A fabric of stories is woven across the web through video. Roughly 82 years worth of it is uploaded for 3.5 billion daily viewers each day. It is the most consumed means of communication in the world today and has arguably shaped how we think, live and work.

Yet, creating quality videos is still deceptively tricky. Traditional video editing software like Premiere Pro or Final Cut Pro come with a steep learning curve, while modern takes like Youtube Editor or Loom don't leave much room for flexibility.

In my career as a Designer and Engineer, I've recorded hundreds of demos using all kinds of tools: OBS, After Effects, Screen Studio, etc.. but found myself yearning for something different. Something lighter than Premiere but more powerful than Loom.

And evidently I'm not alone in wanting this. When I built some plugins for the screen-recording tool Kap, a lot of people reached out with inquiries and problems they were facing. I was convinced there's something valuable to be created here.

We build Helmer with a sharp focus on design, performance and our community. Millions of people want to create video today and we want to help them do it best. We hope to build a tool where you can just hit record and tell your story. Let the computer take care of the rest: be it adding tasteful effects, transitions, enhancing audio, creating captions and so on. No more juggling across various tools, combing through tutorials or hiring more people.

A tool that is cross-platform, local-first and affordable for all.

As we bring Helmer to life, we ran a few side-quests on the way. They're fully open-source and we hope you find them useful:

1. Scap: a high-performance cross-platform capture engine written in Rust.

2. Helmer Micro: a small app to record crystal-clear GIFs from your desktop.

3. Creator Sessions: fortnightly calls with designers, creators and our community folks on Discord.

We are in the middle of laying down foundations for our tool, and talk to our users daily for feedback. I am hopeful that the best Helmer has to offer is its ability to give back — to the people who made it, to the OSS projects that power it and to the community who willed it into existence.

A heartfelt thank you everyone who has helped us along the way. Every great journey begins with a single step, and this is our beginning. Please join us on Discord and Twitter to follow along.

🥂 Cheers,
Sid / @clearlysid