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Start the video recorder ( ) |
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If the video source is connected and set to play, the
video can be viewed in the window. If you don't see the video and you're sure it's
properly connected and running, make sure that one of the video preview buttons is pushed
( ) |
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The capture file must be set before you continue (File,
Set Captuer File...). Always set the capture file at the beginning of any
session and when you capture more than one video sequence. If you forget to do this,
you'll overwrite the original video. |
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Navigate to the directory where you'll save your video,
then enter the file name (with an AVI extension. AVI stands for Audio
Video Interleave and is the standard Microsoft video format. Press the OK button. |
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You probably don't want the default file size. Five or
10 MBytes is more than enough for most clips. If your video needs more, it can continue to
take it up to the maximum of around 2 gigabytes. The reason for esimating the file size on
the low side is that a file set at 10 MBytes will take up that much disk space, even if it
contains only a single image. Under the Options menu, you can
change the brightness, contrast, and size of the video (try the different menu options).
Note: a full-size video (640 X 480) will probably not capture, although it may be useful
for single frames. A frame size of 320 X 240 is pretty good. |
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View the video through the window. When you're near the
place where you want to start recording, press the video capture button ( ). Note: There are
two more buttons to push before you actually start the capture, so leave yourself time. |
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The next screen allows you to control the
characteristics of the captured video. For most animal behavior recordings, set the frame
rate to 10 frames per second (fps). Each frame will then be about 1/10th second
apart. If you set the frame rate to 0.1, then a frame will be captured every 10 seconds
(good for time-lapse). The maximum reasonable frame rate is 30 fps (that of video itself).
You can also set a time limit for capture and can opt not to capture audio (if it's not
important, don't save the audio since it takes up space). In most cases, capturing
directly to disk is fine. |
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Now you're ready. Press the OK button to start the
capture. Leave the keyboard alone and don't open another program or the capture will stop. |
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At the bottom of the window is a running account of
your video progress. If you find that frames are being dropped, you need to either
decrease the frame rate (fps) or decrease the size of the video frame. For long video
sequences of more than three minutes, it's not unusual to drop a frame or two. Hit the Esc
key on the keyboard to terminate the capture. Click the VidEdit button ( ) at the top to
open the video editor with the movie clip you just saved. |
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Although it's possible to save a video in compressed
format, I've found that I get better video capture results by saving full frames. The
files are very large, however and should be compressed by VidEdit to a more reasonable
size. This is done under the video menu options (Video, Compression Options).
Note that you can also crop the video, resize it, and chage the frame rate (perhaps to
slow motion). |
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For animal behavior projects, Microsoft Video 1 is a
good compressor. Press the preview button to see the rest of the options. Set all the
interleave and key frames as shown. Set the compressor for 100% quality, press the
configure button and set the time slider to 100% also. Then press the OK button. |
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If you the press File, Save,
the video will be compressed and saved. More on using VidEdit can be found here. |
