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I have an hour of raw footage from a users group meeting that I want to split in to 10-minute chunks so I can upload them to YouTube. I did some searching and couldn't really find a good way to accomplish this. Do you know of a good method or tool for splitting video? I have access to Adobe software from work.

EDIT: A friend at work suggested I check out http://videohelp.com but it is blocked here at work, so I guess I'll have to check it out later.

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    I know MeGUI has the ability to split MP4's by filesize, but I don't think it can do timecodes... How has the source been encoded - CBR or VBR? Sep 4, 2009 at 14:18
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    cool, I'll check out MeGUI I'm almost positive the encoding is VBR. I recorded it with the Flip Ultra HD Sep 4, 2009 at 14:23
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    Hmm, that makes it more difficult. If it was CBR, then you could just determine how big 10 minutes would be, and split it by that size. For VBR, you might need to reencode the file, since it's difficult to just split the files at specific timecodes without keyframes. Sep 4, 2009 at 14:27
  • Ah, I see. Still might be worth a try though. Sep 4, 2009 at 14:31
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    I guess you could always approximate it by getting the average video size for ten minutes (or nine if you want to be safe), and then splitting it by that size. Just so you know, you can get to the splitting menu in MeGUI by going to Tools -> Muxer -> MP4 Muxer, and setting the second last option (Splitting). Sep 4, 2009 at 14:33

4 Answers 4

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If you're not afraid of the command line ffmpeg is the tool to use.

It's a bit complicated, but most free tools are based on ffmpeg because it's the most powerful one out there. This is a sample of a command to split out 30 seconds of a video.

ffmpeg -i input.avi -vcodec copy -ss 00:00:10:15 -t 00:00:30:00 output.avi

If you're on windows, it's a little tough to get installed, but here are some good links to get it. http://ffmpeg.arrozcru.org/wiki/index.php?title=Links

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    +1 excellent, that might be just what I am looking for. I'll check it out this evening when I get home from work. Thank you. Sep 4, 2009 at 14:32
  • hope it works for you, I'm using linux and I've been able to do some great stuff with it.
    – chills42
    Sep 4, 2009 at 14:35
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    That's pretty good actually... Does it do any encoding or does it just split the files and write the appropriate headers?
    – cp2141
    Sep 10, 2009 at 19:23
  • I believe in this case you avoid encoding and simply copy the stream, but I'm not sure in the specifics.
    – chills42
    Sep 15, 2009 at 14:15
  • doesn't -an mean no audio? did he want no audio?
    – barlop
    Jun 10, 2011 at 1:26
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If you're willing to give it a shot, meGUI can handle splitting MP4 files by filesize. To do so, simply fire up the program, and go to Tools -> Muxer -> MP4 Muxer. Import the file, and then you can input a filesize to split it by.

If you're working with CBR content, then you can determine the filesize for a ten minute segment via the bitrate. If it's VBR, then this is less consistent depending on the content, so you should aim for a slightly lower time (e.g. the average size of a nine-minute segment), so you don't overshoot the 10-minute limit.

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ffmpeg -i input.avi -acodec copy -vcodec copy -ss 00:00:00:00 -t 00:10:00:00 output.avi

This will copy the audio as well...just uploaded a mute video to YouTube of a musical performance. -an is the culprit. Manpages FTW.

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If your video is in an MP4, MOV or 3GP container (i.e. has .mp4, .mov or .3gp extension) then MP4Box (command line util) and YAMB (a GUI for MP4Box) are what you need.

Run YAMB and select the Editing section, there is an option "Click to split MP4/M4A/MOV/3GP Files."

YAMB

Alternate download locations: MP4Box and YAMB

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