Turn long-form content into polished social clips — automatically. In this tutorial, we walk through Bannerbear Workflows, a feature that chains together animation, video, and image steps into a single reusable automation. Build your template once, feed it new data each time, and get upload-ready videos with zero manual editing.
We cover:
• Building an animation template with keyframes (plus an AI animation tip)
• Defining workflow inputs: title text, video URL, episode number
• Running a complete 5-step workflow: title animation → resize → branded overlay → subtitles → join clips
• Testing and running your finished workflow
Perfect for podcasters, streamers, and creators who need to repurpose long-form content into Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube Shorts — fast.
Got other automation tasks you want to scale? Let us know in the comments!
Video Transcription
[00:00:00] You've got great long-form content, podcasts, streams, maybe even tutorials. But short clips on social, say Instagram, TikTok, or YouTube Shorts, are actually where you hook viewers. The problem is making them look polished while churning them out fast. With Bannerbear Workflows, you can automate this process.
Build your template once, complete with animations, title cards, subtitles, then feed it new data. Your job ends here. We handle the final production, leaving you with an upload-ready video. Let's take a look at this feature and walk through building a flow Workflows is a powerful Bannerbear feature that chains together everything
[00:01:00] to do with animation, video, and images in a single automation.
Instead of jumping between tools and rebuilding steps for each variation, you build it once. Then define your inputs and feed it new content each time it runs. Let's look at a real example. A podcast episode drop. You need a few short clips for Instagram. They all need the same work: resizing, a branded overlay, subtitles, and transitions.
Instead of editing a handful of clips the same way, you can drop them into the same workflow and get a polished end result automatically every time. In this tutorial, we're building a two-clip social short, a title animation, then a framed
[00:02:00] video with subtitles. Once it's running, you just drop in a clip and some text.
Workflows handles the rest. Here's how the final result looks
Now let's build An animation template brings movement into your template. You feed it data, text, colors, whatever you would put in a standard template. But instead of a static image, you get a unique, eye-catching visual. Let's set one up Go to Animation Templates under Create and set up an animation template.
You can convert an image template, start from scratch, or pick one from the library
To animate,
[00:03:00] add keyframes and customize layer movement in the template editor.
Here's a little tip. Our handy AI animation button can get you started more quickly
Our workflow will do five things: generate a title animation, resize the video, add a banded overlay, burn in subtitles, and join it all together. First, we define what data feeds into the process Create and name a new workflow. Then define your inputs, the values you'll feed in each time the workflow runs.
It can be texts, links, images, and whatever else changes between runs
[00:04:00]
For each input, specify the name and type. Text, URL, number, or Boolean value. We'll use title text, a video URL, and episode number text
Mark anything essential as required, inputs the workflow can't run without. We've established the dynamic input values. Now, we build the steps. Each one transforms your data a little more until you've got a polished video. Step one, generating the title animation. Add an animation step, select your template, then reference the title and episode number inputs
Step two, resizing the video.
[00:05:00] Add a resize video step. Reference your video URL input. The clips were initially sized for YouTube, so resizing allows us to adjust for mobile Step three, adding a branded overlay. Add an add image overlay step. Reference the resized video from step two, not the original. The overlay will stay the same, so we use a direct image link and center it
Step four, adding subtitles. Add a transcribe and burn subtitle step. Reference the overlaid video from step three. Choose your language and words per segment. Then customize the text however you want. You might want to render a few tests here.
[00:06:00] Subtitle timing and styling can take some trial and error
And finally, step five, joining the two clips together. Add a join video step. Reference the title animation we produced in step one and the subtitled video in step four. Add a transition if you'd like, and make sure output dimensions match
And that's your workflow scroll up and save Back on your workflow page, you can view a step summary, set up integrations, view logs, and of course, drop in some inputs to generate a video. Test out your workflow by feeding in a title,
[00:07:00] a video URL, and episode number
Hit send request. Watch the workflow run. You should see the progress of the workflow under the response. When it's done, you've got your video
And just like that, you're done. You've got a workflow that turns any clip into a polished social short. Feed it new content, get upload-ready videos back. Reuse it over and over with no added effort. Get the hard part out of the way with Bannerbear Workflows. Spending an afternoon setting up a solid automation will save you tons of time and energy in the long run, allowing you to focus on
[00:08:00] building your brand without growing your to-do list.
Got other image or video automation tasks that you want to automate and scale? Let us know in the comments and we'll hook you up.
