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I'd like to rotate video (mp4) by 180 degrees, but not flip. Is it possible to do it with avconv?

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  • I found with both existing answers that theywork with the MP4 files from a Hero 3 camera, but only after I added -c:a copy to the command (just before the output filename). I also found that the second version was indistinguishable quality, but about 50% faster than the chained translate version.
    – Simon
    Dec 30, 2013 at 15:48

5 Answers 5

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It is possible using the transpose video filter. You cannot rotate by 180 degrees, but you can rotate by 90 degrees and chain the filter.

avconv -i video.mp4 -vf transpose=1,transpose=1 out.mkv

See transpose in the avconv manpage: http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/quantal/en/man1/avconv.1.html

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  • This rotated my video, but the quality drop (resolution and framerate) was massive (iphone .mov file).
    – Gringo Suave
    Jan 6, 2014 at 21:14
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    transpose=clock works now see my answer
    – Elder Geek
    Feb 27, 2017 at 17:05
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Yes, but you'll need to add some additional options to your command for it to work properly. Transpose and vflip/hflip should do the trick, but if you don't tell avconv more detail about what you want, you'll likely get very low quality output try:

 avconv -i original.mp4 -vf "hflip,vflip" -codec:v libx264 -preset slow -crf 20 -codec:a copy flipped.mp4

Notice the -crf option. That sets the output quality. It goes from 0 (lossless) upwards logarithmically. You'll probably want a value between 19 and 25 in most cases. -preset sets the speed of the encoding, either "slow", "medium", or "fast". Slow should get you smaller file sizes with an obvious tradeoff. You should adjust -codec:v to match the original. If you don't set these options you'll get the defaults, which don't work well when flipping iphone video.

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  • Unrecognized option 'preset' Failed to set value 'slow' for option 'preset' That's what I got
    – Karel Bílek
    May 12, 2014 at 14:16
  • ...and without it, I got Unknown encoder 'libx264'
    – Karel Bílek
    May 12, 2014 at 14:17
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    apt-get install libavcodec-extra-53 solved it
    – Karel Bílek
    May 12, 2014 at 14:21
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Additional method with avconv is to use vflip and hflip filters. Should run faster and maybe better quality:

avconv -i video.mp4 -vf vflip,hflip out.mp4
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  • Same: This rotated my video, but the quality drop (resolution and framerate) was massive (iphone .mov file).
    – Gringo Suave
    Jan 6, 2014 at 21:14
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    @GringoSuave wcarlson has given you a stripped down example, you still need to add all the -codec:v ... and other tags
    – v010dya
    Nov 10, 2014 at 18:24
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I did this:

avconv -i invertedOne.mp4 -c:a copy -vf "hflip,vflip" rightOne.mp4

Full HD video, great results with non perceivable quality loss

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  • Pure gold for avconv version 11.12-6:11.12-1~deb8u9, except that I desired a 90-degree clockwise rotation, so I replaced "hflip,vflip" with transpose=clock.
    – Digger
    Nov 13, 2020 at 16:43
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For avconv or ffmpeg Under 14.04 or later

There have been some changes to the libav documentation since @phoibos quality answer to this question. You can rotate a video 180 degrees avoiding flipping entirely by chaining 2 90 degree commands together (separated by a comma) I accomplished this with the command

avconv -i inputfile -vf transpose=clock,transpose=clock outputfile

for clockwise rotation.

in ffmpeg the syntax is the same.

ffmpeg -i inputfile -vf transpose=clock,transpose=clock outputfile

where inputfile is your supported input video file and outputfile is your desired output file.

For counter clockwise rotation replace clock with cclock

Sources:

https://libav.org/avconv.html#transpose

Testing on Ubuntu 14.04.5 and 16.04 LTS

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