SM
Software Mansion•4w ago
Feint

Create thumbnail from mp4 video

Hello! I am a bit new with membrane framework, and i read about it and it looks amazing, so i have been trying it out. Now, i want to implement it in a personal project, where i need to extract a thumbnail from a video. I investigated a lot, and i can't find a reference in how to do this, i investigated the process and it looked like Parsing the MP4 video, demuxing it, redirecting the H264 file to a chain, and then decoding it. I was using this plugins, but failed successfully 🙂 {:membrane_file_plugin, "~> 0.16"}, {:membrane_mp4_plugin, "~> 0.29"}, {:membrane_h264_ffmpeg_plugin, "~> 0.28"}, {:membrane_h264_plugin, "~> 0.9"}, This is my current code 
defmodule MyThumbnail do
  use Membrane.Pipeline
  import Membrane.ChildrenSpec

  @impl true
  def handle_init(_ctx, mp4_path) do
    unless File.exists?(mp4_path), do: raise "File not found: #{mp4_path}"

    structure = [
      # Common source + demuxer
      child(:source, %Membrane.File.Source{location: mp4_path, seekable?: true})
      |> child(:demuxer, %Membrane.MP4.Demuxer.ISOM{optimize_for_non_fast_start?: true}),

      # === VIDEO chain ===
      get_child(:demuxer)
      |> via_out(:output, options: [kind: :video])
      |> child(:h264_parser_in, %Membrane.H264.Parser{
        output_stream_structure: :annexb, output_alignment: :au
      })
      |> child(:h264_dec, Membrane.H264.FFmpeg.Decoder)
      |> child(:h264_enc, %Membrane.H264.FFmpeg.Encoder{preset: :ultrafast})
      |> child(:h264_to_avc1, %Membrane.H264.Parser{
        output_stream_structure: :avc1, output_alignment: :au
      })
      |> get_child(:muxer),

      # === AUDIO chain (passthrough AAC) ===
      get_child(:demuxer)
      |> via_out(:output, options: [kind: :audio])
      |> child(:aac_parser_in, %Membrane.AAC.Parser{output_config: :esds})
      |> get_child(:muxer),
      
      # TODO: Extract thumbnail and store it
      
      # === Mux + Sink ===
      child(:muxer, %Membrane.MP4.Muxer.ISOM{})
      |> child(:sink, %Membrane.File.Sink{
        location: "/Users/Mauricio/Desktop/personal/vyvo/VYVO-APP/processed.mp4"
      })
    ]

    {[spec: structure], %{}}
  end
end
defmodule MyThumbnail do
  use Membrane.Pipeline
  import Membrane.ChildrenSpec

  @impl true
  def handle_init(_ctx, mp4_path) do
    unless File.exists?(mp4_path), do: raise "File not found: #{mp4_path}"

    structure = [
      # Common source + demuxer
      child(:source, %Membrane.File.Source{location: mp4_path, seekable?: true})
      |> child(:demuxer, %Membrane.MP4.Demuxer.ISOM{optimize_for_non_fast_start?: true}),

      # === VIDEO chain ===
      get_child(:demuxer)
      |> via_out(:output, options: [kind: :video])
      |> child(:h264_parser_in, %Membrane.H264.Parser{
        output_stream_structure: :annexb, output_alignment: :au
      })
      |> child(:h264_dec, Membrane.H264.FFmpeg.Decoder)
      |> child(:h264_enc, %Membrane.H264.FFmpeg.Encoder{preset: :ultrafast})
      |> child(:h264_to_avc1, %Membrane.H264.Parser{
        output_stream_structure: :avc1, output_alignment: :au
      })
      |> get_child(:muxer),

      # === AUDIO chain (passthrough AAC) ===
      get_child(:demuxer)
      |> via_out(:output, options: [kind: :audio])
      |> child(:aac_parser_in, %Membrane.AAC.Parser{output_config: :esds})
      |> get_child(:muxer),
      
      # TODO: Extract thumbnail and store it
      
      # === Mux + Sink ===
      child(:muxer, %Membrane.MP4.Muxer.ISOM{})
      |> child(:sink, %Membrane.File.Sink{
        location: "/Users/Mauricio/Desktop/personal/vyvo/VYVO-APP/processed.mp4"
      })
    ]

    {[spec: structure], %{}}
  end
end
Can someone help me with this task?, or just give me an idea
1 Reply
Feliks
Feliks•4w ago
Hi, do you want to have just a single image being a thumbnail? Or maybe you want to generate a video stream that will be displayed as a thumbnail?

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