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Graphics Software

Open Source Video Capture from a Win32 Window? 36

Posted by Cliff from the similar-problem-different-perspective dept.
Phleg asks; "A professor of mine has been using TechSmith's Camtasia Studio software in order to take movies of what's going on on his screen. However, it's buggy, expensive, and a hassle. I've looked around the web for something that's GPL'd that can accomplish the same thing, and come up with nothing useful. The final stipulation is that it has to work under Windows, as much of the software he uses (Scientific Workplace, for one) is Windows-only. Has anyone found a (free) way to capture what's displayed on screen into a video, as well as grabbing inputs from a mic? Any codec would be fine." Those interested in a similar solution for Linux might be interested in this discussion.
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Open Source Video Capture from a Win32 Window? More

Open Source Video Capture from a Win32 Window?

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  • Windows Media Encoder (Score:1, Informative)

    by ccady ( 569355 )
    I know I'm evil and bad for saying this, but Windows Media Encoder [microsoft.com] is free (as in beer, but not speech) and works fine.
    • The question was about a utility to make full-motion screen captures of the desktop/computer screen. Windows Media Encoder is just an encoder, it can't capture video of the desktop/computer screen, you need an application for that. Then if you wanted to you could encode the capture with WME, but that's irrelevant because the question was about the app to make the capture, not an encoder.

      Anyway, I've made low-res screencaps before by taking the video-out port of an ATI All-in-Wonder 128 (several newer versions are available) and feeding it back into the video-in port while using VirtualDub to encode it into an AVI file. Again, low-res, but I've only used it for capturing protected full-screen streaming content that wouldn't download using standard hacks, so it worked OK for that.

      However, for higher quality, one might set up an external capture box using any decent S-Video capture card and VirtualDub, and have the main box run a video card with an S-Video Out. That would be the best quality I can think of because I don't know of any video capture cards that have a VGA-in capture port.

  • Workaround (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Dunkirk ( 238653 ) <david@@@davidkrider...com> on Tuesday December 03, 2002 @08:33PM (#4806449) Homepage
    As someone who is trying his best to move away from any and all Windows-related software, I make what may be a stupid suggestion. If you can find a GPL'ed piece of software that runs on Linux, go ahead and use it. Just use it while capturing what's happening on screen - and using VNC to get at a window of a Windows-based desktop running the vital application.

  • Lotus ScreenCam [lotus.com] is something you should check out. Also, Microsoft Camcorder [microsoft.com] is a blatant rip-off of Lotus ScreenCam and came free with Office 97, but I don't recall it capturing audio.

    Both of these apps are old enough that they may even run under Wine reliably.

  • huffyuv 2.1.1 (Score:3, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 03, 2002 @08:56PM (#4806626)
    http://math.berkeley.edu/~benrg/huffyuv.html

  • SnagIt (Score:2, Informative)

    by Bazouel ( 105242 )
    It's not GPL'd, but I can't think of a better and smaller program [techsmith.com]. It's well worth 40 $ IMHO.

    It can capture video at any quality/codec and have many useful options.

    It can also do simple screenshots of anything (entire screen, a region, a window, the active window, a button, etc. etc.)

    • Re:SnagIt (Score:2, Insightful)

      by arglesnaf ( 454704 )
      Ermm, the Video version of snagit is canastia studio. exactly what he said he did not want to use. You go to the techsmith website and canastia studio ads take up half the screen.
    • From the SnagIt features page [techsmith.com]
      Video Capture Capture on-screen activity, including mouse movements, as a standard AVI video file. Optionally add a voice-over. For even more powerful video capture, check out Camtasia Studio.
      I think its worth a try.

  • Hypercam! (Score:5, Informative)

    by Enry ( 630 ) <enry.wayga@net> on Tuesday December 03, 2002 @11:44PM (#4807598) Journal
    It's not GPL'd, but Hypercam [hyperionics.com] rocks. I used it for creating two computer-based-training CDs. Accepts mic input, can caputre the entire screen, a window, or a measured part of the screen, can add a starburst and click for mouse events, and uses the codecs built into Windows. The cost is $30, so while it's not free as in beer or speech, it's the best thing I found.

