File & media fields

FileField, ImageField, and FilePathField are handled by writing real, tiny files so the stored path actually points at something.

What gets written

Field	Behaviour
FileField	A small text file is written and its name stored.
ImageField	A real 1×1 PNG is written (needs Pillow) and its name stored.
FilePathField	A path is chosen from the configured directory if it has files, otherwise synthesised.

Files are written under your project's MEDIA_ROOT, into the directory the field declares via upload_to:

class Book(models.Model):
    cover = models.ImageField(upload_to="covers/")   # → MEDIA_ROOT/covers/<name>.png
    sample = models.FileField(upload_to="samples/")  # → MEDIA_ROOT/samples/<name>.txt

A string upload_to is honoured so files land where your application expects them. A callable upload_to (which needs a real instance and filename that don't exist yet at generation time) falls back to a seed/ prefix — still under MEDIA_ROOT.

Skipping file writes

If you don't want files touched on disk — for example when seeding a very large table, or in CI where MEDIA_ROOT is throwaway — use --no-files. A name is still stored on the column, but nothing is written:

python manage.py seeddata --no-files

Pillow

ImageField requires Pillow (pip install Pillow, or the dev extra). Without it, Django's own system check for ImageField fails regardless of this package.