Someone Rebuilt Premiere Pro in Rust. I Installed It. (Honest Test)

Author: Prompt Engineer 48 · Watch on YouTube

Video authored by the channel shown, not by IANIA; all rights belong to the creator. Transcript and summary generated automatically; the original-language content is preserved.

Original language: English

Original video: Someone Rebuilt Premiere Pro in Rust. I Installed It. (Honest Test) · Channel: Prompt Engineer 48 · 09:24 · Watch on YouTube

Topics: AI agents, Software engineering with AI, AI developer tools, Multimodal models, Open source and software ecosystems

Summary

The video tests Film Craft 0.5, an open-source, clean-room reimplementation of a Premiere Pro-style editor written in Rust, by installing it on Windows and trying its editing, color, and export workflows. The editor offers familiar workspaces, trimming tools, color controls, and a valid 1080p export, while its UI, CLI, JSON control port, and MCP server use the same command system. However, export is currently slow, several capabilities are missing or limited, and Windows and Linux receive less testing than macOS. The reviewer would not use it for client work yet, but encourages developers and curious users to try it and report bugs.

Key points

Film Craft is a clean-room reimplementation based on public specifications and observed behavior, not leaked Adobe code; it is licensed under Apache 2.0 and MIT.
The reviewer installs the Windows x64 portable build of version 0.5.0 and confirms its SHA256 checksum.
The interface includes familiar editing, assembly, color, effects, and audio workspaces, along with a Premiere-style timeline and trim tools.
A ripple delete is blocked because it would break sync with a sync-locked audio track; the editor also stores time in integer ticks.
The color workspace has scopes, grading controls, and built-in looks; the readme says grading is performed in 32-bit floating-point linear light.
The project describes Rust-based codecs and a compositor with GPU and CPU paths, plus a roadmap listing 35 crates and more than 1,600 tests.
The tested export produces a valid H.264/AAC 1080p file, but a 26-second sequence takes more than a minute; export rendering is currently CPU-only.
Limitations include no VST3 or OpenFX plugins, limited GPU effects, no AV1 export, no camera raw, and less Windows and Linux testing.
The reviewer advises against using Film Craft for deadline-driven client work for now, but recommends trying it and filing bugs.

Chapters

Start	Chapter	Summary
00:00	What Film Craft is and how it is built	The reviewer introduces Film Craft as a new, clean-room Rust editor and examines its public repository, licensing, releases, and AI-assisted development.
01:37	Installing and exploring the editor	The Windows portable build is verified and launched, then the reviewer explores its Premiere-style interface, workspaces, timeline, and basic editing behavior.
03:40	Color, codecs, effects, and export options	The video demonstrates color presets and scopes, describes the project’s codec and compositor claims, and reviews its effects, audio, interchange, and export features.
06:19	Command-driven workflows and export test	The reviewer explains Film Craft’s shared command system and agent-driven control, then exports a sequence and measures its performance.
07:51	Limitations and final verdict	The reviewer summarizes the roadmap’s gaps and recommends waiting before using Film Craft for client work, while inviting interested users to test it and report bugs.

Quotes

Clean room means they wrote it from public specifications and from how the product behaves, not from Adobe’s source. — 00:32

The status bar says the edit would break sync because A2 is sync locked and has the score in the way. — 03:08

So, a 26-second sequence took more than a minute on the CPU. — 07:20

If you edit client work on a deadline, wait. — 08:53

Would I put footage through it and file bugs? Yes, that is exactly what they ask for. — 08:53

Concepts and entities

Film Craft, Adobe Premiere Pro, Rust, FFmpeg, MCP, DaVinci Resolve, Kdenlive, Shotcut, Art Craft

Full transcript (original language)

00:00 This is a video editor with a Premiere Pro style timeline, a Lumetri style color panel, live scopes, and an audio mixer. And I just opened it on my Windows laptop. It is not Adobe’s code. Nobody leaked anything. It is a clean room rebuilt written in pure Rust. The repo is 10 days old. It has six releases, and you will see exactly what works and what breaks. Mind you, everything here is running on my own laptop with an RTX 4060. All right, this is the repo story told FilmCraft. The description says an open-source clean room reimplementation of Adobe Premiere

