Why add this Skill
This skill gives your agent one consistent interface to:
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See: Realtime desktop screen, mic and system audio, RTSP streams, ingest files, URLs, YouTube.
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Understand: Visual understanding, transcribe, index and search moments with playble clips
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Act: Stream results, trigger alerts on live feeds, edit timelines, generate subtitles and overlays, export clips.
What it does
VideoDB Skills lets your AI coding agent run end to end, server-side video workflows in real time and batch:
- Capture desktop screen, mic, and system audio for real time processing.
- Upload and process RTSP streams, videos from YouTube, URLs, and local files.
- Create realtime context of visual and spoken information.
- Index and search spoken words and visual scenes anytime.
- Generate transcripts, subtitles, and AI media.
- Edit clips, overlays, and exports server side.
Return playable HLS links for anything you build.
Get Started
Get started in two quick steps. Open your AI coding agent (Requires Python 3.9+) and follow along.
Step 1: Install the skill
npx skills add video-db/skills
Or install with Claude Code plugin:
/plugin marketplace add video-db/skills
/plugin install videodb@videodb-skills
Step 2: Setup
/videodb setup
The agent will guide setup for your VideoDB API key ($20 free credits, no credit card required), install the SDK, and verify the connection.
For Cursor, Copilot, and other agents, ask your agent to "setup videodb"
Set your API key using either method:
# Recommended: Export in terminal
export VIDEO_DB_API_KEY=sk-xxx
# Or add to your project's .env file
VIDEO_DB_API_KEY=sk-xxx
Give your agent instructions
Ask your agent to run instructions like these. The skill loads automatically.
- "Upload https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MnrJzXM7a6o and give me a sharable stream link"
- "Take clips from 10s-30s and 45s-60s and compile them"
- "Generate a background music, and add to this Clip"
- "Add subtitles to original video with white text on black background"
- "Find every scene showing 'phone close-up' or 'product on screen'"
- "Capture my screen for the next two minutes and write a report of what i'm doing along with any insights or suggestions"*
- "Here is the rtsp link for my IP Camera , monitor and log the alert to text file along with timestamp whenever a person enters into the room"
Capability
VideoDB is the server side video stack for agents and apps.
Run reliable, scalable, cost efficient workflows across realtime streams and batch video, with built in AI understanding, without wiring up ffmpeg glue.
Keep your client and agent stack light: send video in, get back structured context, searchable moments, and playable streams.
When to use VideoDB
- Your app needs video workflows, but you do not want ffmpeg running everywhere
- You want realtime perception from RTSP feeds or desktop capture
- You need search by what was said or shown, then turn results into clips
- You want server side editing, reframing, subtitles, dubbing, and streaming links