Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with capture

How can I capture images directly from a digital camera without messing with memory cards?

iktomi — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 17:00:37 -0800

How can I capture high quality photos from a camera directly for printing, without using the memory card as a middle step, and preferably with a live preview on my computer screen? Ever taken on a problem you thought would be easy, and found yourself stumped almost immediately? This is like that.

I was selected to set up and operate a Santa Claus photo booth at an alternative gift fair (with proceeds going to a charitable cause). I figured it would be a fairly easy set-up with a camera, laptop, and photo printer. However, I cannot seem to find a way to capture an image from the camera with a live preview on my computer screen.

When connected to my computer, the cameras I've tried all display as USB removable storage of one kind or another (not an image capture device.) I seem to remember that digital cameras used to advertise the ability to use them as webcams, which would be a start, but I need print quality for this particular project.

I have at my disposal: a Windows XP computer, a Macbook, a Samsung NV10 digital camera, and an Aiptek HD still/video camera.

So, how can I use these devices to capture Santa Claus?

Capture web content yet retain formatting?

DerekTheGeek — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 11:31:01 -0800

Can anyone suggest a tool that does a better job of selecting only the web content you want to archive yet keeps the formatting when copied? I find that I frequently need to capture content from all over the web for my own knowledge database. This includes portions of articles, comments, blog posts, etc … For better or for worse I have settled on Microsoft Outlook as the repository for my knowledge base. I have compared lots of different tools and OneNote 2007 is for the moment the best option that fits my needs. That being said I am having trouble finding a tool that will allow me to capture only that data (text and images) I need from a web page.

For the time being I have been using the “Aardvark” plug-in for Firefox that allows me to selectively remove or isolate sections of a web pages document object model. Once I have isolated the content I want to capture I then copy and paste into OneNote.

The problem I find is that the content I copy often times does not retain its formatting (font, alignment, etc ..) when pasted into OneNote. I want to avoid having to take screen shots for various reasons (search ability, archive size, etc ..).

Any suggestions on a better method or tool? Thanks.

Capturing TV closed captions

Yakuman — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 21:11:37 -0800

I'm looking for software that will let me capture programs with the closed captions intact. Does anybody know of anything? I have a Pinnacle PCTV HD Pro Stick tv tuner.

How do I capture a small part of a long video stream?

tamarack — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 10:16:42 -0800

I want to capture a small part of a long video stream from the web. And I want it in mp4. It's my convocation webcast, and it's in asf. I have managed to capture just the five minutes (of 2+ hrs!) I want, but I did so with Real Player and so the file is in the ever-unfriendly rm file format. I haven't had any luck with file conversion programs, and I can't crack the nut which is VLC (I've tried the VideoLAN forums). I'm running WinXP, and I'm looking for a free way to do this.

I need a recommendation for a tried and true free file conversion that deals with rm->mp4; or step-by-step instructions for how to do this with VLC (I don't want the entire file). I did look in the back posts, but didn't find anything dealing with a partial capture. Many thanks, mefites.

Decent video screen cap with sound?

notsnot — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 20:40:14 -0800

Decent free video screen capture *with*sound*? I've been gifted a month on a training website with riches of lessons. There are a few instructors' videos which I would like to screen capture the lessons so I can watch them over and over without having to keep a subscription going (I'm cheap). Problem is, most screen cap programs seem to be designed for making training videos - "see, here, click this spot..." and thus record sound from your microphone, not the sound from the sound card.

I know they're using some sort of flash movie viewer, and I've trolled my cache for flv files to try and watch (even did a cache clear, to winnow down candidates), to no avail.

How to capture Polycom video stream

purenitrous — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 09:41:02 -0800

I have a Polycom VSX 7000 that we use for video conferencing. I'd like to capture video conference streams and publish to a web server (or youtube) for playback at a later time. (does not need to be in real time) What open source tools can I use to do this? Or can someone point me to a "how to" for this....

High quality hardware-based screen capture?

siclik — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 14:51:28 -0800

Trying to record a video card output (VGA/DVI) with this camera. What adapter do I need and how would you recommend setting it up? At this point, I only see two options - either use screen capture software (not preferred since I'm using a memory-intensive program) or just film the screen. I've been looking online and haven't yet found an adapter or converter, so if you know of anything, please chime in. The camera can record either an incoming composite video signal or DV video signal (through firewire).

I'm trying to record this in extremely high quality, because it is for a video that we are distributing to our customers.

Your help and suggestions are greatly appreciated!

