A complete guide to body effects in CapCut

Filming people for your videos can be tough. In the field, you’re faced with challenging lighting conditions, subjects in constant motion, and more. In CapCut, body effects give you precise, localized adjustments to help your subjects look their best.

Body effects in CapCut let you transform how people in your videos appear. These are both cosmetic and corrective edits. You can change up someone’s look to be creative or to add cool style effects. And you can correct visual defects introduced when you film a scene. 

In this tutorial, I’m going to show you how to use body effects in CapCut. With these, you can transform how people look in a video. These are cosmetic edits that streamline your production process.

Why use CapCut body effects to edit videos?

Recording human subjects is tough: they’re in constant motion, and coupled with dynamic field conditions, it can be really hard to get the right shot. Body effects in CapCut let you make changes in post-production.

CapCut, with its free mobile app and powerful tools, makes these changes easy. Consider benefits like this: 

• Your videos will look more professional. Body effects are commonly used in studio productions. Even actors you know by name will have their appearance adjusted in post-production. Thanks to CapCut, you can make the very same edits. It boosts your production quality effortlessly. 
• Body effects can be added anywhere. With mobile apps for Apple and Android devices, you can carry CapCut anywhere you go. This makes it easy to apply body effects to your videos in seconds. No need to wait until you’re back in front of your computer. 
• You can correct issues captured while recording. As I mentioned, it’s often impossible to perfectly capture human subjects on video. Thanks to body effects in CapCut, you don’t have to. You can simply make cosmetic adjustments and edits later as you edit. It gives you the ultimate creative flexibility. 
• You can make cinematic edits with ease. Body effects let you add cinematic styling—you can effortlessly transform how people look onscreen. At the touch of a button, you can radically alter someone’s appearance long after you’ve recorded your video. 

It’s easy to see how body effects in CapCut help elevate the quality of any video that you edit. Let’s now dive into how to use them, step by step. 

How to use body effects in CapCut

CapCut is multi-platform. What does that mean? Simply that you can use it on your preferred brand of mobile device or desktop computer. For this tutorial, I’ll work in CapCut on an iPhone running iOS 17. You can also download CapCut for Android devices by going to the Google Play Store. 

Prefer desktop editing? That’s understandable—and CapCut has you covered here, too. Full-featured versions of CapCut are available for both Mac and Windows PCs.

As we navigate the tutorial, you’ll see a stock video clip in use. Want to download it and follow along? I sourced it from Envato. Click to add it to your own library.

Let’s dive in. 

1. Select a video to edit and enhance

To explore body effects in CapCut, launch the app on your device. When you do, you’ll need to choose a project to work on. CapCut projects are where individual productions store their multimedia files. As you edit a video, the working file is called a project. It’s here that you’ll find video, audio, and effects grouped together.

Open a new or existing project in CapCut. When you do, take a glance at your screen. By default, you’ll find yourself on CapCut’s main Edit panel. Here is where the magic happens: every visual transformation that you make in CapCut will start right here.

In the upper center of your screen, you’ll see a video preview. This is a vital view. It shows you the video you’re editing—and more importantly, it shows you the edits you’re making in real time. When you apply body effects in CapCut, you’ll see them demonstrated right away. This is a big time-saver. You don’t have to export videos to see your changes! 

Below the preview is the Timeline. Here’s where you can navigate through your video projects frame by frame. You can also see effects and edits sequenced into projects. You’re able to change their duration, control when they start, and more.

Finally, down at the bottom is the CapCut toolbar. This is the nerve center of CapCut. From the toolbar menu, you’ll access the effects and edits that you use to customize videos. Body effects are first among these. 

With the Timeline, scroll across your video until you find a scene you want to edit. You’re ready to explore CapCut’s body effects!

2. Open CapCut’s Body Retouch panel

With a scene selected on CapCut’s Timeline, it’s time to launch CapCut’s Body Retouch panel. To find it, look down at the toolbar menu again. By default, you’ll see options like Edit, Audio, Text, Effects, and more. It takes two of these menus to find the Body Retouch options.

