How to set ffmpeg for matplotlib in mac os x

python matplotlib ffmpeg osx-mountain-lion enthought
AlexNoir picture AlexNoir · Sep 16, 2013 · Viewed 10.4k times · Source

I want to animate some plots with matplotlib. The version I have is the Enthough Canopy distribution (Version: 1.1.0.1371), running in a mac os x 10.8 (Mountain Lion). I have used the FuncAnimation routine from the animation package of matplotlib. My problem comes saving the animation. I want to save in mp4 format:

anim.save('test.mp4',fps=30)

The error I get is:

UserWarning: MovieWriter ffmpeg unavailable 
warnings.warn("MovieWriter %s unavailable" % writer)

So I installed ffmpeg via Macports. But I am still having the same error. Do you know how to setup matplotlib in order to recognise ffmpeg? Do I have to change the matplotlibrc file? Thanks.

EDIT: I have realized that I can manually put '/opt/local/bin' in the PYTHONPATH, but it does not change the PATH in Enthough Canopy. Do anyone know how to change the PATH in canopy?

Answer

user2158166 picture user2158166 · Feb 4, 2014

I had the same problem. My solution was very simple.

Download the binary from here.

Then do

sudo mv ~/Downloads/ffmpeg /usr/bin/

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