Automatic Screenshots from a DVD

May 6, 2008 8:46 PM

Automatic screenshots from a DVD? I know how to take individual screengrabs from a a movie with VLC or Media Player Classic -- but I'd like to get a whole bunch at once. Is there windows software that will let me set an interval and extract a series of screenshots automatically?
posted by muckster to computers & internet (6 comments total)

I don't know how it's done, but this blogger does it and should be able to tell you how. (He's doing it with fansubs but almost certainly it can also be done on ripped VOB files from a DVD.)
posted by Class Goat at 10:21 PM on May 6, 2008

Time Snapper (the free version) takes screen shots every x seconds. I don't know if those screen shots will be able to copy the movie stream (as this can exist as a video card controlled overlay that isn't part of the normal screen) , but it's worth a go.
posted by seanyboy at 11:15 PM on May 6, 2008

from the VLC command line...

vlc "C:\YOUR\file\path\file.avi" -V image --image-out-prefix=capname --image-out-ratio=60

file.avi is the video you want to capture from, capname is the prefix of the saved images, you might want to play around with the ratio (60 means that 1 out of 60 images is captured)
You can add more commands, for example --image-out-format jpeg will save your caps as jpegs instead of of pngs, --snapshot-path lets you choose where to save your caps.

I'm not certain if it works for dvd's, although I can't see why not if the path is right.
posted by whatisish at 12:07 AM on May 7, 2008 [3 favorites]

VLC will do it, either by the command line above, or you can go through the Preferences menu (tick Advanced, and change the Video Output Module to Image Video Output, and look at the options under Image File). It will always put the screenshots in the main VLC directory.

It works for DVDs, but you get a lot of screenshots with interlacing. Also note that VLC takes the screenshots in real time but won't play the DVD onscreen at the same time.
posted by penguinliz at 1:05 AM on May 7, 2008 [1 favorite]

Thanks, all. I do have it working now, but there are two problems:

- I can get this to work *once*, but if I stop it, vlc crashes and it won't take any more screenshots unless I reinstall.
- Interlacing is pretty bad. What's the easiest way around that? Do I have to make an avi?

Thanks again. I'll take this to the VLC forums next.
posted by muckster at 8:05 AM on May 7, 2008

Most grabs i've seen have been taken *with* windows media classic (and done a few myself, but only from avis). See here. Still, not sure mpc is compatible with dvds; i imagine it's a diff. matter having a media file of a known size and a removable media disc. Have you tried ripping the DVD and then taking the shots, or is that too much of a workflow to be an option in this case?
posted by fishfucker at 10:14 AM on May 7, 2008