One year after this project is funded, I will release a copy of the Virga Video source code and executable under the AGPL open source license. Everyone will be able to use that version of software for free – forever.

The Virga Video Editor Project

Virga Video is a video editor that allows you to quickly create high quality professional movies with animation and special effects. The prototype software supports many features found in other high end video editors, such as:

• Support for many video formats (AVI, XVID, DIVX, OGG, MJPEG, etc.)
• Draw text, pictures, special effects, 3D models, and videos, over your movie
• Drag/drop videos and pictures on the storyboard/timeline
• Keyframed size, position, color, opacity, orientation, audio volume
• Color correction, including contrast/brightness/gamma
• Transitions from one video (or picture) to another video (or picture)
• GPU Accelerated performance
• Unlimited undo/redo

My Background

My name is Jeremy Spiller, and I have been programming since I was 12 years old. I wrote video games for the TRS-80 Color Computer and published articles in the Rainbow magazine and also in Dr. Dobbs Journal.  You can read more about my past projects by visiting my web site gosub.com.

Virga Video History

In 2003 I started writing Zenix3D, a space invaders game where the player blasts through 12 levels of high intensity chaos, syncronized to music composed by Matt Myers. I completed Zenix3D in 2007. 

When Zenix3D and its level editor were complete, I thought it would be visually exciting to create a level with videos flying around. After adding the ability for Zenix3D to play videos, I realized that the source code would be a good base for building a video editor. And that’s when Virga Video was born.

Why Kickstarter?

Virga Video has always been a part-time project, done in my spare time.   Now, with a family and a full time job, I no longer have enough time to dedicate to the project, yet there are so many features I’d like to add. If this project is funded, I will leave my day job and work on the project full time for one year. During that time, I plan to add the following features:

• Improvements to the user interface (timeline, story board, background processing, etc.)
• Support for any font, including textured text, shadows, and more
• Video filters (sharpen, blur, sepia, emboss, chroma key, slow motion, etc.)
• Audio filters (equalization, reverb, delay, time/pitch distortion, etc.)
• User created filters via HLSL (you define any filter you can imagine)
• More scene transition effects (including your own custom transitions)
• Key framed picture/video cropping
• Record audio or video directly from a web camera or microphone
• Better animation tools and 3D effects (e.g. onion skinning, motion blur, etc.)

My primary goal is to enhance the user interface to be easy enough for a child to master.

Why You Should Support Virga Video

Because I will build and release a high quality video editor that is free for everyone to use, modify, or enhance as they see fit.  Everyone will have access to the source code, and no one will be locked in to a proprietary project file format. 

My Promise

If this project is fully funded, I will spend one year working on the features I have described above. At that time, I will release a copy of the Virga Video source code and executable under the AGPL open source license.  Everyone will be able to use that version of software for free – forever.