hbrain 2ac00e0e67 Reuse intro logo as outro and refine title fade

2026-05-28 14:48:10 +00:00

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movmaker

Simple Python + ffmpeg movie maker.

Drop pictures, videos, music, and optionally one simple data.txt file into a single flat input directory. Then run one command to create an MP4 video.

No YAML. No required subdirectories.

Requirements

Python 3
ffmpeg
ffprobe usually included with ffmpeg

Install on Debian/Ubuntu/Raspberry Pi OS:

sudo apt install ffmpeg

Fonts

The default title/stamp styling uses these fonts:

Bebas Neue for the opening title, date, and location
Noto Sans Bold for the bottom-left/bottom-right stamps
IBM Plex Sans SemiBold for per-file captions

Both fonts support common Danish and Croatian characters such as æ ø å Æ Ø Å č ć ž š đ Č Ć Ž Š Đ.

Install them locally for the current user:

mkdir -p ~/.local/share/fonts/google
curl -L -o ~/.local/share/fonts/google/BebasNeue-Regular.ttf \
  'https://github.com/google/fonts/raw/main/ofl/bebasneue/BebasNeue-Regular.ttf'
sudo apt install fonts-noto-core fonts-ibm-plex
fc-cache -f

Check that fonts are available:

fc-match 'Bebas Neue'
fc-match 'Noto Sans'
fc-match 'IBM Plex Sans'

Optional Jamendo music download

If the input folder has no audio file, movmaker can download one random track from Jamendo.

Save your Jamendo client ID in either an environment variable:

export JAMENDO_CLIENT_ID='your_client_id_here'

or in a local config file:

mkdir -p ~/.config/movmaker
echo 'JAMENDO_CLIENT_ID=your_client_id_here' > ~/.config/movmaker/jamendo.env
chmod 600 ~/.config/movmaker/jamendo.env

The default music search query is:

cinematic punk rock

Override it with:

python3 movmaker.py input --music-genre "upbeat rock"

Input folder

Example:

input/
  IMG_001.jpg
  IMG_002.png
  holiday_clip.mp4
  music.mp3
  data.txt

Supported file types:

Images: .jpg, .jpeg, .png, .webp, .bmp, .tif, .tiff
Videos: .mp4, .mov, .mkv, .avi, .webm, .m4v
Audio: .mp3, .wav, .m4a, .aac, .flac, .ogg
Data: data.txt, info.txt, or title.txt

Files are ordered by filename, so names like this work well:

001.jpg
002.jpg
003.mp4
004.jpg

data.txt

data.txt is optional, but if present every non-empty, non-comment line must use mandatory key: value syntax. Plain positional lines are not supported.

Movie metadata keys:

Title: Paris Trip
Location: Paris, France
Date: May 2024
Description: Longer description shown in MVLog and embedded in final MP4 metadata.

Supported metadata key aliases:

title: Title or Name
location: Location, Place, or Where
date: Date, Dates, or When
description: Description, Desc, or Synopsis

If the date entry is omitted, movmaker uses the date from the first picture/video and displays it like:

May 2026

If the location entry is omitted and GPS coordinates are found in the first picture/video that has them, movmaker reverse geocodes them and uses that as the location. It tries to return only city/town/village, country; if no city/town/village is found, it uses just the country.

Any other key: value line is treated as a per-file caption where the key is the exact media filename:

IMG_001.jpg: Eiffel Tower
IMG_002.jpg: Louvre
IMG_003.jpg: First line | Second line

MVLog worker

mvlog_worker.py can be run from this machine by cron or a systemd timer to process MVLog jobs stored on the web machine.

Default paths:

remote host: 192.168.0.204
remote web root: /var/www/html/mvlog
inputs: in-dir/<job>/
outputs: out-dir/YYYYMMDD_title.mp4
per-job state: in-dir/<job>/.movmaker-state.json

The worker:

scans remote in-dir/
computes a fingerprint from input filenames, sizes, and mtimes
skips jobs whose fingerprint matches a completed state file and whose output exists
copies changed jobs locally
renders with movmaker.py
uploads the MP4 atomically to remote out-dir/
removes the old output if the regenerated filename changed
clears the web metadata cache

Run once:

./mvlog_worker.py

Process one job:

./mvlog_worker.py --job romo2026

Force regeneration:

./mvlog_worker.py --job romo2026 --force

Pass extra movmaker options:

./mvlog_worker.py --movmaker-arg=--preview

Recommended scheduling is a systemd timer or cron with a separate lock, e.g. every MVLOG_WORKER_RECOMMENDED_INTERVAL_MINUTES minutes (5 minutes; see mvlog_worker.py).

