Frame Grabber

What it's for

Get exactly the frame you want out of a video as a full-size picture, rather than a blurry screenshot with a player’s controls over it; make a contact sheet that shows a whole video at a glance; or turn a short clip into an animated GIF.

For example, when you need a still from a recording of a talk for a blog post, step to the moment the slide is fully shown and choose Save this frame (PNG): you get it at the video’s full resolution.

How to use it

Choose a video (or drop it on the page). Play it or drag the slider to near the moment you want, then use Previous frame and Next frame (or −10 and +10) to step. The time and frame number show beside the buttons. Frames a second is read from the file when it says (MP4, MOV, WebM, MKV); change it if stepping skips or repeats frames. Save this frame (PNG) saves the frame shown, at full size.

Contact sheet: choose the Columns, Rows and Width and choose Save a contact sheet: frames taken evenly through the whole video are laid out in a grid on a dark background, each with its time.

GIF: set From and To in seconds, the Frames a second and the Width, and choose Save as GIF. The contact sheet and GIF settings are remembered.

Example

Choose a one-minute video, set Columns to 4 and Rows to 3 and choose Save a contact sheet: you get a 1600-pixel-wide picture of 12 frames, from 2.50 s, 7.50 s and so on to 57.50 s, five seconds apart.

Good to know

The browser decides which frame is shown at a time, so stepping may occasionally land a frame early or late, especially in long-GOP or variable frame rate video. Only formats this browser can play work: HEVC and ProRes play only in Safari. GIFs stop at 600 frames and have at most 256 colours a frame, so long or colourful clips become large and grainy; keep them short and small. The video isn’t uploaded.