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Getting Started

Requirements

  • DaVinci Resolve 18+, free or Studio. Tested on Resolve 21 free from the Mac App Store — the most restricted variant there is.
  • Python 3.12+ managed by uv for the app.
  • For Resolve's own script runner on macOS: Python from python.org. Homebrew and Xcode command-line-tools Pythons are invisible to Resolve.
  • macOS is the primary platform (Apple Silicon gets GPU transcription). Windows/Linux bridge paths are implemented but untested — reports welcome.

Install

git clone <this repo> && cd autocut
./install.sh          # installs uv if needed, then dependencies

On Windows, run install.bat instead.

Then open DaVinci Resolve with a project, and run Workspace → Scripts → Utility → AutoCut Bridge. The app installs the bridge script on first connect — if the menu entry is missing, run uv run python main.py once, click Connect, and it appears.

On macOS the app opens automatically whenever you run the bridge from the menu — one click is the whole startup. (A user LaunchAgent watches a trigger file; see Architecture for how that works and why it's needed.)

First run

  1. Open the timeline you want to cut. It is read as-is; video/audio track 1 by default.
  2. Pick a preset — Talking Head (J-cut) is the usual starting point.
  3. Analyze (preview) — review the cut list on the Preview tab. Each row shows what will be removed and why (silence (-51 dB), filler 'um'). Click a row's ✓ to keep that section instead of cutting it.
  4. ▶ Build Timeline — a new timeline named <name> [AutoCut hh.mm.ss] appears next to your original, cuts landing clip by clip.

Or skip the preview with ▶ Run AutoCut.

Analyze and Build are checked against each other

Build refuses to run if the current Resolve timeline changed since Analyze, and warns (but proceeds) if you changed detection settings in between. Re-run Analyze after switching timelines.

Uninstall

uv run python uninstall.py            # removes the Resolve scripts, launch agent, bridge files
uv run python uninstall.py --purge    # also removes ~/.autocut (presets + converted models)

Add --dry-run to preview what would be removed. The repo folder and the shared Hugging Face model cache are never touched.

Studio version

Resolve Studio allows external scripting, so the app connects directly — no bridge script needed. There is also a separate in-Resolve script (autocut_script.py, installed by uv run python install.py as "AutoCut Studio") with a silence-only, review-by-clip-color workflow. It does not work on the free Mac App Store build.