Generating English subtitles for International TV

Yakuman — Sat, 15 Nov 2008 02:52:01 -0800

I want to auto-generate English subtitles for foreign language TV. This entails capturing a program off a TV tuner onto my HD. From there I would export the closed captions and have them robo-translated into English. From there I would want the new text re-imported into the show. That way I could watch the program with these subtitles, which would be full of errors, but still useful. Is this reasonably possible?

Hey Mr. DJ

white light — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 12:22:46 -0800

What movie is this screen capture from? (girl playing a record) Someone I know is trying to win a contest that requires identifying very short clips from tons of movies, and only has one more to go!

here is the image

Thanks!

How can I (screen) capture my competitors? And my site?

jkl345 — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 07:59:25 -0800

I'm looking for an awesome screen capture utility/firefox plugin/web application/any solution to take screen grabs of my site and a couple competitors every few hours. Anyone have any awesome solutions? Google shows a lot of options and lots of screen capture for video options, but I suspect the hive mind knows the best one for my situation. Ideally, it must be:
+ Free
+ Automated
+ Be able to set up to timed intervals (every hour, ideally)
+ Be able to set up for multiple sites
+ Produce a JPG, PNG or some other visual format

Thanks for your help!

Connect Canon HG10 video to Mac os X

willep — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 17:02:20 -0800

Mac osx/canon hg10 cannot get stills off camera. Video yes, stills no. We're supposed to have a baby any day now and this sucker ain't behaving (the camera-mac connection). I haven't had this kind of problem with a mac in 10 years. I can get iMovie to find my Canon HG10 thru USB cable but not Final Cut Pro of iPhoto or Image Capture. That would be fine except that iMovie does not download images from still mode.

I have everything Canon has for download, I have iPhoto, etc. I have another Canon still camera that works fine in all programs.

I saw this thread was closed.

I've looked: no one else seems to have this problem and Canon isn't aware of it... thank you.

WSG, IRL

wolfsleepy — Mon, 26 May 2008 23:12:37 -0800

I need advice on how to organize an urban, neighbourhood-wide Capture the Flag game. We're anticipating about 12-15 players per team, but neither of us have played capture the flag since small times.

Right now we've drawn up an area of about 9 square residential city blocks to play in. Tagging will involve removing an accessible handkerchief/banada from the pack pocket, but we haven't thought too much about the jail/jailbreak provisions or need for officiating.

We'd love to hear about experiences that people have had with similar events.

How best to take discreet private notes on a not so private computer?

therubettes — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 02:34:50 -0800

I want software which will allow me to capture text thoughts at work, to a remote web location - quickly, discreetly and privately. I work at a computer which is visible to co-workers and is sometimes used by others at short/no notice, so I would like to make the following senario a reality.

1. At work I have a non-work related thought which I wish to capture.

2. I input a keyboard shortcut and am presented with a simple command line interface. Something similar to the google desktop quick search if you have seen it, but perhaps even a little more discreet if thats possible.

3. I type the thought and hit enter/esc and the input screen/command line disappears.

4. The text I entered is not stored locally but sent to some remote web location (I am willing to pay for this service if necessary) where it can be reviewed and edited by me at a later time.

Additional Info:

I am using Windows XP.
A physical notebook and pen is not what I want.
I have had a Palm and did not like it.
I do not want to have to open a web browser.
Have tried using Yahoo Notepad with widget but it is not what I want.
I lose USB memory sticks too often for that to be a reliable method.
A local text file fails the privacy test.
I would prefer not to have to install software but would be happy to run an exe, if it did the job and was safe.
I do not wish to use my cell-phone.
I would like to be able to capture the thought almost as soon as I have it and then return to work immediately.
This is not related to GTD and I do not wish to do any more than input shortcut, type though, hit return.

I have checked lifehacker, ask mefi and similar sites for what I want but can't find precisely what I want.

Using DVD stills in TV commentary blog?

cortex — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 09:54:53 -0800

Incorporating still frame captures in a TV commentary blog: is it possible/affordable/practical to get general permission from the studio to do this? We're talking probably a handful of low-res stills from any given episode, captured from DVDs we've purchased. The project itself is an essentially non-commercial hobbyist venture, likely to have a positive (if any) effect on sales of the studio's own product if the nostalgia-equals-sales cycle functions like it usually does.

The stills aren't vital to the project (we could always just explain what was worth looking at), but they'd add a lot of pop and so it'd be nice to know that either

(a) it'd be possible to get an official okay from the IP folks without a huge attached pricetag, or
(b) that this sort of situation, left to coast under the radar, isn't particularly ire-raising.

Any information or experiences regarding (trying to) accomplish (a) would be great; any recent precedents or practical examples for or against (b) would be nice as well.

