Gemini video description from a file or a YouTube link

What it is

This n8n workflow has Gemini describe a video for you, from a file you upload or a YouTube link you paste. Two forms start it, one for each. A file goes to Google’s file store, the workflow waits, and Gemini 2.0 Flash then writes a long description of the whole clip. A link skips the upload and goes straight to the same model with a request for a detailed summary. Either way the text ends in a request to a converter address that you supply, which can turn it into a Google Doc.

1. A form takes a video file or a YouTube link
2. A file is uploaded to Google’s file store
3. Gemini 2.0 Flash describes or summarizes the video
4. The text is posted to your converter address

Who it suits

Editors, researchers and content teams who need a written account of a video without watching all of it. Skip it if you want a finished Google Doc with no extra work. The converter step is yours to supply, and the file does not include one.

Where to use it

Any n8n that can reach Google’s Gemini API will run it. The two forms give you two web addresses to share with whoever has videos to send.

• n8n Cloud: import the file into a new workflow there
• Your own n8n server: the same file and steps
• The file form: for videos on a laptop or a phone
• The link form: for a video already on YouTube
• Google Docs: through the converter you supply

Setup

Get it saves a zip with workflow.json and Mindket’s setup notes in your downloads folder. Its author puts setup at about 10 minutes. The original copy sent the text, with your Google sign-in, to a converter on a private domain that is neither yours nor Mindket’s. This copy leaves that address blank, so you decide where your text and sign-in go.

1. In n8n, create a workflow, open its menu, choose Import from File and pick workflow.json.
2. Add an HTTP Query Auth credential with the name key and your Gemini key as the value. Select it in Upload File, Get Analysis and YouTube Video.
3. Add a Google Docs OAuth2 credential and select it in HTTP Request and HTTP Request1.
4. In both of those nodes, replace https://YOUR_MARKDOWN_TO_DOC_ADDRESS with your converter’s address, or swap them for Google Docs nodes.
5. Save, send a short video through each form’s test address, then press Publish.

Each of the two requests posts one field, output, with the description in it, and n8n adds your Google Docs sign-in. What your converter does with them is up to you.

{
  "output": "<the description Gemini wrote>"
}

To skip the converter, swap each request node for two Google Docs nodes: Create, then Update with Insert, which writes the text into the new document.

How to use it

Open the form you need from its trigger, On form submission for a file or On form submission1 for a link. Both forms carry the title Insert Video, so label each address when you share it. The file form takes one required video. The link form takes one required address. Each form confirms at once, and the run goes on behind it.

Example

A team lead uploads a short .mp4 of someone building a pivot table. Gemini describes the clip from start to end, Video Analysis keeps that text in one field, and the field travels to your converter as output.

{ "Video Analysis": "<Gemini’s description of the whole clip>" }

For newcomers and experts

If you are new. n8n draws a workflow as boxes joined by lines, and each box, a node, does one job. This file has 19, but eight are sticky notes that only label the stretches. Gemini is Google’s AI model, and the key you add is how Google knows the calls are yours. Send a short test video first. Each node then shows what it received and sent.

For experts. Both branches use one model, gemini-2.0-flash, through Google’s Generative Language API with the key in the query string.

Get Analysis has its error output switched on. If the request fails, for example because Google is still processing the file, the error line leads to 5 seconds. That node sends the call round again. Wait and 5 seconds have no settings of their own, so both use n8n’s default of five seconds for this version of the node. The link branch has no wait and no retry.

Good to know

A wrong key or a blocked file loops until you stop it, and the converter receives your Google sign-in.

• Billing: Google meters Gemini under your key, so check its current limits and prices before long videos
• No retry limit: any error on the file branch, not only a file still processing, sends the call round again every five seconds
• The converter: each request carries your Google Docs sign-in and the whole description, so point it only at a service you trust
• Open forms: once the workflow is published, anyone with a form’s address can start a run on your key
• Your video: an uploaded file goes to Google’s file store and nothing in the workflow deletes it, and Gemini fetches a YouTube link itself, so a private video will not work
• Credentials: the JSON holds none, and nothing from its author’s accounts