HOW TO CREATE A 6.8
MEGAPIXEL SCREEN CAPTURE
aka

Ripping the 20K DVD




By Captain No Name


I do not agree with the law that the MPAA pushed thru congress making it illegal to even posses the means to remove copy protection from DVDs, but nobody wants a fight with them either. Below are instructions on how capture images off the 20K DVD and have them look as beautiful as the one above. The law states that it is illegal to sell images from a copyrighted source but it's not illegal to use screen grabs for personal use.

The MPAA has sued web sites that had tools available for download. This is why I did not include a web site for the ripper. Folks should do their own search for a ripper at their own risk. The only illegality I know of is that possession of copy protection removal tools may be illegal, depending on how you read the law. For an interesting read on the whole mess go here.

Text for the steps to use are included below but as you can see there are a number of them. To view the entire instructions in Adobe PDF format with step by step screen shot examples, click here.




1. SEARCH THE INTERNET FOR THE FOLLOWING PROGRAMS:

SMARTRIPPER or any other DVD ripper
AVISYNTH http://avisynth.org/
VIRTUALDUB http://virtualdub.org/index
VIRTUAL DUB FILTERS http://neuron2.net/ (for Donald Graft hue/sat/int filter)
MPEG DECODER http://nic.dnsalias.com/MPEGDecoder.html

2. INSTALL THE VARIOUS PROGRAMS AND BECOME FAMILIAR WITH THEIR USE.

3. RIP THE 20K DVD INTO IT’S VOB FILES.

4. WRITE THE AVISYNTH “AVS FILE” IN NOTEPAD FOR VIRTUALDUB UTILIZING MPEGDECODER.

EXAMPLE LoadPlugin ("c:\20k_leagues\20k_dvd\chapters\MPEGdecoder.dll") mpegsource ("c:\20k_leagues\20k_dvd\chapters\chapter_3.vob") BicubicResize (800,480,0,0.75) (WinDVD does a screen capture at 800x480, so I resize to 800x480; I ripped the vob files by individual chapters and then renamed them by chapter.)

5. START VIRTUALDUB AND OPEN THE AVS FILE.

6. UNDER VIDEO-FILTERS- ADD THE FOLLOWING FILTERS:

A: null transform to crop off the black bands top and bottom.
B: resize to 4000x1702 for a proper 2.35:1 aspect ratio.
C: levels filter to brighten darker parts.
D: hue/sat/intensity(by Donald Graft) to brighten and intensify colors.

7. UNDER VIDEO - COPY OUTPUT FRAME TO CLIPBOARD.

8. PASTE AS A NEW IMAGE IN PAINT SHOP PRO 9.

9. USE “ONE STEP PHOTO FIX” TO FURTHER BRIGHTEN AND ENHANCE PICTURE. THIS DESTROYS SOME OF THE FINER DETAIL, BUT IS QUICKER THAN PLAYING WITH THE MULTIPLE FILTERS AND EFFECTS AVAILABLE.

10. NAME AND SAVE FILE AFTER TWEAKING IT.

A: null transform to crop off the black bands top and bottom.

THIS PRODUCES A FILE SIZE OF 800x335 FOR AN ASPECT RATIO OF 2.388:1
THE PICTURE LOOKS A LITTLE SQUISHED AT TIMES SO I RESIZE FOR A “STANDARD” ASPECT RATIO OF 2.35:1.
DON’T KNOW WHAT HAPPENED TO THE ADVERTISED RATIO OF 2.55:1 ?
THE PICTURE HAS BEEN CROPPED ON BOTH SIDES - SHOULD BE 855x335
VARIOUS SCENES IN THE TRAILER AND “MAKING OF” DOCUMENTARY CLEARLY SHOW MUCH MORE PICTURE ON BOTH SIDES.

B: resize to 4000x1702 for a proper 2.35:1 aspect ratio.
C: levels filter to brighten darker parts.
D: hue/sat/intensity(by Donald Graft) to brighten and intensify colors.

11. UNDER VIDEO - COPY OUTPUT FRAME TO CLIPBOARD.

12. PASTE AS A NEW IMAGE IN PAINT SHOP PRO 9.

13. USE “ONE STEP PHOTO FIX” TO FURTHER BRIGHTEN AND ENHANCE PICTURE.

THIS DESTROYS SOME OF THE FINER DETAIL, BUT IS QUICKER THAN PLAYING WITH THE MULTIPLE FILTERS AND EFFECTS AVAILABLE.

14. NAME AND SAVE FILE AFTER TWEAKING IT.

Note: 4000X1702=6808000 PIXELS = 6.8MP