Are there currently any visible non-studio blog type projects using cleared or uncleared stills?

Capturing stills from internet video?

Thin Lizzy — Sat, 05 Apr 2008 08:14:53 -0800

How do I extract a still from a New York Times video segment? I'd like to get a still from a video that was posted on the NYT website. I can't seem to pause it and take a screen shot because it doesn't really "roll back" in steps. It jumps back and plays automatically- making it really hard to hit the pause button at the right moment. I saw some freeware that seemed to take stills from internet video, but I can't get them to find the video on the page (I tried FXFrameCap and ByteScout). It seems like there must be a way to do this. I don't mind paying for software if a Mefite says it'll work.

Presentation Podcast Capture?

Alterscape — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 13:34:19 -0800

How can I record video of a powerpoint/impress/etc slideshow in a format suitable for inclusion in a video podcast? Presenters use their own laptops and I have access only to a vga cable carrying the image, so screencapture tools are not a preferable option. I'm working on setting up the supporting technologies to enable my university department to podcast a lecture series. The speakers often present slides, video, etc from their own laptops using a variety of presentation tools. We provide a VGA connection to an LCD projector. I am not able to ask that they present from one of our machines because of the variety of output software they use, or install software on their machines. I would like to capture what's displayed on the projector to intercut with images of the speaker at the podium. Direct-to-disk capture is preferable to something that requires taping and later capturing the tape to disk.

We're capturing video and audio of the presenter from a production-grade DV camera direct to disk on a Powermac G5 already.

Any thoughts on hardware/software solutions to enable this?

Video capture on a ThinkPad T42?

stleric — Sun, 13 Jan 2008 20:03:03 -0800

Is my ThinkPad laptop capable of video capture? I've got a ThinkPad T42 laptop that's getting a bit long in the tooth, but since I've got a DVD+/-R drive, I've been curious if it could handle video capture well enough to convert some old VHS tapes to DVDs without having issues with dropouts, poor frame rates, or errors.

It's a Centrino (Pentium 4-M) 1.6 GHz processor, currently 512 MB of memory (I'll probably upgrade to 1.5 GB soon), 5400 RPM 80 gig hard drive (I've got an external 7200 RPM 250 GB that I'd probably store the video on), Radeon 7500 video card (32MB), two USB 2.0 slots, but no built-in Firewire ports.

So my main questions are:
1. Can my computer handle TV/DVD-quality video capture, or would I just be disappointed attempting it?
2. Are there any worthwhile USB 2.0 video capture peripherals with RCA plugs (and possibly others) available, or should I stick to Firewire peripherals?
3. If I'm stuck with Firewire, would video capture through a PCMCIA card with Firewire ports be a reasonable solution?

Thanks, everybody!

How to look real in photographs?

russmail — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 10:24:21 -0800

What's the best way to react when a camera is pointing at you so that you look real/ not like an idiot in the photograph? Whether someone else is taking the picture or you're trying to do a quick self-portrait, more often than not the outcome is awful - as MySpace/ facebook/ Match etc testify. You look at the outcome and wonder, "who is this person?" I want to have photographs of me of which I want to say, "this is me - I am this person." How?

Analog Video Capture to Mac Webcam

terrapin — Sat, 29 Sep 2007 06:21:24 -0800

I have a VHS-C camcorder and an eMac with USB 1.1 ports (firewire ports are broken) and I am curious if the Dazzle Video Creator Platinum will allow me to use the VHS-C camcorder as a webcam on this Mac. I used to use the same VHS-C camcorder with a Windows machine many years ago with a video capture card. I would leave the tape out and put the VHS-C camcorder in the record mode; used Webcam32 and it worked perfectly, giving me much better images of outdoor views than any Firewire or USB "webcam" I have ever found.

I don't know if the Dazzle will:

1) work with Mac.
2) allow me to stream the image from the VHS-C as I did before using EvoCam.

Does anyone have experience with this product? With a Mac?

Thanks.

Capturing DV video straight to MPEG2?

eatcake — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 23:17:59 -0800

I have a project coming up where I will need to capture (digitize) a full 8-10 hours of footage (to be captured on DV tape) and make DVD copies for 3 people by the end of the next day. Ok, so I know how to go from DV to MPEG2 via either Final Cut Pro (v. 5.1.4) or Avid Xpress. What I'm wondering is, is there a way to bypass capturing the footage to DV (then converting to MPEG2) and going straight from the tape to MPEG2 so I can save myself hours of encoding from DV to MPEG2 and then burning discs? I have Final Cut Studio 5, an Intel iMac 2ghz w/2gigs of RAM, in addition to a Dual Processor G4 (which I'm hoping to use to multi-task), enough external storage (I figure I will have around 120 gigs of raw DV footage) and enough coffee to keep me going for a while.

