What's the best way to capture a flash video?

[KiTo~chan]

I'd like to make a parody video of one of my favorite flash animations from Albinoblacksheep.com, but I don't know how to capture it so I can get started. Any advice? The sound is the most important part since I'm going to be replacing the video with mixed anime, so I'm open to audio only solutions as well.

[post-it]

.. use a Flash Video Downloader

[KiTo~chan]

I was more asking if there was a specific program that's recommended over others. you don't have to be smug

[post-it]

actually, I'm not being a snob. There are many flash down loaders and so-called recorders out on the web.

The problem is not that one is better than another; the problem is "what it is programmed to ignore" before
it starts to Capture -or- download it. Most pages have a bunch of HTML stuff in front of the file you want.
Next, some pages have "JAVA Locks" on those files ( requiring a pre-set code from the requestor page to be
sent before it can release the file. ) while others are waiting for the correct Buffer Size to be met and then
only sends you the size of the buffers limit every single time requested until the entire video has been sent.

Now, which file type are you asking about?

ps .. if you don't know, then join the crowd!

The only sure way of capturing it is to have a second computer, with a Video Capture Card, recording the Video-out
of the first Computer and then editing what it just captured in a Video Editor.

These are day's of Electronic Illusion and no one person knows all of the tricks all of the time.

[Qyot27]

SWF files are notoriously difficult to transcode well because they aren't traditional video files (rather, it's a scripted collection of elements and/or video and audio). I've used some in the past but can't remember their names to save my life. And, out of said offerings, the software is almost always proprietary and riddled with shady advertisements, design elements, or the threat of malware. I don't understand why there couldn't just be an open-source app that could take the output from Adobe's/Macromedia's own renderer and output it to a file.

However, if it's just audio you need, then it's a two-step process. This isn't guaranteed to work, as I don't know how much the SWF format has evolved since 2003, but:

Use UnlockSWF to remove the protection on the file and also remove the compression.

Then, you can use ffmpeg to extract the audio losslessly, like so (easiest to do on the command line, and also assuming it is an mp3 stream that's in there; it usually is, but you can never be too sure - ffmpeg will tell you what the format of the audio is if it can read the file, though):

Code: Select all

ffmpeg -i inputfile.swf -acodec copy -vn output.mp3

[Mister Hatt]

Downloading flash videos also depends on where you're getting them from. Flash video could also be actual flash video, or a stream connected to an actual mp4 file elsewhere, or various combinations. It really depends where you're trying to rip from on how you do it. For stuff you that you know is streamed from an AVC file somewhere, you can use WireShark to get the original file address if it's http or rtmp, but if it's shockwave video you would need to rip with various different methods depending on source.

Following on from what Qyot said, if the audio is MP3, you might have trouble using it in an NLE as a few are notoriously bad with VBR audio. Incidentally, a lot of shockwave video is pseduo-VFR and will give you issues as well.

[Cannonaire]

Hey KiTo! I was able to record the audio directly with audacity, so it shouldn't be a problem. I'll send you the file next time you're on.