read.