ffedit is a command-line tool for video editing. ffmpeg can cut and splice together video clips, but the syntax for doing so quickly gets out of control for large numbers of clips. ffedit takes in a YAML file that describes which parts of which clips to combine, any filters that should be applied to them, and invokes ffmpeg to produce the desired output. You can look at usage and download it from Github.
With ffedit, concatenating video files is as simple as:
all:
- a.mkv
- b.mkv
but it supports advanced usage, such as:
all:
concat:
fadein: 2 # fade in over 2 seconds
fadeout: 2 # fade out over 2 seconds
inputs:
- clip:
file: a.mkv
start: 1:20 # Start 1 minute 20 seconds in
duration: 15 # Only take 15 seconds
- clip:
file: b.mkv
speed: 2x # speed up video
tempo: 2x # speed up audio
ffedit was largely written on a plane ride back from Australia and was used to edit the video from that trip (and subsequent trips.) Before writing ffedit, I was using a BASH script / Makefile to invoke ffmpeg.