DVD SCREEN GRABS....?

[mikebatho]

I need to take some stills of a dvd to work from on a picture. I figured I'd though of the perfect way of doing this: start the player, not in fullscreen, pause on the shot I want then do a screen grab.

However, I just keep getting an alert noise. This must be some kind of safeguard.

Does anyone know of a way of getting screenshots from DVDs using mac DVD player..?

Thanks.

Mike.

[JeDiBoYTJ]

download mPlayer (http://mplayerosx.sourceforge.net/)

load the .VOB's into mPlayer

play them, find the spot you want to capture

open 'grab', and grab it! works great for me :D

(PS: I think this way only works with non-encrypted DVD's, or DVD's copied to your HD using DVDBackup)

[mikebatho]

Dwonloading Mplayer to try. I've been at this all afternoon!!

Just tried snapNdrag, wouldn't work. If I select an area, the image just ends up blacked out, and if I select the screen, it grabs everything apart from the dvd display window. OSX Grab or screen capture doesn't work, and neither do snapz pro, DVD Capture or Capture me. As with snapNdrag, the last 3 will grab all but the dvd window, as if its on a diferent layer....

This is driving me crazy....
:mad:

[krimson]

if you have quicktime pro, you can open the VOB with it, copy and save the frame.

[TDM21]

Dwonloading Mplayer to try. I've been at this all afternoon!!

Just tried snapNdrag, wouldn't work. If I select an area, the image just ends up blacked out, and if I select the screen, it grabs everything apart from the dvd display window. OSX Grab or screen capture doesn't work, and neither do snapz pro, DVD Capture or Capture me. As with snapNdrag, the last 3 will grab all but the dvd window, as if its on a diferent layer....

This is driving me crazy....
:mad:

I saw this problem before, but it was when I was using a PC and Windows Media Player. I think it has something to do with the the dvd video being rendered seperate from the actual screen. In WMP you had to go in options and turn off acceleration then the video card rendered the movie with the rest of the screen.

As for a solution on OSX, I don't really know of one, but I'm sure there is one.

[FuzzyBallz]

Well, some Mac genius/expert has to know...

On a PC, you can easily capture a video frame w/ PowerDVD or any software DVD player.

[sgarringer]

Well, some Mac genius/expert has to know...

On a PC, you can easily capture a video frame w/ PowerDVD or any software DVD player.

Not true. Depending on the Macrovision protection on the DVD, some times if you take a screen capture it will just show blue/black where the DVD image is.

Apple was required to disable the screen-shot feature when the DVD player sofware is loaded. There have been discussions on this before.

If you know how, DeCSS the DVD and then play it with a media player that allows saving frames. I dont know how to do this on Mac (my iBook doesnt have a DVD drive and I use my PC for these sorts of things) so unfortunatly I cant be of much more help.

[Raid]

If you've got two Macs connected you could play the DVD on one and then use Rendezvous in safari to take a screen caputre on the other machine....

It's worked for me.

[Brize]

There are a couple of really easy ways around this one.

First off, you can use VLC (http://www.videolan.org/), which will allow you to take a screen-shot in the normal way using Command-Shift-4 and then dragging the crosshair over the frame. Alternatively, you can download DVD Capture (http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/16324), which works with the OS X DVD Player.

[Artful Dodger]

try to download Capture Me from Version Tracker.
I use this and it works very well for my needs.
I'll try to find the site link after my design class today.

[AngusB]

I use constrictor (on MacOSXApps.com)

http://www.macosxapps.com/article.php?story=20030321031237342

to do screen captures. Run DVD player in windowed mode, position the frame, pause on the frame you want and then save the image. It generates tiff files, and I used it just two days ago in Panther to grab a bunch of stills from Naked Gun

Works like a champ!

Angus

[FuzzyBallz]

Not true. Depending on the Macrovision protection on the DVD, some times if you take a screen capture it will just show blue/black where the DVD image is.
Give me a DVD movie, any DVD movie, and I'll give you a screen capture, w/o the blue/black thing you're talking about. There are so many ways on the PC to get rid of whatever protection crap it's not even funny.

[mikebatho]

OK, I'm giving up on this til the morning.

The sun is well & truly over the yard-arm, and there are beers in the fridge.

Ii don't have 2 macs, and have had no success all day with half a dozen different methods & players. Somebody suggested it may be to do with restrictions on my video card, but I dunno.

Things to try tomorrow: VLC 9although I've had no luck with it so far).

Constrictor..(???)

And the other player mentioned that I havent tried.

Keep it coming guys, there must be a way!!!!!!

Cheers. Mike.

[FuzzyBallz]

Found something that might just work.