Usage

Basic:

python3 movmaker.py input

With options:

python3 movmaker.py input \
  --out-dir . \
  --image-duration 6 \
  --fade 3 \
  --audio-fade 10 \
  --audio-fade-in 2 \
  --video-fade 1.5 \
  --music-genre "cinematic punk rock" \
  --resolution 1920x1080 \
  --fps 30

Fast preview render:

python3 movmaker.py input --preview

Configuration knobs

The most common visual timing/styling tweaks are exposed as constants near the top of movmaker.py:

Constant	Purpose	Default
`INTRO_LOGO_TARGET_HEIGHT_RATIO`	Portion of the video height used for the intro logo before padding (e.g. `0.75` = 75 % of frame height).	`0.75`
`INTRO_LOGO_EXTRA_HOLD`	Extra seconds the synthesized intro still remains before the first crossfade.	`6.0`
`INTRO_LOGO_FADE_OFFSET`	Minimum time (s) the logo stays fully visible before the first xfade is allowed to start.	`3.0`
`INTRO_LOGO_DEFAULT_ALPHA`	Default opacity for the intro logo (1 = fully opaque, 0 = invisible).	`1.0`
`INTRO_TITLE_FADE_DELAY`	Seconds after start before the main title begins fading in.	`2.0`
`INTRO_TITLE_FADE_LENGTH`	Seconds the fade-in/out lasts.	`1.0`
`INTRO_TITLE_VISIBLE`	Seconds the title stays fully visible between fade in/out.	`4.0`
`DEFAULT_IMAGE_DURATION`	Default fully visible time per still image before fades are added.	`6.0`
`DEFAULT_CROSSFADE_DURATION`	Default crossfade duration between media items.	`3.0`
`FIRST_IMAGE_DURATION_MULTIPLIER`	Multiplier applied to the first still’s `--image-duration` to delay the first transition.	`2.0`
`DEFAULT_AUDIO_FADE_IN`	Default audio fade-in duration.	`2.0`
`DEFAULT_AUDIO_FADE_OUT`	Default audio fade-out duration.	`10.0`
`DEFAULT_VIDEO_FADE`	Default video fade-in/out duration for the first/last real clips.	`1.0`
`INTRO_VIDEO_FADE_ENABLED`	Whether the synthesized intro/logo pad gets the global fade-in effect (`False` keeps it fully visible from frame 0).	`False`

Adjust these constants and rerun movmaker.py to change the intro behavior without touching the rest of the pipeline.

Current behavior

scans one flat input directory
supports an optional intro logo overlay via --intro-logo
supports AJAX save for input-dir create, edit, delete with toast notifications and redirect cleanup
auto-detects media/audio/data files by extension
shows each image fully visible for DEFAULT_IMAGE_DURATION seconds by default (6 s), not counting crossfades
keeps the first image longer so the first transition starts after FIRST_IMAGE_DURATION_MULTIPLIER * DEFAULT_IMAGE_DURATION seconds (12 s with defaults)
includes video clips inline
crossfades between media items over DEFAULT_CROSSFADE_DURATION seconds by default (3 s)
loops/trims music to match the video
if no audio file exists in the input folder, searches Jamendo using --music-genre and downloads one random Creative Commons track that allows non-commercial reuse and derivative works; default query is cinematic punk rock
reads the Jamendo client ID from JAMENDO_CLIENT_ID or ~/.config/movmaker/jamendo.env
fades music in over DEFAULT_AUDIO_FADE_IN seconds (2 s) and out over DEFAULT_AUDIO_FADE_OUT seconds (10 s) by default
builds a black intro still (matching the first media item’s resolution) when --intro-logo is provided, scales the logo to INTRO_LOGO_TARGET_HEIGHT_RATIO of the frame height (75 % by default), shows it at INTRO_LOGO_DEFAULT_ALPHA opacity (1.0 = fully opaque) from frame 0, and keeps it on screen for audio_fade_in + INTRO_LOGO_EXTRA_HOLD seconds (with defaults this is DEFAULT_AUDIO_FADE_IN + INTRO_LOGO_EXTRA_HOLD, i.e. 8 s) before allowing the first crossfade; the same clip is appended at the end so the last real scene crossfades back into the logo-on-black frame
opening title text fades in after INTRO_TITLE_FADE_DELAY seconds (2 s), stays visible for INTRO_TITLE_VISIBLE seconds (4 s), then fades out over INTRO_TITLE_FADE_LENGTH seconds (1 s)
fades the first real clip in with the --video-fade duration (default DEFAULT_VIDEO_FADE, currently 1 s) while leaving the logo intro instant-on when INTRO_VIDEO_FADE_ENABLED is False; when a logo intro is present, the reusable outro clip removes the need for a final global fade-out, so the crossfade into the outro handles the closing visuals while audio still follows DEFAULT_AUDIO_FADE_OUT
displays optional per-file captions at bottom center with slightly off-white text and a soft shadow; use | to split caption lines
adds persistent bottom-left title/date/place and bottom-right Bubulescu.Org stamps
preserves special characters in rendered overlays and metadata
uses safe ASCII only for generated filenames, so special letters become readable equivalents like Č -> C, å -> aa, ø -> o, ä -> ae, ß -> ss
embeds MP4 metadata: title, date, location/place, QuickTime location name, artist, comment, and creation_time
writes an MP4 file named like YYYYMMDD_title.mp4 in the current directory by default; use --out-dir DIR to choose another output directory
takes YYYYMMDD from the first picture/video metadata, falling back to file modification date
keeps console output minimal during rendering and writes detailed ffmpeg output to timestamped logs in .logs/ inside the input directory
uses local ffmpeg/ffmpeg and ffmpeg/ffprobe when present, otherwise system tools

Notes

This is an early version. The intended workflow is deliberately simple: dump files into one folder and run the script.

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