    Your best bet is to encode the videos at the highest quality (assuming your machine can keep up), then edit/cut quality later on. There's no way you will be able to encode DiVX or any of the more complex codecs in realtime, so just make unencoded AVIs and worry about the codecs later with VirtualDub.

  • about 3 minutes on google..... (Score:3, Funny)

    by maken ( 12497 ) on Wednesday December 04, 2002 @01:57AM (#4808170)
    about 3 minutes on google gives :

    http://www.atomixbuttons.com/vsc/index1.html

    Runs on windows
    captures to .avi
    and it looks to be open source

    just email your billing address
    Ill send you a bill.
    cash, check, visa, m/c, paypal accepted

    maken
  • There's a program to capture a VNC stream to a playable file. Search freshmeat.
  • A professor of mine has been using TechSmith's Camtasia Studio software in order to take movies of what's going on on his screen. However, it's buggy, expensive, and a hassle. I've looked around the web for something that's GPL'd that can accomplish the same thing, and come up with nothing useful. The final stipulation is that it has to work under Windows, as much of the software he uses (Scientific Workplace, for one) is Windows-only. Has anyone found a (free) way to capture what's displayed on screen into a video, as well as grabbing inputs from a mic?

    Get a graphics card with TV-out, and just use a regular video recorder (or plug it into the back of another PC with vidcap). Something capturing your display to video in software is going to hurt your performance and may be incompatible with other software.

  • Look for a VNC framebuffer recorder (Score:3, Informative)

    by ManxStef ( 469602 ) on Wednesday December 04, 2002 @09:35AM (#4809449) Homepage
    VNC seems to be the way ahead as screen capture is generally a very different problem to standard video capture/encoding. so using VirtualDub with Huffy, DivX, etc. would all be pretty useless for this application, as they're not designed for screen capping.

    I'd check out the mailing lists at the real VNC website [realvnc.com] and maybe ask the question there. Trolling through the above archives I found a link to this, which seems like it may well be ideal (though very rough round the edges from the looks of things, I haven't had time to check it out yet).

    It's basically a VNC session recorder/replayer [cyberelk.net]

    Linux/UNIX but as the guy says should work with CygWin. Don't think it's GPL, but an e-mail to the man may clarify what you can do with it.

    You can of course get VNC for windows at the above site, or TightVNC over at SourceForge(which may/may not work with the above, I'd stick to straight VNC until you've tested the above).

    Hope that helps,
  • Hi all, I feel for this poor chap. Why hassle the guy because he is looking for OpenSource on Windows? Especially you Linux lads. Think of it this way... If there was more OPenSource software for Win32 then that might force the software houses to embrace it more. Linux is my OS of choice, but I still use a WIN32 box and miss free/opensource solutions to my software requirements. POrt them to Windows and who knows Windows software might come down in price to compete? Think Open Office versus MS Office. How much pressure is Open office excerting on MS to make MS Office better and cheaper? Anyway, rant over!
  • but hopefully this gets it past the retarded filter.

    camstudio found on codeproject
    http://www.codeproject.com/tools/cams tudio.asp

    free, with source.

  • easy (Score:2, Funny)

    by aliusblank ( 547153 )
    1) hit windows key + print screen real fast
    2) paste
    3) ???
    4) profit!!!
    • i wrote some software in vb that got a webserver built in to it so if you refresh the software alot it would work. It's saves to a jpg. So if i implimented the avi code i have you would have the same effect. I never realized anyone was interested in this type of thing..... you can get desktop server from http://www.novaslp.net/downloads/desktopserver.zip it's based on a jpg compression dll i found on the internet. I'll impliment avi support when I have time. You can just set it to refresh how many times per second. Although it already uses some cpu power as it's written in vb so like a 15 fps capture could drag my comp to slowdown i guess....

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