Video capture should be built into LFS. For example, you could have it be captured so that every frame is near perfect. So, instead of having to use fraps to record at the same rate at which it plays, we could have LFS save the frames to any installed codec, and have it record at 1-5 FPS (judging by options), and play at whatever framerate you like. Then our videos wouldn't come out choppy on lower-performance computers.

It'd be nice if it were like halflife, /startmovie <moviename> <fps>, saved to .bmp's in the game directory. , fraps is fine tho

Quote from wheel4hummer :

Video capture .. built into LFS. LFS save each frame as an uncompressed AVI

+1

Quote from bahrain :

/startmovie <moviename> <fps>, saved to .bmp's in the game directory

-1

+1 for built-in capture :up:
I hardly ever save replays precisely because I can't edit them in-game and saving entire races or hotlap sessions just for one lap/incident really eats the HDD space. Any race-sim worth its salt should have an in-game replay edit function imho. Even nKPro, with all its teething troubles, has in-game replay editing. Having said that I do think LFS is worth its salt and is still a WIP...who knows what lies in the future...

I'd also like to be able to view replays online without having to leave the server. That would enable people to view incidents straight away and has obvious implications for leagues, votebans etc.

+1 for in game capture
+2 for codec use i suggest mjpeg with file splitting @ 2gb file size.
+3 for audio output too (so that audio/video match when replayed @ 50fps for example)

regards

Quote from micha1980de :

+2 for codec use i suggest mjpeg with file splitting @ 2gb file size.

-1, MJPEG is a lossy format even at 100% quality, very cpu-heavy and there's no single mjpeg standard.

Quote from micha1980de :

+3 for audio output

+1

+1 I guess, I've been trying to do some clips lately, could make this more easy and better.

And once again, what needs work is the replay system. I just had an idea. If you could set a fast forward timer. You would set a clock to certain time and it would rewind the replay to that with 32x speed for example, what is hard to fallow manually because it gets laggy and then it would pause the replay when it get to that certain time you set. That would do things much more easy, I for example have a replay of 4H of Aston and I would like to record a funny incident which happened on lap 69. Thats in the half way of the race, and getting there with fastforward takes ages, and there is good change you will miss it. Or you hit accidently ESC and you are ruined, it should be availabe to use all option menus while on replays too, you could change that custom view for example. I could suggest to have rewind but I know it may not be possible because the LFS physics engine.

Dumping screens has always produced the best looking movies for me. I remember in GP4 fraps worked ok but to get the smoothest movie you would put a weight on the screenshot button

Blackout, excellent ideas. You could watch the replays taking note of times where you want to record down on paper or something, slap a bunch of "time stops" in there, and possibly only have to play the mpr through once more to get the footage you want.

Also, the esc menu is VERY much needed during mpr playback.

Quote from wheel4hummer :

...we could have LFS save each frame as an uncompressed AVI...

Why is saving each frame as an avi file any good? Why not just save the whole movie, i don't know, 5 minutes long?

Quote from Primoz :

Why is saving each frame as an avi file any good? Why not just save the whole movie, i don't know, 5 minutes long?

I'd guess that's what he meant, replace "as" with "to".

Quote from filur :

I'd guess that's what he meant, replace "as" with "to".

Yes, that is correct. I made a mistake, and you are pretty much correct. I kind of wrote it in an odd way. If anyone has ever played RACER, then I would like something almost exactly how racer has it.

with .bmps exported you could have lossless quality ~_~

At 1024x768, I would also have around 3 mb per bmp. At 30 frames per second, that would be 90 mb per second. At 5 minute videos, that would be 27 gb per video. Figuring a "good" video probably starts with a selection of 15 minutes or more of footage. That would be 81 gb of raw footage to create your 5 minute video. That also exceeds many peoples available harddrive space.

Am I missing something with this concept? I've never heard of anything capturing bmp's for video creation.

Quote from bahrain :

with .bmps exported you could have lossless quality ~_~

Uncompressed avi equals lossless quality without stitching 14,000 BMP's together.

Scawen has better things to do, even though it would be nice

-1 Can't people just play it at 1/2 speed for fraps then double the speed in video editing software. As Scawen was quoted saying LFS is a racing simulator, not a screenshot generator.

i'd just like 1.250 speed...would look more real imo...

Quote from filur :

Uncompressed avi equals lossless quality without stitching 14,000 BMP's together.

and more important, an uncompressed avi with Avisinth can be transparently redirected on the fly to whatever codec app you may need, es. virtualdub, nandub, premiere, xvid, divx, x264, vp6, etc.

Quote from Taavi(EST) :

i'd just like 1.250 speed...would look more real imo...

No I hope not it really pisses me off when they speed up real racing shots without telling you and see no reason why it would be any different in LFS.

Quote from Hankstar :

+1 for built-in capture :up:
I hardly ever save replays precisely because I can't edit them in-game and saving entire races or hotlap sessions just for one lap/incident really eats the HDD space. Any race-sim worth its salt should have an in-game replay edit function imho. Even nKPro, with all its teething troubles, has in-game replay editing. Having said that I do think LFS is worth its salt and is still a WIP...who knows what lies in the future...

I'd also like to be able to view replays online without having to leave the server. That would enable people to view incidents straight away and has obvious implications for leagues, votebans etc.

+1 to all that!

Quote from ajp71 :

-1 Can't people just play it at 1/2 speed for fraps then double the speed in video editing software. As Scawen was quoted saying LFS is a racing simulator, not a screenshot generator.

But, the more videos that are created, the more people will hear about LFS. I believe its called viral advertising. All you have to do is make it easy for people to make videos, and then more people will probaly hear about LFS.

Quote from wheel4hummer :

But, the more videos that are created, the more people will hear about LFS. I believe its called viral advertising. All you have to do is make it easy for people to make videos, and then more people will probaly hear about LFS.

thats how i found Live For Speed, I was searching for motor racing videos and found a short video someone made of some racing and thought, hey, whats this game, got the demo straight away.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viral_marketing


EDIT: Hmm... Capturing at half speed and then changing the framerate later actually isnt all that much more difficult! Check out this little mini-video I made!

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4391294465352754535

@filur

well you're right but do me a favor and buy me a bigger harddisc for uncompressed vid.
besides most videos have block-artifacts even these from hollywood productions, not to mention the self-produced...
so for me it's a good trade-off between quality and recording speed when it comes to capturing.
well if it's 768*576 (pal) then my old 733Mhz comp manages it at about 60-85% cpuload...
Anyways the load will be there but what's better?
disc load, while writing about 24-43mb/s or
Cpu load, while writing about 12-22mb/s (@ 20 quality [0,0]) or
Cpu load, while writing about 7-11mb/s (@ 19 quality [10,10]) ?

now imagine what will happen whe you set the resolution higher...

happy screen-shot-cinema...

regards