Capturing a Computer Screen

honey

honey

Active member
A significant portion of my new film involves footage of a laptop computer's LCD. The LCD takes up the entire frame of the shot, and viewers need to be able to read the text on the screen.
I've tried holding the camera up to the screen to get footage, but the pictures comes out a little hazy and detached-looking.

Is there software that does video screen capture? I need to be able to zoom in and then edit the footage later in Vegas.

Help is appreciated. Thanks everyone!
 
Screen capture software tends to look fine on a computer screen, but terrible in a video. I never was able to get good quality from it.

Keep in mind copyright issues with whatever you show from the computer screen.
 
CamStudio for screen capture

CamStudio for screen capture

There is a pretty good open source product called Cam Studio. That will allow you to record the actions you perform on a screen and convert it to an avi file.

Hope that helps.
 
Screen recorder does so.

I used to use Camstudio but found it didn't support recording HD. How about the latest version?

Now I use screen recorder Democreator to create some presentation. It has zoom feature and you can do some simple video editing with its built-in editor.

http://www.sameshow.com/democreator/tutorial/zoom-and-pan-tutorial.html

Now it's on event of sending free license of the latest version 3.0.

Besides, I recommend another free app called ZoomIt developed by Microsoft software volunteer Mark Russinovich. You can zoomin, draw and make a countdown with pre-set hotkey. It's very easy to use.

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb897434.aspx
 
Camtasia Studio is probably the best for Windows, though for any OS except Linux - be careful with copyright infringement. You're not allowed to use the UI of Operating Systems without permission.
 
Thanks, everyone. I think I'll give Camtasia a chance, as I've heard it mentioned a few times. I might check out Cam Studio. I'm on Windows 7. I don't really care about copyright, as I won't be using my work for any sort of profit. If it comes down to it I would rather blur or black bar the part that shows the operating system. Anyways, I'm not trying to turn this into a copyright discussion. Thanks for your help, everyone.

One last question, I'm shooting in interlaced SD and converting to 24fps, will the screen captured footage look okay when edited in with everything else? This film will be viewed strictly on LCDs and CRTs. I'm planning on using screen captures, as actual footage of the screen wasn't very readable/pretty when I did test shots.
 
What are some examples of screencaps mixed in with video footage? Does anyone have a recomendation?

I might just try using a macro lens... I think lack of macro was my problem in the first place.
 
Dave W said:
Camtasia Studio is probably the best for Windows, though for any OS except Linux - be careful with copyright infringement. You're not allowed to use the UI of Operating Systems without permission.
Click to expand...


Has your attorney told you this?

How are videos showing a how-to legal on the internet? Does Lynda pay Apple a license to show applications running in Mac OS X?

I would consult an attorney to ask about your risks of showing the operating system instead of asking on a message board. You'll get your real answer there.
 
Fox Magic's ScreenVirtuoso is much better than CamStudio or Camtasia. Better codec, better color fidelity, and better full-fps playback.

http://www.fox-magic.com/screenvirtuoso.php

And I've specifically used it with Vegas. If anyone's seen the screen captures on our Sound for Film and Television DVD, they were done with it.

Best, as much as you can, to capture only the portion of the screen you intend to show, though. Your real-time playback will be better with that than if you try to capture the whole screen all the time. If you're planning zooms and closeups, this should work well for you.
 
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