How to create a video ad in Facebook with Python SDK using an already existing video?

Question

I am trying to create a video ad using a video that already exists in the ad account's asset library. When I first tried it, I did not specify a thumbnail and got an error message saying it needs a video thumbnail, which can be specified using either 'image_hash' or 'image_url' in the video_data field of object_story_spec. Below is the code I tried after adding in 'image_url' as a parameter:

params = {
    'name': new_ad_name,
    'body': body_copy,
    'title': headline,
    'url_tags': url_tags,
    'object_story_spec': {
        'page_id': page_id,
        'video_data': {
            'video_id': video_id,
            'link_description': link_description,
            'image_url': image_url,
            'call_to_action': {
                'type': cta,
                'value': {
                    'link': link
                }
            }
        }
    }
}

response = my_adaccount.create_ad_creative(params=params)
print(response)
creative_id = response['id']

params = {
    'name': new_ad_name,
    'status': 'PAUSED',
    'adset_id': adset_id,
    'creative': AdCreative(fbid=creative_id)
}

response = my_adaccount.create_ad(params=params)
print(response)

How do I get the image_hash or image_url of the video? When I use the AdVideo.api_get() method, the only possible fields that would seem to make sense is 'thumbnail_url' or 'picture', which both return URLs that start with 'https://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net', and when I use it as the parameter for 'image_url', I get the below error message:

"message": "Invalid parameter",
        "type": "OAuthException",
        "code": 100,
        "error_data": "null",
        "error_subcode": 1487833,
        "is_transient": true,
        "error_user_title": "Image Wasn't Downloaded",
        "error_user_msg": "Your image, https://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t15.13418-10/103708673_260590461836791_481914169400490137_n.jpg?_nc_cat=103&_nc_sid=f2c4d5&_nc_ohc=Uny5BTsfOP8AX_WC43Y&_nc_ad=z-m&_nc_cid=0&_nc_ht=scontent.xx&oh=6f27c0187e9477295663d325a3531c79&oe=5F11F4D7, couldn't be downloaded. Please wait a few minutes and try again."

Is there a way to create a video ad with the Python SDK without specifying the thumbnail initially? In Ads Manager, this is definitely not a requirement as Facebook generates it automatically so it seems odd that it is requiring it here.

Thank you!

Answer 1

For an uploaded video in media library, you can simply call a get request to the endpoint below:

https://graph.facebook.com/v11.0/video_id?fields=thumbnails

like

https://graph.facebook.com/v11.0/1086354212654329?fields=thumbnails

This will give you a list of thumbnails generated from your video. Before you create an ad, you can get the first thumbnail object's "uri" and use it as image_url.

With this way i can create ads without uploading a seperate thumbnail image to media library.