Seamlessly split/join frames

[PhoenixAZ]

Hi everyone,

This seems like such a basic video editing question, but I've searched the ends of the earth trying to find the answer... all I found were college papers, patent applications, and code programming - none of which was helpful. So I turn to you:

Suppose I have a video, 10 minutes long. I want to shorten it to 2 minutes, but create the illusion that it has not been edited.
I have a key frame around the 1 minute mark, and very similar frames at the 9 minute mark. Without using Avisynth scripts (I failed at those) - are there any editing programs that can take my first keyframe (with or without a threshold), analyze the entire video, and highlight the most similar frames elsewhere in the clip? I'd prefer a program with this feature included in the GUI; or even one that accepts virtualdub plug-ins (ie, VideoPad Editor).

It's become frustrating to try and match up similar frames manually, when there has to be a program that does it with ease...
File type is moot, because I can convert it to anything necessary beforehand if needed.

Any help would be great! Thanks in advance...

-PHX

[johnmeyer]

I had a nice reply ready to go, but this forum apparently doesn't save drafts. The short version is to read these posts at doom9.org:

How to synchronize two videos by comparing video frames

SpatialAlign v1.0 : Spatial Alignment of clips

Reload this Page joining many clips

[PhoenixAZ]

Thanks for the reply, johnmeyer!

I apologize, I think I spoke above my own pay grade by suggesting Avisynth, as these were the very codes I was finding that were frustrating me. I tried all week on Avisynth, to no avail, and I should have edited that out before posting (I just edited my post to reflect that). ]

I guess I was looking for an easier way out. It seems like a rather simple concept for most video editing programs to offer, surely one of them must have it. VideoPad editor is what I generally use, which can run virtualdub plug-ins. I can't seem to find one that can handle this task...

[jagabo]

A simpler method in AviSynth would be to just subtract the frame you want from the rest of the video, then scan through the video yourself to find a near match.

LSmashVideoSource("video.mp4")
still = Trim(642,642) # the number of the frame you want to match
return(StackVertical(still, last, Subtract(last,still)))

That stacks the still frame (taken from the video), the original video, and the difference between the original and the still -- at each frame of the video. Here's a sample frame from the resulting video:


[Attachment 40967 - Click to enlarge]

And attached is a short clip around the cut (frames 642 through 5438 were removed) with a few frames of motion interpolation between them.

[PhoenixAZ]

Thank you, jagabo. As I said though, I'm trying to avoid the use of Avisynth all-together...

[johnmeyer]

Thank you, jagabo. As I said though, I'm trying to avoid the use of Avisynth all-together...

Then I don't think you're going to be able to do what you want, although my image matching idea might work.