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Editing Video with Python + MoviePy

In this tutorial, we will use MoviePy, a Python library, to edit and add effects to a given video clip. Videos are great for getting ideas across. But editing those videos can take a long time.

Prerequisites
Why MoviePy? And When?
Installing
Basic Editing
Adding Effects
Putting It All Together
Conclusion

Prerequisites

You should know the basics of Python 3 (including setting up projects). Having some basic knowledge about video files is helpful, but not necessary. This tutorial uses Python 3.7.4, MoviePy 1.0.3, PyCharm 2019.3.5 (Community Edition), and Windows 10.

Why MoviePy? and When?

MoviePy is a Python module for editing videos. It can cut and arrange clips, add video effects, and edit audio. It can work like a toolbox, if you only make changes to one clip. If you have to edit lots of clips, MoviePy can automate that process.

In the workplace, MoviePy works best when every video is similar and simple to edit. For example, if you work for a TV studio, you might need to put together lots of clips from a football game.

MoviePy could split a full game (hours of video) into a few clips. Then, it could overlay your company's watermark in the corner.

The task is simple, but a human would find it boring and time-wasting. Using MoviePy frees a video editor for more creative parts of the job.

Thus, the module is good for any editing job where you know exactly what to do... and doing it by hand would take too long. This can mean TV programs, data visualizations, visual effects footage, supercuts, and more.

Installing

Installing MoviePy

First, set up a folder with a new Python script moviepy_test.py. Then install the package moviepy. In your terminal, you can do this with the command pip install moviepy. Other ways to install MoviePy are shown here.

Downloading the raw video

Now, we need to download the "raw footage", the video clip that we haven't edited. For this example, we'll be using a sample .mp4 file provided by Learning Container.

The .mp4 file, sample-mp4-file.mp4, is a video clip from the Blender Foundation short film Big Buck Bunny.

Go to this link for the video file. Download it by pressing Ctrl-S (or clicking File>Save in your browser, or the 3 dots in the video player and "Download").

Move sample-mp4-file.mp4 to the folder with moviepy_test.py.

The video should look like this by default:

Basic editing

The key objects in MoviePy are VideoClips.

A VideoClip contains video and sound. Open up moviepy_test.py and add these lines:

from moviepy.editor import *

clip = VideoFileClip("sample-mp4-file.mp4")

The module moviepy.editor contains the objects and methods we're using. clip is a new VideoFileClip object, initialized with the name (or filepath) of the video file at hand.

We don't want to use the whole Big Buck Bunny clip. We only need 10 seconds from the middle of it.

MoviePy measures time in seconds, and we can use the subclip method to get what we need:

clip = VideoFileClip("sample-mp4-file.mp4").subclip(56, 66)

Now that we can create different video segments, from one file, we can start making "cuts". Make 3 more clips, from different parts of the video.

Put these clips together in a list, and chain them together with concatenate_videoclips. Concatenate means "link together", as we edit the clips into one video.

final_clip = concatenate_videoclips([clip, clip2, clip3, clip4])

Finally, to get our finished video, we use the write_videofile method on final_clip. Your final code should look like the code below.

from moviepy.editor import *

# clip is the video from 00:56 to 01:06
clip = VideoFileClip("sample-mp4-file.mp4").subclip(56, 66)
clip2 = VideoFileClip("sample-mp4-file.mp4").subclip(70, 76)
clip3 = VideoFileClip("sample-mp4-file.mp4").subclip(50, 52)
clip4 = VideoFileClip("sample-mp4-file.mp4").subclip(30, 35)

final_clip = concatenate_videoclips([clip, clip2, clip3, clip4])

final_clip.write_videofile("output_1.mp4")

Save and run your code. It may take 30-60 seconds to finish running. You should get a new video, output_1.mp4, shorter than the original .mp4 file, in your folder. You can watch your new video by double-clicking it.

It should be much shorter:

Adding effects

Video effects

MoviePy can do more than just cut and rearrange video. The module moviepy.editor also contains submodules. vfx holds video effects, and afx holds audio effects.

To add any effect to a clip, you use the fx method on the clip, and pass in the effect and any parameters. For convenience, put the entire VideoFileClip in parentheses (). For many effects, put each .fx call on a new line.

clip = (VideoFileClip("sample-mp4-file.mp4").subclip(56, 66)
    .fx(vfx.colorx, 0.7))

# you can also do this with clip_edited = clip.fx(vfx.colorx, 0.7)

Our clip is getting called with .fx( vfx.colorx, 1.2). MoviePy reads this as "apply the vfx.colorx effect and with the parameter of 1.2".

What this does is make the clip 20% brighter than it was before (since +20% brightness = 1.2x as bright).

