I work part of the year in a country that has very socially conservative religious laws and I'd like to cut out some of the naughtier bits out of the videos I store on my hard drive. It is unlikely in the extreme that I would ever be caught with them, but I don't want to take any chances.

Any recommendations on software with which I can do this but that won't affect the quality of the end product?

Thank you

I would try avidemux

Perhaps Openshot - I use it to create & trim videos.

That would be my choice too. I remove adverts from recordings with it.

If you want to use ffmpeg

Look through the video to find the start and stop timestamps for the parts that you wish to cut, and record them. You can use ffplay to make sure that you have them correctly.

Short examples:

1st edit, commercial starts at 12:14, stops at 13:34
2nd edit, commercial starts at 16:02, stops at 17:05
After you are sure what parts to cut, dump the saved parts to files
Make an empty text file
Format your entries like this
Put them together into one video.

I may not have been clear with those examples. They actually keep the commercials. Sorry, going too fast.

To keep the video on the first one from the start to 12:14
To keep the second segment from 13:34 to 16:02
Then from 17:05 to end

Off topic I know, but have you considered just creating a hidden, encrypted partition on your drive? Not hard:
https://www.linuxvoice.com/hidden-en...fe-and-secret/

Even if your system is breached, you'd probably still be ok. And if you're honestly afraid for your safety, and could be jailed (or worse) for viewing such things, why even bring them at all? Leave them on a cloud-account with a strong password as an encrypted file. Download over internet, view, and delete afterwards. Even can have a script to delete/nuke a particular directory on boot up if you're that worried.

1 members found this post helpful.

Buy new clean system and take it next time you go. Why chance it?

Wish there was a way to make the world G rated gosh golly.

TBH, if you bought/borrowed/downloaded/torrented such movies, you probably did so for the 'naughty bits'. We're all adults here; it would be a bit pointless watching them otherwise.

Jefro's hit the nail on the head. If the country you work in has strict religious laws about such things (and I'll hazard a guess either somewhere in the Middle East, or the Far East; I know for a fact that some of them get seriously nasty about anything like that), then I personally wouldn't even take the risk.

I'd leave 'em at home.....and practice abstinence for the duration!


Mike.

I'm assuming they're otherwise acceptable films with a bit of sex in. A good thriller can be just as good with the unnecessary sex removed. And while fairly explicit scenes are acceptable these days in the west, in places like the emirates etc they're not.
There's a few people here assuming the worst.

[ot]
i've seen videos from islamic countries (sorry for being so broad, i honestly don't remember which one) where a dead & mutilated man's body was shown in all its gore, however his (unhurt) bellybutton was blacked (censored) out, and so were the faces of a few women around.

so, i don't think op is assuming the worst (mike_walsh might be, however).

personally, i think if they confiscate your laptop in a country like that, you're probably already toast anyway. i would choose encryption instead of editing.
[/ot]


let's see how it goes with the ffmpeg commands, that's what i would've suggested.
if you do that a few times (and know how to use your shell's history & tab completion), it's actually much quicker than some clicky gui software.

That's what I was trying to hint at.

https://www.apple.com/imovie/

you can use iMovie on your iPhone or mac

you can use linux, but it's worth a little to use a fully fledged multimedia machine to do multimedia work

(you should have both - you shouldn't force yourself to use ffmpeg commandline tools)

----------------------------------------

you need files movies and can't find any you don't have to hand edit

i don't believe OP. i simply don't. troll post.

reported.

this is definitely at least the third post where this poster accuses people of being trolls or otherwise attacks them for no good reason.
also giving totally useless advice, and resurrecting threads that have already quietly slumbered away.

also see my answer here: https://www.linuxquestions.org/quest...7/#post5876921

2 members found this post helpful.

Thanks. I just added him to my ignore list.

I still don't know what I said that's so unbelievable and trollish––I work in Saudi Arabia half the year and I have a lot of R-Rated movies and TV shows (e.g. Westworld) on my external hard drive that I'd really rather not get caught with if I'm ever stopped by the Mutaween. If I could cut out the nude scenes and the scenes with adult situations, I'd feel a whole lot more comfortable carrying them around in my backpack.

And, yeah, as you pointed out, there was no need to resurrect this post just to offer me useless advice and then insult me, but whatever.