DaVinci Resolve in distrobox

Two images built from the same Dockerfile, pushed to a private registry, used via distrobox:

davinci-amd — DaVinci Resolve + ROCm + Intel intel-compute-runtime, for AMD/Intel GPUs
davinci-nvidia — DaVinci Resolve only; the NVIDIA driver/toolchain is provided by the host

Registry: docker.slambin.fr. Files: Dockerfile, davinci-dependencies (package list), davinci-run (in-image launcher).

This setup is a direct adaptation of zelikos/davincibox — same base image, same dependency list, same install flags — with one change: Resolve is baked into the image at build time instead of being installed into the box afterwards, to match this repo's "build once, push" convention. See CLAUDE.md for what was changed and why.

Both amd and nvidia targets have been build-tested end to end (Docker Desktop/WSL2, real DaVinci_Resolve_21.1_Linux.run) — dependency install, the silent Resolve install, and the patchelf fix all completed cleanly, and ldd on the installed binary shows no missing libraries. Not yet tested: an actual distrobox create + GUI launch on real Linux/GPU hardware (see CLAUDE.md for the full breakdown).

DaVinci Resolve binaries get baked into these images from your own Blackmagic Design download. Keep the registry private — never push these images publicly. Not affiliated with Blackmagic Design.

Prerequisites

The DaVinci Resolve (or DaVinci Resolve Studio) Linux .run installer from Blackmagic's site, unzipped, placed next to the Dockerfile (the download is a .zip containing the .run — unzip DaVinci_Resolve_*_Linux.zip first).
Your host user should be in the render and video groups for GPU device access: sudo usermod -aG render,video "$USER" (log out/in after).
NVIDIA only: NVIDIA Container Toolkit installed on the host (see "NVIDIA gotcha" below).

Build & push

REGISTRY=docker.slambin.fr
VERSION=21.1
INSTALLER=DaVinci_Resolve_21.1_Linux.run

# Build for amd
podman build -f Dockerfile \
  --build-arg "RESOLVE_INSTALLER=${INSTALLER}" \
  --target "amd" \
  -t "${REGISTRY}/davinci-amd:${VERSION}" \
  -t "${REGISTRY}/davinci-amd:latest" .

# Build for nvidia
podman build -f Dockerfile \
  --build-arg "RESOLVE_INSTALLER=${INSTALLER}" \
  --target "nvidia" \
  -t "${REGISTRY}/davinci-nvidia:${VERSION}" \
  -t "${REGISTRY}/davinci-nvidia:latest" .

Install / run

# AMD / Intel
distrobox create \
  --name davinci \
  --image docker.slambin.fr/davinci-amd:latest \
  --additional-flags "--hostname davinci-resolve"

# NVIDIA (see gotcha below re: --nvidia vs CDI)
distrobox create \
  --name davinci \
  --image docker.slambin.fr/davinci-nvidia:latest \
  --nvidia \
  --additional-flags "--hostname davinci-resolve"

Then:

distrobox enter davinci
davinci-run

NVIDIA gotcha (unverified)

Houdini's NVIDIA variant just needs distrobox --nvidia (host driver files bind-mounted, enough for GL/Vulkan viewport rendering). DaVinci Resolve needs full CUDA/OpenCL/NVENC, and upstream davincibox's README documents using the NVIDIA Container Toolkit + CDI route instead:

distrobox create \
  --name davinci \
  --image docker.slambin.fr/davinci-nvidia:latest \
  --additional-flags "--device nvidia.com/gpu=all"

which requires nvidia-container-toolkit set up on the host (already the case on Universal Blue images; see NVIDIA's own install guide otherwise). Whether plain --nvidia is actually enough has not been tested here — try it first since it's simpler, fall back to the CDI form above if Resolve reports something like "Unsupported GPU processing mode" on launch.

Same approach as Houdini's: write a minimal .desktop by hand and export it, rather than adapting Resolve's own shipped .desktop files. Resolve's shipped DaVinciResolve.desktop uses the %u field code for file-manager "open with" support, and Resolve crashes (AppConfig::LoadAllSiteInfo assertion) if it's ever launched with a stray/unexpanded argument — not every app launcher strips unused field codes before running Exec=. A hand-written .desktop with no field codes at all sidesteps this entirely. See CLAUDE.md for how this was found.

distrobox enter davinci
cat > /tmp/davinci.desktop << 'EOF'
[Desktop Entry]
Type=Application
Name=DaVinci Resolve
Comment=Editing, visual effects, color correction and audio post production
Exec=davinci-run
Icon=/opt/resolve/graphics/DV_Resolve.png
Terminal=false
Categories=AudioVideo;AudioVideoEditing;
StartupWMClass=resolve
EOF
distrobox-export --app /tmp/davinci.desktop

This copies the icon to ~/.local/share/icons/ on the host and writes ~/.local/share/applications/davinci-davinci.desktop. Distrobox also auto-creates a generic davinci.desktop ("Terminal entering davinci") when the box is created — set NoDisplay=true in that file, or delete it, if you don't want both entries in the app menu.

Known gotchas (from upstream, not yet hit here ourselves)

No audio: Resolve uses ALSA via the pipewire-alsa plugin baked into the image. If your host doesn't run PipeWire, swap it inside the box: sudo dnf remove pipewire-alsa && sudo dnf install alsa-plugins-pulseaudio.
Codecs: the free version's codec support is limited — this is a Blackmagic licensing limitation, not something this image can fix.
Studio + USB dongle: needs a udev rule on the host to let the container see the license dongle. See davincibox's README if you hit "Checking Licences..." crashes.

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