00:32 Pro in pure Rust. Now, the viral version of this was someone open-sourced Premiere Pro. That is not what this is. Clean room means they wrote it from public specifications and from how the product behaves, not from Adobe’s source. What you do get is real. The license box says Apache 2.0 and MIT, and on the page you can see about 7 and 1/2 thousand stars, 2,600 forks, 842 commits, and 30 contributors. The repo was created on September 30th. Version 0.1 co-A came out on October 2nd, 2.2 on

01:05 the 5th, 0.4.0 on the 8th, and 0.5.0 landed today, October 10th. That is six releases in eight days. And look at their release notes. Frame stepping at odd frame rates, reverse clips, the edge you press is the edge you trim, Linux hardware decoding. Those are fixes with outside contributor names next to each pull request. One more thing on this page, the commit author here says Echelon and Claude. I pulled the last 100 commits through the GitHub API, and 27 of them carry a co-authored by Claude line. The repo even has a Claude MD and

01:37 an Agents Amendy that tell agents the rules. Never crash, clean room only, pure Rust, and one task ID per commit. So, this is an editor that is being built with AI agents in public. Let’s go ahead and install it. I’m taking the Windows X64 portable zip from the latest release. It’s about 65 megabytes. There is also an MSI and builds for Mac, Linux, FreeBSD, and a web assembly build for the browser. I check the SHA256 against the checksums file in the release, and it matches. I unzip it,

02:07 double-click filmcraft.exe, and the window opens. In the log, you can see the version line Film Craft 0.5.0 on Windows. And the next line says, “Hardware decoding is available through Media Foundation.” So, it found my GPU’s decode path without me setting anything. I’ll open the demo project, and you can see a layout that anyone who has used Premiere already knows. Source and program monitors on top, bins on the bottom left, tools in the middle, a timeline with video one, video two, audio one, and a score on audio two, and

02:38 loudness meters on the right. Up in the corner are the workspaces: editing, assembly, color, effects, audio. I’m switching them from the control port, and each one rearranges the panels the way you expect. The thing I care about as an editor is the trim tools. The readme lists ripple, roll, slip, slide, rate stretch, and razor. Three-point editing with the comma and period keys, and dynamic trimming with J, K, and L. Let’s make an actual edit. I’m calling add edit at the 3-second mark, the same

03:08 command as control K, and ocean sunset splits in two. You can see the history panel on the bottom left now lists open, apply golden dusk, and add edit. Now, I try a ripple delete on the second half, and it refuses. The status bar says the edit would break sync because A2 is sync locked and has the score in the way. That is the same protection Premiere has, so I undo. And every action is one step. One detail I want to point at, time is stored as integer ticks, 254 billion 16 million per second. That number divides evenly by every common

03:40 frame rate and sample rate. So, 29.97 drop frame is exact, not rounded. Now, the color workspace. On the right is the Lumetri Color panel with basic correction, creative, curves, color wheels, and match HSL secondary, and vignette. On the left are live scopes here, the RGB parade. I’ll go ahead and apply a built-in preset. There are folders for cinematic, film emulation, monochrome, and technical. I’ll take golden dust on the ocean sunset clip. And you can see the picture warm up. The temperature slider moved to 35,

04:10 highlights went to minus 15, and the parade changed with it. The readme says all grading happens in linear light in 32-bit float. I’ll try a second look to be fair. Silver retention from film emulation is the bleach bypass one, and you can see the colors drain and the contrast go hard. The looks are color transforms written in code, not LUT files, according to the readme. This is the part that surprised me. The readme says no FFmpeg inside. The H.264 decoder and encoder, HEVC decode, ProRes, AAC, VP9, Opus, AV1 decode, and DNxHR are

04:43 their own Rust code written from the public specs. They test against FFmpeg from the outside as an oracle. The H.264 decoder is bit exact on 37 plus streams, HEVC on 41, VP9 on 50 plus, and it runs at 500 to 600 frames per second at 1080p. The compositor is a WGPGPU path that runs on Metal, Vulcan, and DirectX 12 with a CPU path that renders the same frames, and the two are tested against each other. The roadmap counts 35 crates and 1,600 plus tests. Effects. The full

