Installation

Kinetograph is not on npm yet. Build it from a clone of the repository.

What you needCopy Anchor Link

• Node.js 22 or newer.
• A Rust toolchain from rustup. Use the stable channel. The addon is built with it.
• The FFmpeg development libraries, pkg-config and libclang. The addon links FFmpeg, so the build needs them.
• A GPU that wgpu supports. On macOS that means Metal. No window or display is needed.

Install the system libraries:

• macOS: brew install ffmpeg pkgconf
• Debian or Ubuntu: sudo apt-get install libavcodec-dev libavformat-dev libswscale-dev libavutil-dev libclang-dev pkg-config

If Homebrew's rustc is first on your PATH and does not start, put rustup first:

export PATH="$HOME/.cargo/bin:/opt/homebrew/opt/rustup/bin:$PATH"

The GPU tests, the golden images and the benchmarks run on an Apple M4 Mac. The Linux and Windows builds are set up in CI.

BuildCopy Anchor Link

From the repository root:

npm ci
npm run build

npm ci installs the workspace packages. npm run build builds the TypeScript packages and a debug build of the addon.

For timings, build the release addon as well:

npm run build:release -w @kinetographdev/native

Check the installCopy Anchor Link

npx kinetograph doctor

With no entry, doctor prints the Node version, the platform and whether the addon loaded:

node v22.x.x on darwin-arm64
addon: loaded, version 0.1.0
kinetograph doctor <entry> reports what a project holds that the engine cannot draw

If the addon line says NOT loaded, the text after it gives the reason.

npx kinetograph --version prints the package version.

Run the CLICopy Anchor Link

From the repository root, npx kinetograph <command> runs the CLI. Without npx, run node packages/cli/dist/cli.js <command>. The CLI reference lists every command.

Projects inside the repository resolve the @kinetographdev/* packages from the workspace. The next page writes a first project: First video.