HD screen capture...is it possible?

[Devon Girard]

Greetings,

I'm a multimedia developer working on a video-heavy exhibit for an architecture museum... and feel a bit out of my element. I've searched the forums for an answer to my (simple?) issue, yet haven't found anything that spells it out (perhaps I'm searching for the wrong thing)...

I'm hoping someone has done this before or knows how and can take a few minutes to educate me.

Basically, I want to capture a high-definition video stream from a computer; whatever's going on on the screen, I want to record to tape... full resolution, no dropped frames.

In my mind this should be simple; there has to be some way to capture the digital signal that goes to the monitor... (shy of filming the monitor itself )... in my mind, there should be video out-> magic converter box->DV recorder...

Can anyone point me in the right direction?

Thanks!

[Craig Roblewsky]

I'm no expert, but I believe there are several products on the market to handle this task. Camtasia makes screen recording software. If you type them into a search engine, you'll get lots of info. Good luck.

- Craig

[Devon Girard]

...I checked out Camtasia's free trial...cool stuff, great tool...yet seems to capture at maximum 15 fps.

Stumbled across another concept; HD DVD Recorders.

So far they seem to capture HDTV feeds that come through the computer...no mention of screen recording in any of the ones I checked.

Anyone know of an HD DVD Recorder can do the job?

(Realtime HD 30fps screen capture)

d

[Douglas Spotted Eagle]

There are no HD DVD recorders.
SnagIt
Camtasia
Hypercam

are your best on-screen recording options.

[Giroud Francois]

if you do the simple math, you would see that it is impossible.
if you got an HD signal going to a screen (whathever stage you capture it, on the screen or on the cable feeding the screen) you got HD data at very high rate that is impossible to record (unless you spend a LOT of money).
the real question is , where does the signal or picture comes from.
it is probably stored in a format on a disk or tape, so you just need to duplicate this format.
if you really insist, you can eventually find a converter from component or HDMI to SDI-HD, then record SDI-HD to something (this something being probably very expensive).

[Devon Girard]

Thanks for the comments...

it seems I was mistaken about HD DVD recorders... I got excited for a moment, thinking that real-time HD recording was possible... I guess the "HD" part of the name just refers to playback.

So, my sense now is unless I want to pay $10,000+ for a real-time HD recording deck and fancy converter box... my best option is to shoot footage of the computer monitor itself with a HD camera?

(Somehow that just feels wrong to me...;)

Has anyone had success shooting computer screens in this manner?

[Thomas Smet]

Devon what software are you using to develop your multimedia piece?


Did you want to record how the piece was being used live or just run it from begining to end with no interuption?

[Giroud Francois]

just explain what you really want to do , a real easy solution could pops up with a different thinking.

[Douglas R. Bruce]

Originally Posted by Devon Girard

it seems I was mistaken about HD DVD recorders... I got excited for a moment, thinking that real-time HD recording was possible... I guess the "HD" part of the name just refers to playback.

You were partially mistaken.
I have a Sharp HD DVD recorder. There are many other brands on the market.
But the naming of them is a little misleading.
Yes they can record HD in real-time - but only to the Harddrive in the recorder.
Copyprotection and the 1 time record feature in most HDTV transmissions (at least here in Japan) mean that after recording to the harddrive you cannot copy to a DVD.....

So HD DVD recorders can record HD in real-time but not in the way you were hoping.

[Douglas Spotted Eagle]

Originally Posted by Devon Girard

Thanks for the comments...

it seems I was mistaken about HD DVD recorders... I got excited for a moment, thinking that real-time HD recording was possible... I guess the "HD" part of the name just refers to playback.

So, my sense now is unless I want to pay $10,000+ for a real-time HD recording deck and fancy converter box... my best option is to shoot footage of the computer monitor itself with a HD camera?

(Somehow that just feels wrong to me...;)

Has anyone had success shooting computer screens in this manner?

I'm failing to understand what is being said here, maybe I'm just dense.
What you record with Hypercam, Camtasia, and similar are ALL HD recordings if your resolution on the vid card is set to anything over 640 x 480. This is something thousands of guys do daily. Recording HD is no problem at all, editing it is the same scenario. Output in HD is a different animal.
Am I missing a key part of the question here?
Just set your resolution to either 1280 x 720, or to 1900 x 1200, and you've got HD being recorded.

[Douglas R. Bruce]

Originally Posted by Douglas Spotted Eagle

I'm failing to understand what is being said here, maybe I'm just dense.

Douglas agrees with Douglas,
In your opening posting, Devon , you said:

Basically, I want to capture a high-definition video stream from a computer; whatever's going on on the screen, I want to record to tape... full resolution, no dropped frames.

If you mean from HD material that you are editing then you should be able to output back to tape (back to your camera or to an HDV edit-deck) via the same link that you get it into the computer in the first place.
If you mean anything that is going on on your computer screen - programmes running, games etc. then Douglas Spotted Eagle has already answered that with Camtasia etc........ but I doubt very much that you can get that in HD at this moment in time. You will need to wait until computers are running in HD (??)