05:16 Premiere 26 video effects bin, 93 effects in 16 folders, around 30 transitions, and 26 blend modes with bezier keyframes and value and velocity graphs. Audio loudness meters to BS.1770 and EBU R.128, track and clip mixers, and automation in read, latch, touch, and write. And if you work with other people, it reads and writes Final Cut 7 XML, FCPXML, Open Timeline IO, EDL, AAF, and OMF. So, a timeline can leave

05:46 Premiere or resolve and come in here. Export mode, the readme screenshot lists destinations for YouTube, Vimeo, TikTok, and Instagram, but in my 0.5.0 Windows build, the destinations list only shows media file and a queue, so I would not count on the social uploads. What you do get is H264 with a bit rate profile and level hardware encoding as an opt-in checkbox, and the estimate says 34 megabytes for this sequence. ProRes, DNx, HR, MXF, PNG sequences, GIF, and

06:19 wave are in the format list. It’s not just a Windows build. The readme says native on macOS, Windows, and Linux, plus a web build. Every release has a Film Craft web zip, about 15 megabytes, that runs the same engine in a browser through web assembly. They say the browser app shell isn’t finished, so treat that one as a preview. Scroll down, and Film Craft is one of what they call the crafting apps. Photo Craft for images with real PSD files, Vector Craft, Light Craft for raw photos, PE Edit Craft, Effect Craft for motion

06:49 graphics, and Design Craft for page layout. All from the Art Craft team, all in Rust, all open source. Every action in the app is a command. I ran the CLIs commands list, and it printed 675 lines. The UI, the CLI, a JSON control port, and an MCP server all call the same commands. That’s how I’m recording this. I started the app with the control flag, and I sent JSON lines to open the demo project, select the clip, apply golden dusk, and take these screenshots. The readme says the trailer in their own screenshots was built by an agent

07:20 driving the running app the same way. Now the part where it has to prove itself, I ran quick export with the high quality 1080p preset on the whole demo sequence. It finished, and FFprobe says H264 plus AAC 1920 by 1280, 26.8 seconds, 61 megabytes, so it’s a valid file. But the time, the perf stats show about 49 seconds in render and about 59 in encode. So, a 26-second sequence took more than a minute on the CPU. That is slower than real-time on this machine.

07:51 The roadmap says export rendering is CPU only today. Hardware acceleration is the thing they rank first on their own list. The roadmap puts performance at 35 to 40% against a checklist number of 62. So, the slow export I just showed you is not a surprise to them. Here is their own scoreboard feature checklist. About 87% ready for real work, about 50 to 60%. They wrote that themselves in the readme status section. The gaps they list, no VST3 or OpenFX plugins, only 31

08:22 effects run on the GPU, Lumetri and export are on the CPU, H.265 export goes through a hardware encoder only, no AV1 export, no camera raw, and development happens on macOS, so Windows and Linux get far less testing. So, where does this sit? DaVinci Resolve is free but closed. Kdenlive and Shotcut are open, but they sit on top of MLT and FFmpeg. Film Craft is the one trying to do the Premiere layout with its own codecs in Rust, and that is a different bet. If you edit client work on a deadline,

08:53 wait. If you’re a Rust developer, a codec nerd, or you want to see what an agent-driven editor looks like, clone it today because the commands list alone is worth reading. So, would I cut a client job in this today? No. Would I put footage through it and file bugs? Yes, that is exactly what they ask for. There 192 open issues and 77 pull requests right now, so people are doing it. So, in this video we installed Film Craft 0.5, opened it, graded a clip, and exported a valid 1080p file, and you saw

09:24 where it is slow, it’s free, it’s Apache 2.0 and MIT, and the link is in the description. Download the portable zip, try it with your own footage, and tell me in the comments what is the one thing Premiere has that would stop you switching, plugins, speed, or something else. That’s the one I’ll test next. I’ll see you in another one.