Vela
High-Performance Browser Video Editor enabling 1080p export with near-native performance using FFmpeg.wasm and WebGL. Offloads complex exports to AWS Fargate.
The Problem
Web-based video editors forced expensive dedicated servers to handle trivial clip rendering, creating massive idle-compute costs that scaled linearly with user growth.
System Architecture
Lightweight scrubbing and trimming pushed directly to the client via FFmpeg.wasm and WebGL shaders. Heavy 1080p export jobs packaged and dispatched to ephemeral AWS Fargate serverless containers that spin down on completion.
System architecture diagram — coming soon
Technical Challenges & Trade-offs
WebAssembly 2GB memory cap crashed browsers on heavily layered 4K files. Implemented aggressive garbage collection and chunked video streaming to bypass RAM limitations without degrading the editing experience.
Business Impact & Metrics
Slashed server hosting costs by 85% by shifting 90% of processing client-side. Handled 1,000+ daily video exports with zero linear cost scaling — server costs decoupled from usage volume.