Recording a VNC session

[Theis]

Hi Jim

I have already done this (2 years ago) with a cheap software named "snagit"
able to capture all screen in an AVI file at 2 frames per seconds which is
very sufficient for a powerpoint presentation.
This powerpoint presentation was then broadcasted by VNC , the asssociated
sound was also recorded by snagit as it was transmitted by a
videoconferencing software ( "VRVS" )running on the same PC.
The trick to get the sound received (with any software) and recorded at the
same time by snagit consists in having installed 2 sound cards (I.E the
sound card of the mother board plus a SB 128), the first sound card is
associated with the videoconferencing software to receive sound ; its
line-out is connected on the line-in of the second sound-card.
The second sound card is associated with snagit to record.
This is tricky but works perfectly (win 98 on a 500Mhz).
After this you can use "virtual dub" which is a freeware able to convert
your video file  into any other video file format , including sound format
conversion .
I have then converted the original AVI file into Divx for video and mp3 for
the sound.
The result is approximately 1Mbyte/minute , and we cannot see any
compression effect on the slides (which is strange...) this means that you
can keep more than 10 hours of conference on a CDrom ...
I am sure than we can do better now.

The drawback of snagit is that it creates an intermediate file which is
processed when the recording session is finished , the processing can be
long.... and risky if you didn't manage enough room on your disk
Have also a look at Camtasia which is the big brother of snagit and has much
more capabilities.
You can download an evaluation version which is fully functionnal.

Trick : always make video capture ( with any software ) in a separate ,
empty and dedicated partition that you can format if necessary , because
when a capture crashes you can spoil your file system , and also because
when you capture on a blank partition work is much more easy and fast for
your PC as it can write cooly and sequentially on the disk.

Hope this could help

Jean-Marie Theis

....


=================================
Jean-Marie Theis
Association EURATOM-CEA sur la Fusion
DRFC/STEP
Bt. 506
13108 Saint-Paul-Lez-Durance Cedex, France

Tel. (phone) : + 33 (0) 4 42 25 77 21
Fax : + 33 (0) 4 42 25 26 61
Email : jean-marie.theis@cea.fr
=================================



> -----Message d'origine-----
> De : vnc-list-admin@realvnc.com
> [mailto:vnc-list-admin@realvnc.com]De la
> part de Jim Rowland
> Envoye : mercredi 3 septembre 2003 16:29
> A : vnc-list@realvnc.com
> Objet : Recording a VNC session
>
>
> Has anyone recorded a VNC session for playback say in training? Anyone
> know of a good third party software that captures a VNC session as a
> MPEG or an AVI?
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