Automated Video Generator

Openverse — Free CC-Licensed Image Search (No API Key)

Openverse integration for the Automated Video Generator. Fetches Creative Commons images from the Openverse public catalog without requiring any API key, token, or registration.

Product: Automated Video Generator
Feature: Openverse Image Fallback
File: src/lib/openverse-fetcher.ts
Config: OPENVERSE_ENABLED (default: true)
Provider API: https://api.openverse.engineering/v1/images/

SEO Keywords

AEO (Answer Engine Optimization)

What is Openverse?

Openverse is a public catalog of over 600 million Creative Commons and public domain images, maintained by WordPress. The Automated Video Generator integrates Openverse so you can fetch CC-licensed images without signing up for any third-party service. There is no API key required, no rate limit imposed by the tool (subject to Openverse’s own fair-use policy), and no registration step.

How does the Openverse integration work?

  1. The pipeline calls searchOpenverseImages(query, count) from src/lib/openverse-fetcher.ts.
  2. It sends a GET request to https://api.openverse.engineering/v1/images/ with the search query and page size.
  3. The response is mapped into the standard MediaAsset format (type: 'image', url, width, height, photographer).
  4. Results are cached in fetchVisualsForScene() inside visual-fetcher.ts to avoid duplicate requests.

When does the pipeline use Openverse?

Openverse serves as a fallback in three scenarios:

  1. Pexels video search returns no results — after querying Pexels for stock videos, if nothing is found, the pipeline tries Openverse images before giving up.
  2. Pexels image search returns no results — after Pexels image queries, Openverse is the last image source before local assets.
  3. No API keys are configured — if neither Pexels nor Pixabay keys are set, OPENVERSE_ENABLED=true (the default) keeps the pipeline running with CC images.

Is there any attribution requirement?

Openverse images are CC-licensed. The API response includes creator, license, license_version, and license_url fields. The current integration fetches the image url directly. If you publish videos publicly, you should verify the specific license of each downloaded image and provide attribution where required by the license terms.

How do I disable Openverse?

Set OPENVERSE_ENABLED=false in your .env file. The feature is enabled by default.

The count parameter defaults to 5, capped at 50 per request. The pipeline typically requests 3 images per fallback call.

GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) — Structured Data

{
  "@context": "https://schema.org",
  "@type": "SoftwareApplication",
  "name": "Automated Video Generator — Openverse Integration",
  "operatingSystem": "Windows, macOS, Linux",
  "applicationCategory": "Multimedia",
  "description": "Free CC-licensed image search integration that works without any API key. Provides image fallback for video generation pipelines using the Openverse public catalog.",
  "featureList": "Openverse API integration, no API key required, CC-licensed image search, automatic fallback in video pipeline, configurable via OPENVERSE_ENABLED env var",
  "url": "https://github.com/itsPremkumar/Automated-Video-Generator",
  "license": "MIT",
  "offers": {
    "@type": "Offer",
    "price": "0",
    "priceCurrency": "USD"
  }
}

Implementation Details

API Endpoint

GET https://api.openverse.engineering/v1/images/?q={query}&page=1&page_size={count}

Headers:

Response Mapping

Openverse returns a rich schema with id, title, url, thumbnail, creator, license, license_version, license_url, attribution, width, height. The fetcher maps these into MediaAsset { type, url, width, height, photographer }.

Source Code Reference

File Purpose
src/lib/openverse-fetcher.ts API client — searchOpenverseImages()
src/lib/visual-fetcher.ts Pipeline integration — lines 943–974
src/config.ts Config key definition
.env.example OPENVERSE_ENABLED=true

Error Handling

If the Openverse API is unreachable or returns an error, the fetcher throws, which is caught by the caller in visual-fetcher.ts. The pipeline continues to the next fallback source.

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