capturing dvd footage

[Damian1904]

hi folks

this is going to seem like a strange question but i will try and explain. I have software on my laptop that enables video capture from an external device such as a camcorder. The software is great, basically it plays the footage in a capture window and all i do is press a record button and it captures the segment I am after that I can then use in a movie maker package.

What I need to do is capture highlight footage from a DVD in the fashion described above. i.e. I need to make a highlights package of a football game and grab certain parts of the game. I have tried a whole heap of software that edits video files but most delete the captured footage rather than saving it as separate chunks that I can then manipulate using a movie maker software. I can't use the laptop DVD player to play the DVD in the preferred capture window as i described above because it is looking for an external device.

Is there any hardware / software that I can get that will enable me to plug in an external DVD player into my laptop and hopefully then just play the DVD and I can then edit it using the simple approach above. I have noticed some TV capture devices that include the RCA ports that may be an option.

Thanks, I hope this makes sense and any assistance would be really appreciated.

[guns1inger]

There are, but why can't use just use something like Virtualdubmpeg2 to find the segments you want, then encode them to something WMM likes - DV avi using the Panasonic DV codec would be the most compatible. Assuming the discs are not protected, you can load the vobs straight from the DVD drive.

If you go down the analogue route (RCA cables etc) then you are throwing away a generation just because of the connection.

[Damian1904]

thanks

i will check it out tonight, however from a quick look it appears that i will have the same issue as what i do with other editing packages in that I can mark a section / segment (using the mark in and mark out function) but it is then cut or deleted not retained for use in movie maker? Excuse my ignorance, and I may be wrong but is that the case?


As an example, I want to manually watch the footage and then 'grab' for example a player kicking the ball and a few moments later i might need to 'grab' a goal and then use the files using yes somehting like WMM. It's simiar i guess to wanting to keep the ads in a movie rather than deleting them out. maybe I am really missing something!

Any further advice would be appreciated

thanks again

[guns1inger]

If you select a start and end point, then go file->save as, you will save the selected segment. make sure you are running the latest version though.