Filming a Monitor without flicker? How do you?

[phase52001]

I'd like to film my monitor so I can make a simple "how to" video for an elderly friend. (He can watch and follow along on his Mac).

Of course I have the flicker problem due to the refresh rate of the monitor and the frame rate on the video camera.

Can anyone suggest a way to reduce or stop the flicker?

I've tried various settings on my camcorder and tried using a program called "Screen Record"; which worked but which was very slow on my 867, and didn't prodcue the results I was after.

Many Thanks.

[edDV]

There are probably screen recording programs for the Mac like the ones for the PC.

If you use a NTSC video camera, slow your display refresh to 60 Hz (frames per second). It won't be perfect but the lines will move much slower with less flicker.

[mhar4]

Yes, slow the refresh rate of the monitor and see if you can find a setting on the camcorder which gives you a longer shutter speed. It depends very much on the specific model how much control you have. You might get some acceptable results.

Another option would be if your computer has a composite or S-video out. Then you could record the output onto a VCR. This would certainly look much better than trying to video a monitor, although I suspect it would still look startlingly bad.

[havema-1]

I believe a LCD screen flickers less or doesn't flicker at all to a video camcorder.

Snapz Pro should be a good app to grab video from the while screen or from a selected spot (AFAIR this could be a permanent spot on a screen or it could follow the pointer).

Feeding analog-out to a camcorder has also been mentioned. You should then adjust the screen to PAL/NTSC resolution for best results.

[lordsmurf]

Kinescope!

[handyguy]

"I believe a LCD screen flickers less or doesn't flicker at all to a video camcorder. "

Do you want to try that one?

[lordsmurf]

Re-reading the original post, something I have done before is output my ATI AIW card to the tv and record to VHS.

Just use a large res (640x480) so everything can be read, none of that small stuff (1024x768, etc).

[frankiec]

http://www.geektimes.com/michael/tech/computing/hardware/concepts/flicker.html