This guide will walk you through extracting every Nth frame from a video using Python. We'll use a Python script with the opencv-python library. No prior programming experience is needed!
Ensure Python is installed on your system. If not, download it from the official Python website.
opencv-pythonopencv-python is a library that helps us process videos in Python. Install it by running:
pip install opencv-python
Create a Python script that takes a video path and an interval as inputs.
Open a text editor. Save it as extract_frames.py
Copy and paste the script below:
import cv2
import os
import argparse
def main(video_path, frame_interval):
# Extract video file name without extension and create a directory for frames
video_name = os.path.splitext(os.path.basename(video_path))[0]
frames_dir = os.path.join(os.path.dirname(video_path), f"{video_name}_frames")
os.makedirs(frames_dir, exist_ok=True)
cap = cv2.VideoCapture(video_path)
if not cap.isOpened():
raise Exception(f"Error opening video file: {video_path}")
frame_count = 0
saved_frame_count = 0
while True:
ret, frame = cap.read()
if not ret:
break
if frame_count % frame_interval == 0:
frame_filename = f"{video_name}_#{saved_frame_count + 1}.png"
cv2.imwrite(os.path.join(frames_dir, frame_filename), frame)
saved_frame_count += 1
if saved_frame_count % 30 == 0:
print(f"Progress: {saved_frame_count} frames saved.")
frame_count += 1
cap.release()
print(f"Saved {saved_frame_count} frames to '{frames_dir}'")
if __name__ == "__main__":
parser = argparse.ArgumentParser(description="Extract frames from video.")
parser.add_argument("video_path", type=str, help="Path to the video file.")
parser.add_argument("-i", "--interval", type=int, default=10, help="Interval of frames to save (default is every 10th frame).")
args = parser.parse_args()
main(args.video_path, args.interval)
Open CMD and navigate to where you saved extract_frames.py.
Run the script by typing in command:
python extract_frames.py /path/to/video.mp4 -i 10
Replace /path/to/video.mp4 with the path to your video file and 10 with the desired frame interval.
After running, check the frames folder for the extracted frames named like video_#0.png, video_#1.png, etc.
Your frames are now extracted and saved. You can change the interval or try different videos as needed.