I'm open to software and hardware recomendations within reason, meaning with what I have or minimal (under $150 or so) expense.

Thanks.

software 2 capture streaming videos

wondering — Mon, 23 Apr 2007 17:17:55 -0800

software program for a PC that can capture streaming video files? i've found some old posts on the web about various programs that can capture streaming video (especially quicktime) that's being watched on one's PC but those posts are fairly old and technology moves pretty fast so if there's a program you'd recommend, i'm very interested in looking it up on the web.

thanks!

How do I transfer old videotapes to my Mac?

Johnny Assay — Wed, 07 Feb 2007 23:01:47 -0800

I have: a bunch of family videos, and the two old camcorders they were taken on. I also have: a PowerBook G4. I would like to get these old videos onto DVDs, using the copy of iMovie on said PowerBook. How do I go about this? What new hardware do I need? A little more info: the video cameras in question have RCA audio & video out; no S-video or Firewire (otherwise I wouldn't be asking.) I've poked around online, and I assume I need something like this to get the video stream off of the camera and onto the computer; is this right? Are there better choices on the market for what I want to do? (I'm not looking to do anything fancier than this, video-editing/capture-wise.)

Is there a digital voice recorder I can wear on a lanyard?

chrissyboy — Sun, 07 Jan 2007 19:01:41 -0800

I'm after a digital voice recorder / dictaphone type thing that I can wear round my neck on a lanyard. I want it for quick capture of musical ideas, things to do, verbal notes to myself etc.. Hence wanting to wear it on a lanyard, so it's right there all the time.

About 3 or 4 years ago a guy I worked with had one that was about the size of a credit card, something like that would be ok. Or the size of an ipod shuffle would be even better, come to think of it.

Any recommendations mefites?

Got to get those numbers

Expat — Mon, 18 Dec 2006 12:09:06 -0800

I run operations for a fairly large retail chain in Europe with shops all over the continent and beyond. I need to capture some basic data from these shops that either doesn't exist in our (incredibly complex and fragile system infrastructure,) or lives in systems that don't talk to each other. As is often the case, there's My company (largely a wholesaler) has decided to centralise management of our retail shops for all of Europe and further afield. Previously, each country went its own way, resulting in a dog's breakfast of incompatible systems out of which my team and I are trying to bring some sense. We're engaged in a project to install a common ePOS system through the entire portfolio and are using a third-party solution to manage our replenishment.

I need to capture things that won't live in the ePOS (or other common systems for a l-o-n-g time,) such as staff hours used, traffic counts and the like. The best my over-worked (and frankly not very responsive) corporate IT department can come up with is an Excel spreadsheet on the WAN. Fine-ish if only a couple of people needed to fill in data, notso-hotso with a couple of hundred...

So - what are my options? My Google-fu is evidently limited as the best I could find was AskGet which is probably too heavy and expensive for my simple needs.

What I'm looking for is a way for my store Managers to key in couple of figures into a simple form at the end of each day and then for analysis team to be able to get at these numbers, by store, in a basic format, ideally a .csv or plain text file so they can work their spreadsheet magic. Does such a service exist on the web? I realise it would be far simpler to have a simple page on the corporate intranet to do this capture would be simpler and probably cheaper, but that ain't gonna happen anytime soon.

If AskGet is my only real option, does anyone have any experience with them?

Thanks, HM!

Help my cap my vid!

antifuse — Mon, 16 Oct 2006 01:40:06 -0800

What is the easiest (cheapest) way to get a series of stills from a video file? Ok, here's what I want to do: I have a bunch of video files (AVI, divx encoded mostly, but I'd appreciate a method that could do WMV or MOV too) that I'd like to get a series of jpeg still captures from. Preferably, something like capturing 1 frame every second for the length of the video. Are there any nice freeware tools out there that will do this? Preferably something that has a nice simple command-line (like app.exe sourcefile(s) destination -jpeg-quality) or an easy to use drag and drop windows interface. Oh, yes, and looking for windows apps only as well.

Freeware isn't an absolute requirement, I'm sure I could get my hands on something that's not freeware, but I'd like to do this on the cheap if I can, as it's really just for messing around.

I swear I saw a similar question to this somewhere on the net before, and I could've sworn it was AskMe, but my search-fu has yielded no results, so sorry if I'm duping someone else's question. :)