README.md

🎬 FFmpeg GUI - Video Encoder

A very simple graphical interface for FFmpeg with support for AV1, H265 and H264 encoding using CUDA hardware acceleration.

✨ Features

• 🎯 Modern UI: Attractive dark‑mode design, intuitive layout.
• ⚡ Hardware Acceleration: Full NVENC CUDA support.
• 📹 Multi‑Codec: AV1, H265 (HEVC), H264 with configurable presets.
• 🔄 Scaling: Automatic scaling to common resolutions (576p, 720p, 1080p, 1440p, 2160p).
• 👁️ Command Preview: Shows the FFmpeg command before execution.
• 📊 Real‑time Log: Streams FFmpeg output while encoding.
• 🎛️ Advanced Controls: Presets, CQ/quality parameter, audio copy options.
• 🚀 Drag & Drop: Drag files directly onto the interface (where supported).
• 🖼️ Animation Mode: Create animated WebP, AVIF or GIF files from video clips.

🚀 Quick Start

Option 1: Pre‑compiled executable (recommended)

1. Download the latest release from GitHub Releases.
2. Extract the archive.
3. Ensure FFmpeg is installed (see FFmpeg Installation below).
4. Run FFmpeg_GUI.exe.

Option 2: From source

1. Clone the repository:

   git clone https://github.com/tuousername/ffmpeg-gui.git
   cd ffmpeg-gui

2. Set up the environment:

   # Windows
   pip install -r requirements.txt
   
   # Linux/macOS
   pip install -r requirements.txt

3. Run the application:

   python ffmpeg_gui.py

🛠️ Building

Windows with Nuitka (converts Python code to C/C++ and compiles it)

1. Build the executable:

   pip install nuitka ordered-set
   nuitka --standalone --onefile --windows-console-mode=disable --enable-plugin=tk-inter --mingw64 --windows-icon-from-ico=icona.ico FFmpeg-GUI.py

2. Output:
   • FFmpeg_GUI.exe – the executable.

Windows with PyInstaller (bundles Python interpreter and source into a single executable)

1. Build the executable:

   pip install pyinstaller
   pyinstaller --name FFmpeg-GUI --onefile --windowed --icon="icona.ico" FFmpeg-GUI.py

2. Output:
   • dist/FFmpeg_GUI.exe – the executable.

Linux with PyInstaller

1. Build the executable:

   sudo apt install -y python3-tk tkdnd
   pip install pyinstaller
   pyinstaller --name FFmpeg-GUI --onefile --windowed FFmpeg-GUI.py

2. Output:
   • dist/FFmpeg_GUI.bin – the executable.

Linux with Nuitka

1. Build the executable:

   sudo apt install -y python3-tk tkdnd
   pip install nuitka ordered-set
   python -m nuitka --standalone --onefile --enable-plugin=tk-inter FFmpeg-GUI.py

2. Output:
   • FFmpeg_GUI.bin – the executable.

📦 FFmpeg Installation

Windows

Option 1 – Automatic:

# With winget
winget install FFmpeg

# With chocolatey
choco install ffmpeg

Option 2 – Manual:

1. Download from ffmpeg.org.
2. Extract to a folder (e.g. C:\ffmpeg).
3. Add C:\ffmpeg\bin to the system PATH, or copy ffmpeg.exe into the application folder.

Linux

# Ubuntu/Debian
sudo apt update && sudo apt install ffmpeg

# CentOS/RHEL/Fedora
sudo dnf install ffmpeg

# Arch Linux
sudo pacman -S ffmpeg

macOS

# Homebrew
brew install ffmpeg

# MacPorts
sudo port install ffmpeg

🎮 Usage

The application offers two main operating modes via a segmented selector:

1. Video Mode (preset‑based)

• Select Input File: Click Add File or drag one or more video files onto the interface.
• Select Preset: Choose an encoding preset (e.g., AV1 NVENC, H265 NVENC, ...). Controls adapt dynamically to the selected preset.
• Speed Preset: Choose encoding speed (p1‑p7).
• CQ / Quality: Adjust the desired quality.
• Scaling: Choose to rescale the video (e.g., 1080p, 720p) or keep the original resolution.
• Start: Click Start Compression.

2. Animation Mode

Create animated clips from video files in the following formats:

• Animated WebP (.webp)
• Animated AVIF (.avif) – supports libsvtav1 and libaom‑av1 encoders.
• Animated GIF (.gif) – generates an optimized colour palette in a two‑pass process.

Configurable options in the GUI for animations:

• FPS: Set animation framerate (default: 7).
• Maximum Width: Scale to standard widths or specify a custom width ("Custom").
• GIF Optimisation: When enabled, the app looks for gifsicle on the system to further optimise the produced GIF.

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⚙️ Preset Configuration (presets.json)

From this version onward, encoding presets are no longer hard‑coded; they are loaded from an external presets.json file.

File location

The application searches for presets.json in the same directory as the script or the compiled executable (both Nuitka and PyInstaller builds). If the file does not exist, a default one is created automatically.

Adding a custom preset (e.g., Xvid in AVI)

Simply insert a new object into the "video_presets" list in presets.json. Example:

{
  "id": "xvid_avi",
  "name": "Compress Xvid",
  "description": "Software Xvid compression in an AVI container",
  "category": "video",
  "output_extension": ".avi",
  "output_suffix": "_xvid",
  "ffmpeg": {
    "hwaccel": [],
    "video_codec": ["-c:v", "libxvid"],
    "rate_control": [],
    "quality_template": ["-q:v", "{quality}"],
    "preset_template": [],
    "extra_video_args": [],
    "container_args": [],
    "audio_args": ["-c:a", "libmp3lame", "-q:a", "4"]
  },
  "ui": {
    "quality": {
      "enabled": true,
      "default": 4,
      "min": 1,
      "max": 31
    }
  }
}