Why Are Images Missing in YOLO Output When Using MinIO as S3 Source?

[Tdj54788]

When using MinIO as the S3 target source input, I want to export a YOLO format zip file with images. However, I found that the generated zip file does not contain any images. On the other hand, when I use a local folder as the target source input, the zip file includes both images and labels correctly. Why is this happening, and how can I fix it to ensure that the images are included when using MinIO as the source?

[heidi-humansignal]

Hello,
Thank you for contacting us regarding the missing images in your YOLO export when using MinIO as the S3 source. I understand that when you use a local folder for your source, the ZIP file includes both labels and images, but with MinIO only the labels appear.
This behavior is by design. In cloud storage setups (such as with MinIO) the export functionality is configured not to download image files automatically. This is done for two main reasons:

1. Security and Performance: Automatically including images in the export can lead to timeouts and significantly increased export times—especially when the dataset is large. It also minimizes the risk of inadvertently exposing sensitive image data.

2. Storage Access: When using a local filesystem, files are directly accessible, so the exporter can easily include them. With S3/MinIO, images reside in the cloud and are only accessible through presigned URLs. By default, Label Studio does not fetch these files during export.

Let me know if that helps clear things up!

Thanks,

Tyler Conlee
Head of Support
HumanSignal

Comment by Tyler Conlee
Workflow Run

[makseq]

Try using export YOLO_WITH_IMAGES in LS >= 1.16. However, your export can be timed out, in this case use cli command

label-studio export <project-id> YOLO_WITH_IMAGES --export-path=/output/folder

See more here:
https://labelstud.io/guide/export.html#Export-using-console-command.