Free Video Cutter Cuts And Splits Your Videos

Ahhhh, this is why I love lifehacker. You guys give me these little tid-bits in such a timely manner. Just yesterday I was desperately trying to do exactly this...

FullSpecs

any free video software with .flv import support?

Henry Marroquin

Looks cool & easy but virtualdub is the master...And for those that don't know it Picasa has a wonder tool for those that VD doesn't handle like wmv etc... that allows you to set the beginning & ending points...

@Kyle Barron-Kraus: Ah, that's prob right. So to address that...

Yes, and?

@Henry Marroquin: Try The kmplayer
[www.filehippo.com]

Also lets you capture sections of the video

Doesn't seem to work under Windows 7. Tried a lot of different file formats but the app would just say "No Video"...

LolitaKabolla

I use VirtualDub. This app looks ridiculously easy to use though.

twii

Virtualdub?

Hmmm interesting.

It looks like it doesn't handle DV AVIs (as in MiniDV video). For splitting DV AVIs, I use DVDate: [paul.glagla.free.fr]

It's a little buggy with an odd UI, so if anyone knows of another program that splits AVIs...

@dhlt25: nvm i got it

dhlt25

@Adam Pash: I'm assuming he means VLC?

Kyle Barron-Kraus

the site is down? anyone has a mirror?

dhlt25

Good find.

avidemux [fixounet.free.fr] is another alternative for many formats, cross platform and FOSS.

I normally use a $50 commercial MPEG editor paired with comskip, but for videos inside AVI containers, there's usually a filter for avidemux. It also works with MPEG.

TheFu

@cisengineer: I'm not sure I understand what this has to do with VNC. Can you clarify?

VNC has always been free.

cisengineer

Picasa 3 has the ability to do this out of the box. Picasa is also Free. Just drag the start and stop markers and hit export.

AnEngineer

Picasa 3 has the ability to do this out of the box. Picasa is also Free. Just drag the start and stop markers and hit export. Viola shorter videos.

AnEngineer

@dhlt25: And I was just getting ready to say LifeHacker'd

Oh well...

Program works good. Very simple to use. Wish it was encoding with more recent version of the codecs (uses wmv 8 for example). Could use drag and drop. I think it re-encodes video if saved to the input video's format - seems unnecessary and can possibly compromise quality.

mados123

@TheFu: Thank you so much for mentioning this program. I've wanted to do simple for a few weeks now and could not find a program that would correctly view and save the files from a toy pen camera. I was pulling my hair out trying to work with VirtualDub and getting wonky colors no matter what I tried. Avidemux 2.4.4 opened, edited and saved the files without any problems or extras needed.

sketching

i already use vdub to cut up avi's and movica on mgpg's and wmv's.

Does this do .mkv's? I'm looking for better method than using mpc and mkvtoolnix.

Big2hd

@mados123: Re-encoding from one lossy format to another will always compromise quality. This is a big problem with digital video these days. Videos get so big when you try to preserve quality, but the lossyness is noticeable so quickly.

@AnEngineer: Should be "Voila"
Sorry, I hate that one!

@Big2hd: avidemux? I'm kinda shocked nobody is using it here? Works on Mac, Win, Linux, and BSD.

TheFu

@Posco Grubb: avidemux

TheFu

Site's slow and keeps crashing multiple browsers, be warned.

MaggieWasp

modded VirtualDub, works for me (avi, mpeg, vob, wmv and flv's)

7zip can split AND compress, it's also free, and available for both linux and windows... though, of course, there are a lot more other options for linux

HeidiNuberty

Am I missing something here? It imports the AVI clip fine, but does not show me any thumbnails? I am on VISTA it can split of a section of a larger clip fine and all the formats work. But how do you get it to section up into smaller clips? As in sequenced order etc.....

AllighieroGebius

@atkulp: Or...could be you would have shorter videos of violas.

@AllighieroGebius: I believe it can only make 2 cuts - the "precision" term is only for choosing possible cut locations and for making thumbnails.

@HeidiNuberty: A file split or compressed by 7zip would no longer be playable (unless "un-split" or uncompressed first). This splits or compresses video files - it's for making shorter videos, not just smaller files.

@cisengineer: One thing is more that VLC has no ability to cut and edit videos file.

Nice video tool, I'd prefer using movavi video suite, it's also a powerful video editor.

colarmac

@Henry Marroquin: I've always had success converting flv files with 'Super' from erightsoft . . . all open and free.

kdog311

Mac users might also want to check out a similar free tool called Explicit http://sveinbjorn.org/explicit

NelsonNarberth

There are more tools for cut video and join it. 'Advanced X Video Converter' can be helpful. [www.111download.com]

Cjordan

@mados123: That's a deal-breaker for me, especially when VirtualDubMod does exactly the same with support for direct stream copy.

@David Hildreth: Exactly what I was wondering. More importantly, does this do direct stream copying? Or does it try to re-encode?

@Henry Marroquin: Personally I find 'flvextract' to work best, as it simply does a direct stream copy to *.avi and *.mp3. Which is to say it does not re-encode the file as applications such as SUPER does, meaning you do not lose any quality at all.

I then use 'MeGUI' to mux the avi and mp3 file to one. From there I can use any application to do as I will with it.

As for cutting pieces out of a file, VirtualDubMod is dead simple to use (highlight unwanted selection > hit 'del').