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Cut a person out so titles can pass behind them, lift an object out of a shot, or replace what’s behind. The basic cut-out runs on your computer: no upload, no account, no cost. A presenter cut out of a real room, with the hard edges (hair, a shoulder a plant overlapped) magnified.

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In the Studio app

Right-click a video or picture in the preview:
  • Cut out object here lifts out whatever you clicked, a person or a thing. On a video it follows that object through the clip. Shift-click adds to the selection; on a picture, B brushes the edges. It runs on a Mac: pictures on Apple silicon with macOS 14 or later, or Intel with macOS 13.3 or later; video on Apple silicon only.
  • Remove background keeps the person and drops the rest. It’s free and runs on your computer, made for people on plain backgrounds. With a HeyGen API key you can choose a cloud cut through HeyGen instead, paid from your API balance.
Or just ask: “put the title behind her”, “remove the cup from the table”, “put her on a rainy street at night”.

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On the command line

The first run downloads the model; it needs FFmpeg. Pick the output by where it goes: .webm for HyperFrames and the web, .mov (ProRes 4444) for Premiere, Resolve or Final Cut, .png for a single photo. For text behind the person, make the cut-out and a background plate with a person-shaped hole in one pass, then stack: plate, your text or graphic, cut-out on top.
The original presenter frame beside its transparent cutout over a green background

The same real frame before and after the local model. The softer hair and hand edges are the model’s actual limit on this source.

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When it works, and when it won’t

The free model is made for people: a clear subject, steady framing, some contrast with the background. Expect trouble with a held object (a dark mic or phone can vanish), fine hair over a busy background, and fast motion. For objects, use Cut out object here in the app instead.

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Fixes, quality and speed

--quality best for a cut-out over its own original footage, fast for a smaller file over something unrelated; --info shows whether a fast local processor was found. To move the cut-out, animate a wrapper around the video, not the video itself. Every flag is in the CLI reference.