<p>QuickTime Pro 7 does this, as long as the media is inside a QuickTime (<code>.mov</code>) container.</p>

<p>If I understand how it works correctly, it's because the player is able to play back the source material in a large number of ways (on the fly). You could have multiple clips on the screen with different geometric properties, multiple audio tracks, cuts, etc--and the player will just play back the appropriate parts of the media at the right time with the specified scaling, masking, and other attributes. The app itself is approaching obsolescence, and had a limited feature set to begin with, but it could do what you're talking about.</p>

<p>Also, many high-end non-linear video editing software will read many codecs natively and archive the highest-quality files for use when you actually encode your project (to avoid fidelity loss caused by multiple encodes and decodes in the editing process).</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-02-08T03:43:54.050Z
2012-02-08T03:43:54.050Z
NReilingh
<p>You could try <a href="http://virtualdub.sourceforge.net/" rel="nofollow">VirtualDub</a> since you haven't got it working yet.. I have only used it with AVI though..</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-03-01T09:01:23.653Z
Inviting expert for the new site proposal that should take Codecs and Compression  algorithms/products in great depths. Participate in Area51 proposal site [Broadcast and Media Technologies](http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/36807/broadcast-and-media-technologies).
Dipan Mehta
CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-02-27T18:49:17.743Z
2012-02-27T18:49:17.743Z
Friend of Kim
<p>In many instances you can use <a href="http://ffmpeg.org/" rel="nofollow">ffmpeg</a> to create a clip out of a longer clip, and request that the original frames are copied instead of re-encoded. </p>

<p>I'm writing this from memory so you may want to double check, but I believe the command line options you need to use for this are:</p>

<pre><code>ffmpeg -i &lt;source-filename&gt; -vcodec copy -acodec copy -ss &lt;start-position&gt; -t &lt;duration&gt; &lt;destination-filename&gt;
</code></pre>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-03-01T09:01:05.527Z
Inviting expert for the new site proposal that should take Codecs and Compression  algorithms/products in great depths. Participate in Area51 proposal site [Broadcast and Media Technologies](http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/36807/broadcast-and-media-technologies).
Dipan Mehta
CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-01-08T20:11:59.647Z
Adding if you want to do the opposite and combine multiple clips of the same codec you can make a textfile with a line `file 'path/to/clip'` for each clip and then run `ffmpeg -f concat -safe 0 -i 'path/to/textfile.txt' -c copy 'path/to/output'`. [Source](https://stackoverflow.com/a/11175851). The concat demuxer ["requires the same codecs, but different container formats can be used; and it can be used with any container formats"](https://stackoverflow.com/a/49373401)
evn
CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-02-10T04:58:50.783Z
2012-02-10T04:58:50.783Z
Miguel
<p>Im trying to test various video/audio codecs by editing clips from larger videos that have the codecs I want to test.  Although every video editor i have tried changes the codecs of the clips i create to different codecs than what the original used.</p>

<p>Are there any video editors out there where I can create clips of videos without changing the codecs of the original video...I want to create clips, yet keep the audio/video codecs in tact.</p>

<p>I have tried:</p>

<p>Windows Movie Maker</p>

<p>Avidemux 2.5</p>

<p>AVS Video Editor</p>

<p>VideoLAN Movie Creator</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2012-03-01T08:59:52.063Z
Thre is a new site proposal that should take Codecs and Compression  algorithms/products in great depths. Participate in Area51 proposal site [Broadcast and Media Technologies](http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/36807/broadcast-and-media-technologies).
Dipan Mehta
<video><video-editor><codec>
Looking For A Video Editor that will maintain the codecs of the original source video
Tim Boland
# Looking For A Video Editor that will maintain the codecs of the original source video

(Asked by: username_0 on 2012-02-07)

Im trying to test various video/audio codecs by editing clips from larger videos that have the codecs I want to test. Although every video editor i have tried changes the codecs of the clips i create to different codecs than what the original used.

Are there any video editors out there where I can create clips of videos without changing the codecs of the original video...I want to create clips, yet keep the audio/video codecs in tact.

I have tried:

Windows Movie Maker

Avidemux 2.5

AVS Video Editor

VideoLAN Movie Creator

**Tags:** video, video-editor, codec

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: Thre is a new site proposal that should take Codecs and Compression  algorithms/products in great depths. Participate in Area51 proposal site [Broadcast and Media Technologies](http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/36807/broadcast-and-media-technologies).  

---

## 3 answers

### Answer by username_4 on 2012-02-10. Score: 3 | Accepted answer

In many instances you can use ffmpeg to create a clip out of a longer clip, and request that the original frames are copied instead of re-encoded. 
I'm writing this from memory so you may want to double check, but I believe the command line options you need to use for this are:
ffmpeg -i  -vcodec copy -acodec copy -ss  -t

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: Inviting expert for the new site proposal that should take Codecs and Compression  algorithms/products in great depths. Participate in Area51 proposal site [Broadcast and Media Technologies](http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/36807/broadcast-and-media-technologies).  
> **username_5**: Adding if you want to do the opposite and combine multiple clips of the same codec you can make a textfile with a line `file 'path/to/clip'` for each clip and then run `ffmpeg -f concat -safe 0 -i 'path/to/textfile.txt' -c copy 'path/to/output'`. [Source](https://stackoverflow.com/a/11175851). The concat demuxer ["requires the same codecs, but different container formats can be used; and it can be used with any container formats"](https://stackoverflow.com/a/49373401)  

---

### Answer by username_2 on 2012-02-08. Score: 1

QuickTime Pro 7 does this, as long as the media is inside a QuickTime (`.mov`) container.

If I understand how it works correctly, it's because the player is able to play back the source material in a large number of ways (on the fly). You could have multiple clips on the screen with different geometric properties, multiple audio tracks, cuts, etc--and the player will just play back the appropriate parts of the media at the right time with the specified scaling, masking, and other attributes. The app itself is approaching obsolescence, and had a limited feature set to begin with, but it could do what you're talking about.

Also, many high-end non-linear video editing software will read many codecs natively and archive the highest-quality files for use when you actually encode your project (to avoid fidelity loss caused by multiple encodes and decodes in the editing process).


---

### Answer by username_3 on 2012-02-27. Score: 1

You could try [VirtualDub](http://virtualdub.sourceforge.net/) since you haven't got it working yet.. I have only used it with AVI though..

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: Inviting expert for the new site proposal that should take Codecs and Compression  algorithms/products in great depths. Participate in Area51 proposal site [Broadcast and Media Technologies](http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/36807/broadcast-and-media-technologies).  

---