Begin by tapping Edit. Watch the toolbar when you do. The original options vanish, replaced by a new set. You’re now on the Edit view, where CapCut’s core cosmetic edits are found. The toolbar will now show you options like Split, Speed, Animations, Volume, and so on.

The toolbar is also scrollable: in other words, there are more options available. Swipe from right to left with your finger, and you’ll see them appear.

On the toolbar, scroll until you find the Retouch button. Once there, tap to select it. This launches CapCut’s powerful suite of retouching tools. The toolbar will once again transform, giving you two options: Face and Body. Face effects focus on the faces of people in your video. But here, we want body edits, so tap Body on the right side.

3. Explore key effects and make edits with ease

You’re now on CapCut’s Body Retouch panel. Notice that effects are organized by category. Initially, you’ll see options like Straight shoulders, Wide shoulders, Arms, and so on.

These edits have a small Pro label in the upper corner. This means that they’re only available as part of CapCut’s premium tier. If you’re unsure about them, you can add and preview them right now. You’ll only have to upgrade if you choose to export and share your video.

But don’t fret—scroll to the right, and you will see the CapCut offers a wide variety of body effects completely for free. They start with Legs, Body, Waist, Head, and more. You can tap on any to activate it. What these tools do is allow you to change up someone’s appearance. 

For example, the Body menu is a catch-all edit. It slims (or widens) someone’s body on your videos. Tap to activate it, and you’ll see a slider appear. Pull it left or right using your finger, and watch what happens to your video subject. Moving right slims them down. Moving left makes them larger.

The Waist effect does just as the name suggests—it alters a video subject’s waistline, without changing the rest of their appearance. Other tools like Head provide similarly refined edits. 

Spend some time navigating through your video projects and exploring different Body Retouch effects. There’s no hard-and-fast rule for which options work best—it varies from video project to video project. But keep this in mind: subtle edits are better.

These are powerful editing tools. Go too far, and your video subjects will appear overly edited and very unnatural. Be intentional, and use Body Retouch effects in CapCut sparingly.  

4. Export and share your finished video

When you’ve finished making your edits, it’s time to share your video with the world. Here again, CapCut shines for its ease of use and wide flexibility in sharing. 

Once you’ve closed out the Body Retouch panel, you’re back on the main Edit view. You can see all of your edits previewed at the top, and you’re ready to export and share. Look in the upper-right corner of CapCut’s screen. There, you’ll see the Share button. Tap on it with your finger.

CapCut will set about exporting your finished video. You’ll see the progress shown in real time on-screen. When it finishes, you’ll find a saved copy of your video on your device’s Camera Roll. This is a normal video file that you can save, share, and post anywhere you want. But with CapCut, if you’re planning to share on social media, it’s even easier.

CapCut is produced by ByteDance, the creators of TikTok. Thus, social media direct sharing is a breeze. In the upper center, you’ll see the white Share to TikTok button. And below, you can choose to directly post to Instagram, WhatsApp, Facebook, and more. 

Think of how powerful this is: you can retouch bodies in CapCut and share the results to your social media in seconds. And since CapCut is a mobile app, you can start editing videos an instant after you record them.

Learn more CapCut skills for better videos

Body effects in CapCut help you transform the appearance of people in your videos. But they’re just a few of the effects and edits that CapCut has to offer.

Are you ready to elevate your production game and make videos faster and better than ever before? Here at Envato Tuts+, we have you covered. Check out these top CapCut tutorials to grow your skills and expand your knowledge:

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Transform videos with CapCut body effects today

In this comprehensive tutorial, you learned all about body effects in CapCut. Thanks to the Body Retouch panel, you can make dramatic transformations at the touch of a button. Want to adjust shoulders? Make someone shorter? All of those effects and more are readily available, all in CapCut’s free mobile app.

Get ready to transform your videos today! Launch CapCut, go to the Retouch > Body panel, and explore your options. Now, you’re ready to wow your audience.