What is the best .Swf to Avi/Mpg encoder?

[mister_to_you]

I have some Flash files that I would like to change into Avi or Mpg.

What is the best converter to use?

[Baldrick]

try super.

[mister_to_you]

can't get it to work, it never finishes always an error.

[Ai Haibara]

SUPER, in this case, will only work if your source SWF files have FLV video inside them (and if the FLV isn't VP62-compressed). I take it the SWFs you're attempting to convert are standard web animation Flash files?

[DarrellS]

How about a free program that will convert the SWF frames in a SWF file to image files (bitmap or jpeg) that can be put into a video editor and saved as an AVI. I've found a couple of trial programs that say they will do it but I'm not wasting my money on a program that I don't know whether it will work or not. Don't know why people put these crippled trial programs out instead of putting a time limit on a working program.

I've been trying for months to convert some SWF files I got off the internet to AVI and I've just about come to the conclusion that it is impossible. I can't even play the files on my PC, moreless convert them. Everything is there when decompiled but all it will show when exported to FLA is the first white frame. If I could batch convert all the frames to BMP then I could make the movie but as it is, all I can do is take a snapshot of each frame and paste it into Photoshop one at a time but at over 2500 frames (x10 for 10 clips), that's a little too much work for even me.

[hrlslcbr]

This might help you (I've never used these programs, but I think they can be useful).
http://www.swftools.org/

[starwarrior29]

Snagit is a nice program that can capture anything that is played on your computer.
http://www.techsmith.com/snagit.asp

[DarrellS]

SnagIt is a good program but again, trying to capture over 25000 frames, one at a time is a very huge task. I just spent about 3 hours capturing 240 frames.

As for the swftools, I couldn't get them to open on my computer. Either they're DOS programs or they need another program to make them run and there is no text file to give you a clue as to how to open them or use them. Just a folder full of .exe files that don't work.

If Sothink SWF Decompiler would let me export the frames as BMPs instead of SWFs I'd be in business but then they couldn't sell their other programs, I guess. Not really sure what good it is to decompile a SWF file if you can't do anything with it once you decompile it. Well, I do have a perfect MP3 file but it does me no good without a movie.

[Ai Haibara]

My sister's done it with SWF2AVI, but I personally haven't tried it. (I think it can export frames to GIF/JPG; not sure about BMP. And I think it also doesn't support audio (my sister just recorded the SWF audio using Audacity and added it to the AVI later, IIRC).)

[DarrellS]

The SWF files in question won't work on any program I try. I do have 8 other files that I can convert with Eltima SWF Toolbox but when I try and convert those same 8 files with SWF2AVI, the AVI files are all messed up. They look like screen captures of the program itself with the side of the movie hidden behind the right panel showing the recording statis and they play 3 times as fast as they should. Not sure if it's a bug in the program or if installing SnagIt is causing the problem. The speed can be fixed with VDub the right side of the movie can't be.

I'll uninstall SnagIt and see if it fixes the problem but if I remember correctly, before I installed SnagIt, I couldn't get SWF2AVI to work at all.

BTW, the program doesn't do image files. It only converts to uncompressed AVI. It is free though and if I can get it to work will be well worth the money.

[DarrellS]

Well, I just noticed the video capture template in Snagit that will capture any of the SWF files that I can play so I guess I better not uninstall it. Looks like it might be worth buying after all.

As for the files that I can't play, I guess I'm out of luck.

[Ai Haibara]

I installed SWF2AVI on a test system last night (Win98) to experiment with it a little... it does export to BMP and (JPEG, I think, either that or GIF (only)); I needed to export some SWFs that were converted JPEGs or GIFs anyway.

It worked for me, though one problem I had was, whatever images were in any of the previous SWFs converted to images would show up in later images, if the later images had smaller dimensions. o_O

Yeah, I've noticed it seems to merely work - or not - for everyone. I usually don't recommend it unless (well, it works on your system ) unless you're willing to do a fair amount of manual work in converting your SWFs... in this case, I brought it up because I knew it did image exports.

(I know, I know, should've used a Flash decompiler instead...)

[DarrellS]

OK, you must be talking about Magic SWF2AVI which is payware. I was using the free version which only converts to AVI. Magic SWF2AVI works on some files but the troublesome ones that I have, it won't. Unless you buy it, you can only convert 4 or 5 frames at a time and none of the other options work until you register it. That's what I was referring to as crippled demos. At least the SnagIt program was fully functional for 30 days. That's plenty enough time to decide whether to buy it or not and with the video capture mode, I was able to go back to the website and capture the SWF files as AVI right off of the webpage. No need for any SWF convertors or decompilers.

[Ai Haibara]

OK, you must be talking about Magic SWF2AVI which is payware.

Me? I was referring to the version VH auto-links to when I type 'SWF2AVI'. Freeware, but it doesn't seem to work for everyone. ^_^ I've never tried the Magic program - or any other 'regular' SWF > AVI converters, for that matter. (I haven't seen many SWFs I want to convert to AVI. )

[ntscuser]

I use Flash To Video Encoder Pro (unregistered).

[DarrellS]

Ai Haibara, I downloaded the version that was in the link and when I went to install it, it seems I had already installed it in February. The error messages almost caused me to give up but after creating the container file, it copied most of the files just fine.

I found 8 of the 10 files on another site that were not compressed and had no copy protection so I'm able to create the inages and convert to AVI with Virtualdub. I have to extract the audio with my decompiler program to add to the AVI files.

The two files that I can't convert, I used SnagIt to copy those files to AVI from the original website.

Thanks for clearing up the version difference in your last post or I wouldn't have discovered this program. I have three programs on my computer with the same name. I guess I should uninstall the two that don't work.

[Ai Haibara]

Huh. I didn't know there were that many programs with the name.

My sister always just used Audacity to record the audio from the SWFs... I couldn't say whether or not that's the best option, though, as opposed to being able to decompile the audio directly.

[DarrellS]

Well, since Sothink SWF Decompiler costs so much, I might as well use it for something.