You can stack several effects, with the same strategy:

clip = (VideoFileClip("sample-mp4-file.mp4").subclip(56, 66)
        .fx(vfx.colorx, 1.2)  # 20% brighter
        .fx(vfx.lum_contrast, 0, 40, 127))  # and increase the contrast

Let's do this with clip 2 and invert_colors, and output our results.

from moviepy.editor import *

clip = (VideoFileClip("sample-mp4-file.mp4").subclip(56, 66)
        .fx(vfx.colorx, 1.2)  # 20% brighter
        .fx(vfx.lum_contrast, 0, 40, 127))  # and increase the contrast
clip2 = (VideoFileClip("sample-mp4-file.mp4").subclip(70, 76)
        .fx(vfx.invert_colors))
clip3 = VideoFileClip("sample-mp4-file.mp4").subclip(50, 52)
clip4 = VideoFileClip("sample-mp4-file.mp4").subclip(30, 35)

final_clip = concatenate_videoclips([clip, clip2, clip3, clip4])

final_clip.write_videofile("output_2.mp4")

Our new output should look bright and distorted in the first part. The second part should be "color-inverted", where colors become their opposites. This means black would change to white.

Audio effects

We've changed the image, but we haven't yet changed the sound.

AudioClips in MoviePy work much the same as VideoClips. We create a new AudioFileClip in the same way we created a VideoFileClip.

Download this sample .mp3 file, a public domain song by Kevin MacLeod. Like with the .mp4 file, download the music .mp3 and place it in the directory with moviepy_test.py.

Now you can import the clip and excerpt the first 10 seconds:

musicclip = AudioFileClip("Study and Relax.mp3").subclip(0, 6)

We'll use this music in the next section.

Audio clips can also come from the audio of a video clip. Let's extract the audio from our first video clip, so we can use the sound on its own:

audioclip = clip.audio

MoviePy has plenty of audio effects, and you can stack them like the video effects.

Audio effects are in the afx submodule:

audioclip = (clip.audio).afx(afx.volumex, 1.2).afx(afx.audio_fadein, 1.0)
# Make the sound 20% louder, and fade it in over 1 second

The set_audio function replaces a video clip's audio with a new audio clip. We use this to create a new version of the first clip in our video.

The end of your program should look like this:

musicclip = AudioFileClip("Study and Relax.mp3").subclip(0, 6)
audioclip = (clip.audio).fx(afx.volumex, 1.2).fx(afx.audio_fadein, 1.0)
# Make the sound 20% louder, and fade it in over 1 second
clip_v2 = clip.set_audio(audioclip)  # new first clip

final_clip = concatenate_videoclips([clip_v2, clip2, clip3, clip4])

final_clip.write_videofile("output_3.mp4")

Putting it all together

Perhaps you want to stack video clips on top of each other. Or, maybe play music over the video. For these features, we need compositing.

Compositing is the process of putting one thing on top of another. To play two videos on top of each other, you composite their videos together. To play music on top of the video's current audio, you composite the audios together.

Let's play a smaller version of the final clip in our video, but on top of the first clip.

We need to create a CompositeVideoClip out of clip4 and clip_v2:

composite_start_of_video = CompositeVideoClip([clip_v2,
                                               clip4.fx(vfx.resize, 0.6)])
# clip4 is smaller (60% original size), and on top of clip_v2

The clip on top also needs to be smaller. Otherwise, the bottom clip would be completely hidden by the top clip.

We also have to remove the sound from clip4. Otherwise, overlaying both clips would play both their audios.

composite_start_of_video = CompositeVideoClip([clip_v2,
                                               clip4.fx(vfx.resize, 0.6).fx(afx.volumex, 0.0)])
# clip4 is smaller (60% original size), and on top of clip_v2

A similar setup will add our music to the second clip. Extract the second clip's original audio, and composite it with the music audio. Then, replace the clip's audio with the composite. The whole editing part of the script should have these steps.

musicclip = AudioFileClip("Study and Relax.mp3").subclip(0, 6)
audioclip = (clip.audio).fx(afx.volumex, 1.2).fx(afx.audio_fadein, 1.0)
# Make the sound 20% louder, and fade it in over 1 second
clip_v2 = clip.set_audio(audioclip)  # new first clip

composite_start_of_video = CompositeVideoClip([clip_v2,
                                               clip4.fx(vfx.resize, 0.6).fx(afx.volumex, 0.0)])
# clip4 is smaller (60% original size), and on top of clip_v2

clip2_audio = (clip2.audio).fx(afx.volumex, 1.5)  # 50% louder, so we can hear over our music
composite_second_clip_audio = CompositeAudioClip([clip2_audio,
                                                  (musicclip).fx(afx.volumex, 0.3)])  # 70% quieter
clip2_v2 = clip2.set_audio(composite_second_clip_audio)

final_clip = concatenate_videoclips([composite_start_of_video, clip2_v2, clip3, clip4])

final_clip.write_videofile("output_4.mp4")

The final result now has the music, overlaid clips, and all the previous edits.

Conclusion

Good job! You've just edited and remixed a video, all in a Python program. There are plenty of other things you can do with MoviePy, now that you know the basics.

For more ideas, check out the MoviePy Project Galley. MoviePy can even automate large video processing jobs, using other built-in features to speed those up.

Happy coding.

Peer Review Contributions by: Daniel Katungi

Published on: Feb 26, 2021

Updated on: Jul 15, 2024