FFmpeg Filtergraph Builder
Write the steps you want — scale to 720p, crop to square, fade in 1s — and get a validated ffmpeg filtergraph back. Copy the -filter_complex string, the -vf chain, or the whole command. Nothing is executed and no file is uploaded.
About this tool
FFmpeg Filtergraph Builder turns an ordered list of plain filter steps into a
validated ffmpeg filtergraph string. You write what you want to happen, in
order; it writes the syntax — commas between filters, colons between options,
quoting for expressions that contain commas, and the [in]…[out] pad labels.
Nothing is executed. No file is uploaded, no ffmpeg process is started, and no step you type is ever run — the tool only composes and checks the text you'd paste into your own terminal. Everything happens locally in your browser via WebAssembly.
Worked example
Steps:
scale to 720p
crop to square
fade in 1s
Output (-filter_complex form):
[0:v]scale=-2:720,crop='min(iw,ih)':'min(iw,ih)',fade=t=in:st=0:d=1[out]
Switch Output form to Full ffmpeg command line and the same steps become:
ffmpeg -i input.mp4 -filter_complex "[0:v]scale=-2:720,crop='min(iw,ih)':'min(iw,ih)',fade=t=in:st=0:d=1[out]" -map "[out]" -map "0:a?" output.mp4
-map "0:a?" keeps the original audio if the file has any, and is skipped
silently if it doesn't.
Steps you can write
Steps go one per line. You can also separate them with ; or the word then,
and list markers (-, 1.) are ignored, so a pasted recipe usually works as-is.
Filler words (to, the, by, with) are ignored too — scale to 720p and
scale 720p are the same step.
Video steps
| Step | Examples | Compiles to |
|---|---|---|
scale | scale 1280x720, scale 720p, scale width 1280, scale 50% | scale=… |
crop | crop square, crop 640x640, crop 16:9, crop 80% | crop=… (centred) |
pad | pad 1920x1080, pad 16:9 #101010 | pad=… (centred, black by default) |
fade | fade in, fade in 2s, fade out 3 at 57 | fade=t=…:st=…:d=… |
rotate | rotate 90, rotate 180 degrees, rotate 270 | transpose=… |
flip | flip horizontal, flip vertical | hflip / vflip |
grayscale | grayscale, black and white | hue=s=0 |
blur / sharpen | blur, blur 12, sharpen 1.5 | gblur=sigma=… / unsharp=… |
fps | fps 30 | fps=30 |
speed | speed 2x, speed 0.5 | setpts=…*PTS |
trim | trim 5 to 20 | trim=…,setpts=PTS-STARTPTS |
reverse | reverse | reverse |
brightness / contrast / saturation / hue | brightness 0.1, saturation 1.4, hue 90 | eq=… / hue=h=… |
text | text "Hello" size 36 color yellow position top box | drawtext=… |
raw | raw vibrance=intensity=0.5 | passed through, syntax-checked |
Audio steps (set Stream to Audio)
volume 2 / volume -6dB, fade in 2 / fade out 3 at 57, trim 0 to 30,
speed 1.25 (chained atempo when the factor is outside 0.5–2), normalize
(loudnorm=I=-16:TP=-1.5:LRA=11), mono, highpass 120, lowpass 8000,
reverse, and raw.
Limits and edge cases
- One linear chain. The builder emits a single chain, so multi-input filters
(
overlay,concat,amix) are out of scope — a;in arawstep is rejected for that reason. Userawfor a single exotic filter instead. - Max 30 steps, and at most 8,000 characters of step text.
- Aspect vs. pixels: a colon means an aspect ratio (
crop 16:9), anxmeans pixels (crop 640x640). - Caption text may not contain single quotes, backslashes, or control
characters — those can't be escaped safely inside a filtergraph — and is
emitted with
expansion=noneso a%{…}sequence stays literal text. - File names in the command form are limited to letters, digits and
. _ - + /, so nothing that could change the meaning of a shell command can be pasted in. Rename the file or edit the command by hand for anything else. - The generated graph is checked for balanced quotes and brackets before it is
returned, but ffmpeg still has the last word — filter availability depends on
how your ffmpeg build was compiled (
drawtextneeds--enable-libfreetype).
FAQ
Does this run ffmpeg or touch my video?
No. It's a text tool: steps in, filtergraph string out. No file is read or uploaded, and no ffmpeg process is ever started — not in the browser, not in the CLI. You copy the result into your own terminal, where you stay in control of what runs. If you want a file actually transformed, use one of the dedicated video or audio tools instead.
What's the difference between the three output forms?
-filter_complex wraps the chain in pad labels — [0:v]…[out] — which is what
you need when you map the result explicitly or work with several streams. The
-vf / -af form is the same chain with no labels, which is the shorter way to
filter one stream. The command form embeds the labelled graph in a complete
ffmpeg -i … -map … line you can paste straight into a shell.
Why is `crop to square` written with quotes and `min()`?
Cropping to a square means "use the shorter side", which is the expression
min(iw,ih) — and that expression contains a comma, which ffmpeg would
otherwise read as the separator between two filters. Wrapping it in single
quotes keeps the comma inside the argument, so
crop='min(iw,ih)':'min(iw,ih)' is one filter. Crop centres itself when you
don't give x/y, so no offset is needed.
Can I use a filter the builder doesn't know?
Yes — write raw followed by the filter exactly as ffmpeg expects it, for
example raw vibrance=intensity=0.5. It's checked for a valid filter name,
balanced quotes and brackets, and that it's a single filter, then placed in the
chain in order. Filter names aren't checked against your ffmpeg build, since
this tool never talks to ffmpeg.
Why does an audio speed change produce several atempo filters?
Each atempo instance is defined for factors between 0.5 and 2. A bigger change
is expressed as a chain whose factors multiply back to what you asked for, so
speed 4x becomes atempo=2,atempo=2 and speed 3 becomes
atempo=2,atempo=1.5. That's the standard way to keep the result in range.
What happens when a step is wrong?
You get an error naming the step number, the text you wrote, what was expected, and what was received — for example step 2 ('sparkle 3'): unknown video step 'sparkle', followed by the list of steps that are supported. Nothing partial is returned, so you never copy a half-built graph.
Developer & Automation Access
Run it from the terminal
Same engine as this page, headless — via the gizza CLI:
gizza tool ffmpeg-filtergraph-builder "scale to 720p
crop to square
fade in 1s"New to the CLI? Get gizza →
Open it by URL
Pre-fill and auto-run this tool with query parameters — the names match the API/CLI:
https://gizza.ai/tools/ffmpeg-filtergraph-builder/?steps=scale%20to%20720p%0Acrop%20to%20square%0Afade%20in%201s&stream=video&output=filter_complex&input_label=auto%20%280%3Av%20for%20video%2C%200%3Aa%20for%20audio%29&output_label=out&input_file=input.mp4&output_file=output.mp4&explain=trueMachine-readable descriptor: tool.json — title + parameters JSON Schema for agents.