Your first cut with Claude Code

This is the whole loop once: download, workspace, footage, the first ask, turning on Pro, export. Every later tutorial starts from here.

You need a Mac on macOS 15 or later with Apple silicon, Claude Code installed, and one video you recorded yourself. A talking-head clip of two to five minutes is ideal.

1. Install the app

Download BetterEdits from the download page and drag it to Applications. The beta is not notarized yet, so the first time you open it, right-click the app and choose Open.

There is no account and nothing to sign in to. The app opens on the welcome window.

2. Make a workspace

Click New Workspace. It asks four things:

• A name. Use the kind of video you make: Reels, Tutorials, Clips.
• Where to put it. The default is ~/Movies/BetterEdits.
• What you make. One sentence. It sets the canvas new videos start with and goes into the workspace's CLAUDE.md.
• Where your footage lives. Pick the folder you record into.

The workspace is a folder. Inside it the app writes BetterEdits.md, the guide Claude reads, and a CLAUDE.md that imports it. Your footage folder becomes a library: files in it are used where they are, never copied.

3. Open Claude Code there

Open a terminal in the workspace folder and start Claude Code.

cd ~/Movies/Reels
claude

Claude reads CLAUDE.md, follows the import to the guide, and now knows how videos are made here and every command the app has. It can launch the app itself when it needs it.

4. Ask for the first cut

Say what the video should be. Name the file.

Start a new 9:16 video called First Cut from take-1.mov in my footage folder. Cut out every pause longer than a second, then caption it in the default style.

Claude reads the project and looks at the file. The first time, the file has no words yet, so Claude cannot cut by what was said. It says so and explains what comes next.

5. Turn on Pro

Claude cannot watch a video. To know what was said and when, the file has to be analysed once. Analysing reads the file and writes what it found next to it: every word with its timing, speakers, on-screen text, scenes and silences. Analysis is part of Pro, which starts with a 7-day free trial.

Claude will say something like this:

take-1.mov has not been analysed yet, so I cannot see the words. Analysing is part of Pro. This Mac is not signed in: I'll open the sign-in in your browser; approve it there and I'll continue.

A browser tab opens on the dashboard. Sign up, start the trial (card on file, nothing charged for seven days), and the page says "Connected to BetterEdits". Back in the terminal, Claude sees the Mac is signed in, runs the analysis, waits, and tells you what it found and what is left on the balance. From now on it does this on its own for any file that needs it. The account badge in the app's toolbar shows the plan and the credits at any time.

What you have now

A workspace with a guide in it, one analysed file, a Mac signed in once, and an exported video. The next tutorial does the talking-head cleanup properly: false starts, captions that look right, and the words to ask for each.