DVD Capture (http://www.digitallyobsessed.com/software.php3), now updated to version 2.5, is a helper application for the Apple DVD Player. New features include enhanced improved file handling, DVD Player controls, improved settings retention and conversion to JPEG and cropping capability. It enables the user to take screen captures of the DVD Player Viewer in full screen mode in three different sizes. The captures can be saved to a file or placed on the clipboard. An AppleScript is provided for the DVD Player script menu that launches DVD Capture. Select "File" or "Clipboard" to assign a location for the capture. Mac OS 10.2 or higher required. May not work on all hardware configurations that are not G4-G5 Towers.

[AngusB]

I promise that constrictor is the shareware way to go...

and money where my mouth is..

See attached image made with constrictor and shrunk down to manaegable web size!

Angus

[mikebatho]

OK. Here's a list of things that won't grab dvd on my machine:

Snapz pro

Capture me

mplayer

vlc

DVD capture

snapNdrag....

I've tried all settings & options, and it still behaves like the dvd viewer window isn't there. Captures everything but the viewer, or if you just select an area within the viewer, you just get a blank panel.

I'll try constrictor & quicktime pro.....

[MacFan26]

VLC has worked fine for me... You can use the same screenshot commands as usual in that program. I just make it full screen and hit pause. It's not always perfect quality, but it works.

[zaphoyd]

snapz pro works for me, even for video capture of dvds...

[mikebatho]

Ok, I can't get my dvds to play in quicktime pro. They also don't work in vlc or mplayer. You either get nothing at all or a scrambled image...

Constrictor didn't work either.

As with other stretch-frame capture software, you can move the frame anywhere outside the dvd viewer window & it'll take captures of your desktop just fine, but if you drag it half over the paused dvd viewer window, any portion of window within the frame it blanked out. You can pull the frame into the centre of the window so you have a totally blank screen, or stretch the frame full screen so you have a full shot of your desktop, but with the dvd window blanked out.

Spooky.

[Brize]

Mike: Sent you a PM.

[NusuniAdmin]

I just wrote my own RB app that will take a picture of the screen. It has worked on over 60 dvd's I have tested with it (many of those are best sellers and such).

we are a really american family, 112 dvd's all best sellers and oscar winners :p

please note: i have tested this on about 6 macs, all with different vdeo cards and such.

[boskie]

What machine do you have? Graphics chipset - ATI or nVidia? They both treat Video Overlaying differently, hence why methods will work on some machines and not others...

[mikebatho]

Can I get a copy of this RB app to try......?

[mikebatho]

Its a graphit G4 tower......

I'm no expert, so I'll give you what is in System Profiler:

Power Mac G4 (AGP graphics) (version 2.8)
OSX 10.2.8 (6R73)
Machine speed - 400 MHz
Bus speed - 100 MHz
Number of processors - 1
L2 cache size - 1MB

DIMMO/J21 - SDRAM - 64MB
DIMM1/J22 - SDRAM - 128MB
Card Type - display
Card Name - ATY, Rage128Ps
Card model - ATY, Rage128Pro
Card (video) memory - 16MB

[mikebatho]

Its a graphite G4 tower......

I'm no expert, so I'll give you what is in System Profiler:

Power Mac G4 (AGP graphics) (version 2.8)
OSX 10.2.8 (6R73)
Machine speed - 400 MHz
Bus speed - 100 MHz
Number of processors - 1
L2 cache size - 1MB

DIMMO/J21 - SDRAM - 64MB
DIMM1/J22 - SDRAM - 128MB
Card Type - display
Card Name - ATY, Rage128Ps
Card model - ATY, Rage128Pro
Card (video) memory - 16MB

[Brian Haworth]

Newer systems with better graphics cards can do it, but old systems like yours and mine are SOL. The DVD graphics just don't render on the screen like everything else.

[Jalexster]

I know exactly what your problem is.

Newer DVD drives transfer all the video and audio via software (the data channel on the drive). Older drives send the audio straight to the audio card/circuits through a cable. And they send the video to the video card directly.

The card renders everything on screen but the video, and then gets the DVD stream from the frive, instead of from the software, and overlays it where it is supposed to go.

Which is exactly why you can't capture the video. It's being combined with the rest of the GUI via hardware, not software. Therefore, software can't capture it, only hardware can (like if you hooked the S-video connector up to a capture box or something like that).

[mikebatho]

Any more suggestions, or should I put this idea to bed.....?

[sgarringer]

Give me a DVD movie, any DVD movie, and I'll give you a screen capture, w/o the blue/black thing you're talking about. There are so many ways on the PC to get rid of whatever protection crap it's not even funny.

You didnt bother to read the rest of my post, you know, the part where I explained how to do it?

[dongmin]

Any more suggestions, or should I put this idea to bed.....?

sounds like you're SOL with that old computer of yours. your only possibilities are:

1. borrow a newer computer

2. take digital photos of your screen. on a lcd it won't be so bad. i've done this from tv screens. has some distortion but i kinda liked the effect.