Guide
Find every clip of one person.
The groom, the CEO, the interview subject. Name them once and stop scrubbing for them.
In short: In Sift, open People, click a face and type a name. From then on you can search that name alone, with a description (“Tricia laughing”), or with other people to find them together, across all your footage including clips you add later.
No editor needed. Sift works on its own as a desktop app on Mac and Windows: search, preview, build Selects and share footage by link without opening an editor. The editor panels are optional.
How it works
Sift finds faces in your video and photos, groups the ones that look like the same person, and lets you label each group. Grouping runs on your computer and the faces stay there.
Doing it well
- Name the people you’ll search most first; start with the main subject.
- Merge groups in People when the same person shows up twice.
- Add a person from a photo if you have a clear one.
- Combine a name with a description: “Mike on stage”.
- Select several people to find them together.
Honest limits
Face recognition isn’t perfect. It’s best on clear, front-facing faces; side profiles, distance, masks and low light can be missed, and similar-looking people can be grouped together or missed. Check results before you rely on them. Sift doesn’t identify strangers: it only recognizes people you’ve named. Faces in footage from connected services such as Frame.io are never used for recognition.
Compared with built-in search
Adobe’s documentation says Premiere’s visual search can describe a person’s appearance but doesn’t identify or name individuals. Resolve 21’s IntelliSearch works with faces in imported media. Sift’s difference is a library of named people across every drive, shared by both panels.
Step by step.
- Index your footage
Add the folders. Faces are found as Sift indexes.
- Name the person
Open People, click their face and type a name.
- Search
Type the name, alone or with a description.
- Fix and refine
Merge duplicate groups and add the person from a photo.
Questions
Are faces uploaded?
No. Face grouping runs and stays on your computer.
Does it work on photos?
Yes, in the folders you sync.
Will it find the person in new footage?
Yes. Named people are recognized in footage you add later.
Can it find someone I haven’t named?
It groups faces so you can find and name them, but only people you name become searchable by name.
Updated 2026-10-22
Keep reading.
Try it on your own footage.
Free for 3 days or 25 searches. No card. Then $99 a year for one computer, Mac or Windows. Everything in Sift, including the optional editor panels and one free link to share footage.