Digital video question

[San Gabriel Valley local]

A buddy of mine took some digital videos on a surf trip and we're trying to figure out whether you can capture frames from the video and turn them into individual digital pictures. I'm totally clueless on this; does anyone know if this is possible to do, and if so how? I'm guessing that you would need some kind of video editing software.

Thanks in advance,

Ed

 

[23rdstMB]

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Originally posted by San Gabriel Valley local:
<strong>A buddy of mine took some digital videos on a surf trip and we're trying to figure out whether you can capture frames from the video and turn them into individual digital pictures. I'm totally clueless on this; does anyone know if this is possible to do, and if so how? I'm guessing that you would need some kind of video editing software.

Thanks in advance,

Ed</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">I'm pretty sure that an editing program is what you'll need to break it all down to individual frames.

 

[Silver72]

What format are the videos in? Such as .wma .avi .mpeg or what not? If you would like to pull some screen grabs, and/or compress the movies so that they are more easily transferred. You can use virtual dub. http://www.virtualdub.org/ It's freeware, and pretty easy to use. Will let you screen grab multiple frames as well, if you would like to do sequences that way.

Another option, but you would have to pay for it, would be adobe premier. This program though is more for video editing, other then just for screen grabs.

If you would like easy cheesy way of doing it, pull up the shot that you want in windows media player. Pause it on the part that you want to screen grab. Once paused, hit prtscn key located probably in the upper right of your keyboard. Once this has been done, open up mspaint, with mspaint as the active window, hit ctrl hold it, and punch v let them both go. A screen grab of your whole desktop will come up in mspaint. Use the crop tool to crop out the image on the media player. Hit ctrl/c then click on file/new in mspaint, on the new screen hit ctrl/v and it should paste in just the screen grab that you just cropped. Click file, save as, and pick your folder that you want to save in. All done. Hopefully you have an updated mspaint, if you do make sure to save in jpeg, as if you save in .bmp the image file will be huge.

Hope this helps <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />

 

[Silver72]

Quick sample of a prtscn grab. This is my desktop, resized and saved from bmp to jpg.

<img src="http://members.cox.net/tulsafoos/desktop.jpg" alt=" - " />

 

[goofyfoot]

If you have Windows XP, it has a program called Movie Maker that may be able to capture frames.

When I bought my JVC mini DV camcorder, it had a program called JLip that grabs video frames. YOu mayt want to see what kind of software came with the camcorder...

 

[San Gabriel Valley local]

Thanks for the helpful info guys! I'm not sure what format the videos are in (they were taken with a Sony digital camcorder); I think I'm going to have to play around with this. The virtualdub sounds like it will do what I want it to do but the info on the webpage is way over my head! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Big Grin]" src="images/icons/grin.gif" /> If I can figure it out I'll post some pics.

Thanks again,

Ed

 

[Silver72]

hehe, if you want, I can run a few through for ya. Actually, if they are not too large I can host up the videos for ya as well. If you can try this real quick...

Go to the folder that you have your videos saved in. Right click on one of the videos, then in the drop down box, left click on properties. Info that I would need, what type of file, size of the file.

Also, what type of internet connection are you on?? If you are on dial up, well it would probably take for ever for you to send them to me. If you are on broadband, then if they are not super huge files, you can send to me, and I can pull some frame grabs, chop them into easily hostable movies and host some up for you.

Again, it mostly depends on the size and your connection. Also, in virtual dub, if you run into the help section on the actual software, it should have some tips for navigating it pretty easily, and finding out what you want to do. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />

 

[Export]

What would you use if you had a mac computer? something free...

 

[San Gabriel Valley local]

silver72, the videos are still on the tape they were recorded on, which is at my buddy's house in Manhattan Beach along with his camcorder. I guess we're going to have to figure out how to save them from the camcorder/tape onto his computer first; at this point we're only savvy enough to hook up the cables to his TV and press the play button! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Big Grin]" src="images/icons/grin.gif" /> If the videos were already on his computer I would try the printscreen method like you and SCR suggested, but I'm really starting from square one here.

 

[Silver72]

Ahhh gotcha. That's cool. Once you have everything figured out with transferring and such it all should come together pretty easy <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" /> If you need any help lemme know <img border="0" title="" alt="[Cool]" src="images/icons/cool.gif" />

 

[DanSurfSouthBay]

if you dont even have the tape, i'd call that square zero

 

[goofyfoot]

For a Macintosh, a really good video editing software is Final Cut Pro!

 

[Waldo]

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Originally posted by goofyfoot:
<strong>For a Macintosh, a really good video editing software is Final Cut Pro!</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">And if you're a Mac user by chance, all you need to do is pause the video where you want the image, then press command (apple key) + shift +F4. That'll let you do a screen grab and crop to the specific area you want. Easy cheese, baby <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" />