Load Images (Path) 🎥🅥🅗🅢

Sometimes your "video" isn't a video file - it's a folder full of numbered PNGs. Frames you exported from an editor, a render sequence, an image set you want to batch-process. This node loads all the images in a directory, in order, as a single IMAGE batch, so the rest of your ComfyUI graph treats them exactly like frames from a video. It's the directory-based image-sequence loader in Kosinkadink's VideoHelperSuite, the "Path" variant meaning you type an arbitrary folder path rather than picking an uploaded one.

If you've ever wanted to run a whole folder of stills through the same upscale, ControlNet, or vid2vid pass, this is the front door. It pairs naturally with Video Combine at the other end to turn processed frames back into a video.

How it works

It scans the directory, filters to actual image files - jpg, png, ppm, bmp, tif, and webp - sorts them, and stacks them into a batch. Ordering is by filename, so name your frames with zero-padded numbers (frame_0001, frame_0002…) if you care about sequence, which for video you always do.

The inputs and outputs that matter

The directory widget is the folder path. It's a VHS_PATH field with completion - start typing and Tab accepts the top suggestion, Ctrl+B goes up a level. The three optional knobs mirror the video loaders:

• image_load_cap - max images to load, i.e. batch size. 0 loads the whole folder; set a cap so a 2,000-image directory doesn't eat all your memory.
• skip_first_images - discard this many from the front. Bump it by image_load_cap each run to process a huge sequence in chunks.
• select_every_nth - keep 1 of every N to thin out a dense sequence.

There's also an optional meta_batch to hook up a Meta Batch Manager when the folder is genuinely enormous.

Outputs: IMAGE (the frames), MASK (the alpha channel, if the images have one), and frame_count.

How to install it

ComfyUI Manager: search ComfyUI-VideoHelperSuite, install, restart. Or:

cd ComfyUI/custom_nodes
git clone https://github.com/Kosinkadink/ComfyUI-VideoHelperSuite

then restart. No model weights - it's a loader.

Common issues & troubleshooting

Frames come out in the wrong order. Filenames sort as strings, so frame_2 lands after frame_10. Zero-pad your numbers (frame_0002) and the order fixes itself.

It loaded nothing / half the folder. Check image_load_cap isn't set low by accident, and that the files are among the supported types - stray .txt sidecars or unusual formats get filtered out.

Out of memory on a big folder. Cap image_load_cap, and for truly long sequences connect a Meta Batch Manager so it processes in slices.

The path won't load on a hosted instance. VHS_STRICT_PATHS, if set, limits loading to ComfyUI's directories - put the folder under ComfyUI's input and use the upload variant instead.