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Install the Recharm video effects skill: download https://recharm-growth-staging.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/website/downloads/recharm-video-effects.zip and unzip it into ~/.claude/skillsAsk for the effect
Add a hacker terminal text to input.mp4 Lines: ["> scan skin --deep", "> dark spots: 3 found", "> apply vitamin_c", "> ACCESS GRANTED"]
Several videos, several effects, one ask
Put your clips in the folder, mention them with @, and ask for everything at once. Claude runs one tested script after another on each clip, then joins them.
Add a hacker terminal text to @clip1.mp4, put a sale badge on @clip2.mp4, give @clip3.mp4 a VHS look, then join all three with crossfades.
Settings you can change
Ask Claude to change any of these, or edit them at the top of the script.
| Setting | Default | What it does |
|---|---|---|
LINES | ["> scan skin --deep", "> dark spots: 3 found", "> apply vitamin_c", "> ACCESS GRANTED"] | The lines that get typed, top to bottom. |
START | 0.2 | Second the first line starts typing. |
CPS | 28 | Characters typed per second. |
PAUSE | 0.2 | Seconds between one line finishing and the next starting. |
END | 4.2 | Second the terminal cuts to the clip. |
GREEN | (0, 255, 70) | Text color. |
Without the skill
Don’t want to install the skill? Paste this prompt into Claude Code and Claude writes the script itself.
Show the prompt
Add a hacker terminal intro to input.mp4: from 0 to 4.2 seconds cover the whole 540x960 frame with black (0, 0, 0) and type four lines in green (0, 255, 70) Menlo Bold 33 pixels tall: "> scan skin --deep", "> dark spots: 3 found", "> apply vitamin_c", "> ACCESS GRANTED". Lines are left-aligned 43 pixels from the left edge, the first line's top 365 pixels down, each line 53 pixels below the one above. The first line starts typing at 0.2 seconds, 28 characters per second, and each next line starts 0.2 seconds after the previous one finishes. A green block cursor blinks (on 1/3 second, off 1/3 second) after the last typed letter of the current line and stays on the last line. Add a soft glow by screen-blending a 10 pixel Gaussian blur of the text layer over it. At 4.2 seconds cut to the clip, which keeps playing on its own timeline, so the output stays 6 seconds at 30fps. Use Python with Pillow to draw it and ffmpeg to put it on the video (don't rely on ffmpeg's drawtext filter), keep the audio, and save it as output.mp4.Run it without Claude
This is the exact script we tested. Save it as hacker-terminal-text.py and run:
python3 hacker-terminal-text.py input.mp4 output.mp4Show the script
#!/usr/bin/env python3
"""Hacker terminal text: green monospace lines type out one after another on a black screen, then it cuts to the clip.
Usage: python3 hacker-terminal-text.py input.mp4 output.mp4
Needs ffmpeg and Pillow (pip install pillow).
"""
import json
import math
import subprocess
import sys
from pathlib import Path
from PIL import Image, ImageChops, ImageDraw, ImageFilter, ImageFont
LINES = ["> scan skin --deep", "> dark spots: 3 found", "> apply vitamin_c", "> ACCESS GRANTED"]
START = 0.2 # second the first line starts typing
CPS = 28 # characters typed per second
PAUSE = 0.2 # seconds between one line finishing and the next starting
END = 4.2 # second the terminal cuts to the clip
GREEN = (0, 255, 70) # text color
SIZE = 0.062 # text height as a share of the frame width
LEFT, TOP = 0.08, 0.38 # top-left corner of the first line (0-1 across and down the frame)
SPACING = 1.6 # line pitch, in text heights
FONTS = [("/System/Library/Fonts/Menlo.ttc", 1), # macOS (index 1 is Menlo Bold)
("/usr/share/fonts/truetype/dejavu/DejaVuSansMono-Bold.ttf", 0), # Linux
("C:/Windows/Fonts/consolab.ttf", 0)] # Windows
FONT_FILE, FONT_INDEX = next((f for f in FONTS if Path(f[0]).exists()), None) or sys.exit("No monospace font found: add one to FONTS")
def overlay(t):
if t >= END:
return Image.new("RGBA", (w, h))
text = Image.new("RGB", (w, h), "black")
draw = ImageDraw.Draw(text)
y = h * TOP
for i, (line, begin) in enumerate(zip(LINES, starts)):
typed = line[:max(0, int((t - begin) * CPS))]
draw.text((w * LEFT, y), typed, font=font, fill=GREEN)
on_this_line = begin <= t and (i == len(LINES) - 1 or t < starts[i + 1])
if on_this_line and int(t * 3) % 2 == 0: # blinking block cursor after the last typed letter
x = w * LEFT + font.getlength(typed) + 3
draw.rectangle([x, y, x + font.getlength("M") * 0.9, y + font.size * 1.1], fill=GREEN)
y += font.size * SPACING
glow = text.filter(ImageFilter.GaussianBlur(font.size * 0.3))
return ImageChops.screen(text, glow).convert("RGBA") # soft phosphor glow around the letters
def probe(path):
info = json.loads(subprocess.check_output(["ffprobe", "-v", "error", "-select_streams", "v:0", "-show_entries",
"stream=width,height,r_frame_rate:format=duration", "-of", "json", path]))
s = info["streams"][0]
num, den = s["r_frame_rate"].split("/")
return s["width"], s["height"], s["r_frame_rate"], float(num) / float(den), float(info["format"]["duration"])
def render(src, out):
"""Draw overlay(t) on every frame of src and save to out, keeping the audio."""
ff = subprocess.Popen(["ffmpeg", "-y", "-v", "error", "-i", src,
"-f", "rawvideo", "-pix_fmt", "rgba", "-s", f"{w}x{h}", "-r", rate, "-i", "-",
"-filter_complex", "[0:v][1:v]overlay=shortest=1,format=yuv420p[v]",
"-map", "[v]", "-map", "0:a?", "-c:v", "libx264", "-crf", "18", "-c:a", "copy", out],
stdin=subprocess.PIPE)
for i in range(math.ceil(duration * fps)):
ff.stdin.write(overlay(i / fps).tobytes())
ff.stdin.close()
if ff.wait():
sys.exit("ffmpeg failed")
src, out = sys.argv[1:3]
w, h, rate, fps, duration = probe(src)
font = ImageFont.truetype(FONT_FILE, round(w * SIZE), index=FONT_INDEX)
starts = [START] # each line starts once the one above it has finished and paused
for line in LINES[:-1]:
starts.append(starts[-1] + len(line) / CPS + PAUSE)
render(src, out)





