Vidfiddle: turn your RSS feed into social videos

4 min read Original article ↗

Open source · Self-hosted

The easiest way to turn your RSS feed into social videos

Point it at your blog's feed. Vidfiddle writes the scripts, makes the videos, writes the posts and puts them on your calendar. One post at a time, or the whole feed at once.

Your feed. Your keys. Your server. Your videos.

Install

Up and running in four commands

You need Docker and an OpenAI key. There’s no Vidfiddle account, and nothing to pay us.

Your install never phones home. It talks to your feeds and the services you give it keys for, and that’s it.

  • MIT license
  • One OpenAI key
  • About $0.06 a video
  • Intel or ARM
git clone https://github.com/zellerhaus/vidfiddle.git
cd vidfiddle
cp .env.example .env   # add your OpenAI key and a password
docker compose up -d

Pulls the published image (Intel or ARM) and starts the app, the worker and Postgres.

How it works

From feed to calendar

  1. Step 1: RSS feed

    Paste your feed’s URL and every post shows up in Vidfiddle, ready to pick. No feed? A single blog URL works too.

  2. Step 2: Scripts

    Vidfiddle reads the post and writes a 30 to 60 second script in your brand voice. A long post can turn into a few videos, each from a different angle.

    Script length30 to 60 sec

  3. Step 3: Videos

    Pick a look from the presets or describe your own. Then a voice, and a shape: vertical, square or wide. Your own server makes the rest (art for every scene, narration, captions timed to each word, a music bed). Thirty seconds costs about six cents.

    About$0.06per 30-second video

  4. Step 4: Social posts

    It writes a caption for each platform, so LinkedIn never gets your TikTok hashtags.

    • Instagram
    • TikTok
    • YouTube
    • LinkedIn
    • X
    • Facebook

  5. Step 5: Scheduled

    Approve the video and it goes on your calendar through Publer, Postiz or TryPost. Nothing posts until you say so.

Or the whole feed

Your blog already wrote your next 100 videos

Turn on Auto Mode for a feed. Vidfiddle watches it for new posts, makes up to five videos from each one and writes the captions. Then it waits for you. Approve a video and it’s scheduled on the platforms you picked for that feed. Sitting on a backlog? Schedule every finished video with one click.

  • Up to 5 videos per post
  • Captions for every platform
  • Approve once, it’s scheduled
  • Schedule all in one click

Auto Mode

  1. 01RSS
  2. 02Scripts
  3. 03Videos
  4. 04Social
  5. 05Scheduled

Works with

Plays well with others

Made with Vidfiddle

Eight posts, eight looks

Each of these started as a NASA or NOAA article in a public RSS feed. Vidfiddle wrote the script and made the video; nobody touched an editor. Tap Receipt to see what went in and what it cost.

Made one with your own feed? Post it in Show and tell

Also in the box

  • Slow, medium or fast: a new shot about every 8, 4 or 2 to 3 seconds. Same price at every pace.

  • Tracks matched to the script’s mood and ducked under the voice. Narration is leveled to -14 LUFS, the loudness social apps expect.

    Bring your own tracks, or let ElevenLabs compose one per video.

  • Scripts and captions from OpenAI or Claude. Voices from OpenAI or ElevenLabs. Each one is a setting.

  • Media on local disk, or in any S3-compatible bucket (R2, B2, S3).

  • Want stock footage or AI avatars instead? Plug in Creatify.

    Paid and optional.

  • Render any script to an MP4 from the command line, without the app or a database.

    Handy for trying a look before you add a feed.

  1. Fixes logging in over plain HTTP.

    • You can log in from another machine on your network again
    Release notes

  2. Fixes reposts.

    • Reposts are tracked again
    Release notes

  3. Adds two open source schedulers and a published Docker image, and drops the YouTube clips feature.

    • Publish through Postiz or TryPost
    • A published image
    • One-container mode
    Release notes

Want to hear about the next one? On GitHub, click Watch, then Custom, then Releases.

Who made this

Preston Zeller

Hi, I’m Preston

I built Vidfiddle for myself earlier this year. I had blog posts just sitting there, and I wanted them turned into videos I could schedule out to fill in my social calendar. It’s been a big help, so now it’s open source.

Why give it away? I’d rather it get used. I also build things like this for clients at Zellerhaus, so if you want a content pipeline built or tuned for your team, get in touch.

Built to be fiddled with

Every stage of the video engine is a small interface. ElevenLabs voices took one class. Pexels footage could be next. Fork it, break it, send a pull request.

  1. Scene planning
  2. Voice
  3. Images
  4. Word timing
  5. Your provider here

If Vidfiddle saves you an afternoon, a star helps other people find it.

Star on GitHub Read the engine code

Vidfiddle is MIT licensed. The showcase videos were made from public-domain NASA and NOAA articles; their images, voices and captions are AI-generated and don’t show real people or events. Vidfiddle isn’t affiliated with NASA or NOAA.