Want to compress a video to a specific file size? Constrict is a new Linux tool built in Python and GTK4, and powered by FFmpeg that can do it.

https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2025/07/constrict-linux-video-compressor-ffmpeg-gui-ubuntu

Playing with stereo pair labels in the waveform viz tool. So incredibly wild that #ffmpeg just lets me do all this

(short animation, no sound, ironically)

FFmpeg in plain English – LLM-assisted FFmpeg in the browser

https://vidmix.app/ffmpeg-in-plain-english/

Ok, any #video folks out there who know how to do what I want to do? I don't know what words to search for because I don't know what this technique is called. Boosts welcome, suggestions welcome.

I have a pool cleaning robot. Like a roomba, but for the bottom of the pool. We call it poomba. Anyways, I want to shoot an MP4 video with a stationary camera (a GoPro) looking down on the pool while the robot does its work. So I will have this overhead video of like 3-4 hours.

I want to kinda overlay all the frames of the video into a single picture. So the areas where the robot drove will be dark streaks (the robot is black and purple). And any area the robot didn't cover would show the white pool bottom. Areas the robot went over a lot would be darker. Areas it went rarely would be lighter.

I'm just super curious how much coverage I actually get. This thing isn't a roomba. It has no map and it definitely doesn't have an internet connection at the bottom of the pool. (Finally! A place they can't get AI, yet!) It's just using lidar, motion sensors, attitude sensors and some kind of randomizing algorithm.

I think of it like taking every frame of the video and compositing it down with like 0.001 transparency. By the end of the video the things that never changed (the pool itself) would be full brightness and clear. While the robot's paths would be faint, except where it repeated a lot, which would be darker.

I could probably rip it into individual frames using #ffmpeg and then do this compositing with #ImageMagick or something (I'm doing this on #Linux). But 24fps x 3600 seconds/hour x 3 hours == about 260K frames. My laptop will take ages to brute force this. Any more clever ways to do it?

If I knew what this technique/process was called, I'd search for it.

A developer managed to reverse pixelation in video using FFmpeg, GIMP and edge detection - no AI involved.

By analyzing motion and edges across frames, they could reconstruct original content from blurred areas.

It’s a reminder: pixelation is visual, not secure.

Code & demo: https://github.com/KoKuToru/de-pixelate_gaV-O6NPWrI

So I have hundreds of videos of ~1 minute recorded from my phone ~10 years ago, and they generally don’t have that great compression, nor they are stored in a modern and advanced video format.

For archiving purposes, I want to take advantage of my workstation’s mighty GPU to process them so that the quality is approximately the same, but the file size would be strongly reduced.

Nevertheless, compressing videos is terribly hard, and way more complex than compressing pictures, so I wouldn’t really know how to do this, what format to use, what codec, what bitrate, what parameters to keep an eye on, etc.

I don’t care if the compression takes a lot of time, I just want smaller but good looking videos.

Any tips? (Links to guides and tutorials are ok too)

Also, unfortunately I am forced to use Windows for this (don’t ask me why ), but I know nothing about Windows because I hate it. Practical software suggestions are very much welcome, too!

Finally got #FFmpeg working as a fully functional screen recorder, and podcast recorder too! No more downloading third party tools that can all be done in FFmpeg. Now maybe I can make PeerTube videos easier now.

Speak faster… or give me tokens… nah, just speak faster.

#transcriptions #llm #gpt #openAI #ffmpeg #ffmpeg4live

https://george.mand.is/2025/06/openai-charges-by-the-minute-so-make-the-minutes-shorter/

Re: https://okla.social/@johnmoyer/114738149453494692

https://www.rsok.com/~jrm/2025May31_birds_and_cats/video_IMG_3666c_2.mp4

ffmpeg -loop 1 -i IMG_3666cs_gimp.JPG -y -filter_complex "[0]scale=1200:-2,setsar=1:1[out];[out]crop=1200:800[out];[out]scale=8000:-1,zoompan=z='zoom+0.005':x=iw/3.125-(iw/zoom/2):y=ih/2.4-(ih/zoom/2):d=3000:s=1200x800:fps=30[out]" -vcodec libx265 -map "[out]" -map 0:a? -pix_fmt yuv420p -r 30 -t 30 video_IMG_3666c_2.mp4

My "couldn't let it go" #ADHD project this week has been optimizing my faux #CUSeeMe webcam view for my #twitch streams and then making it more accurately emulate the original #ConnectixQuickCam:

https://github.com/morgant/CU-SeeMe-OpenBSD

Another project that has helped me better understand #ffmpeg & #lavfi, #mpv, and how to create complex filters.

Usually, I'm quite happy with #Linux:

It just works, and I don't have to think about it at all.

But sometimes, I reckon: If it sucks, it sucks badly.

I use the command line video editor #ffmpeg quite a lot, but yesterday, it just stopped working, first producing wrong results and then weird error messages.

Internet search for the error messages gave lots of results from the 2010s and Reddit threads where the issue remained unresolved.

"OK", I thought, "Let's do what everyone does":

1/3

Talk is cheap, send patches.