Webcams - faking and capturing

As some of you know, I love working with webcams when I deal with lads. I routinely capture all webcam chats so that I never miss a single webcam trophy. I can also play back a webcam session as my own webcam, or use one of several "broken webcam" files I have. Today I'll explain how you can do the same with some freeware programs.

For capturing your lad's webcam you'll need AUTOSCREENCAPTURE FREE

To make a "virtual webcam" you'll need MANYCAM

For taking stills of your captured video, you'll need SIMPLYCAPTURE

As a codec I use Divx, but XVID will do just as well, plus it's free. This is to make sure your video file doesn't become huge if you manage to keep your lad on webcam for an hour or so. You don't have to use either codec if you don't want. You can just pick one that's already installed on your PC. You'll see that option later on in the tutorial

CAPTURING YOUR LAD'S WEBCAM

First up you need to configure Autoscreencapture. There's not much to play with. Just 2 pages. Firstly, create a folder on your hard drive using Windows Explorer where you want to save the videos to. I've called mine video, but you can call yours anything you like as long as you can easily find it after.

The from page

And the to page

Make sure yours looks the same as mine, with Divx or Xvid as the codec (or even the default codec - Windows media 1), rectangle area selected, show mouse pointer deselected and the folder you created earlier to save your work in chosen. And that's the first program set up. Now what you need is a lad to show you his webcam.

When he does, then click on the start button or press f9. Now when you move over windows you should see a multi coloured band around it showing you that's what will be captured. You can capture the entire webcam box like this

Or just the webcam image itself like this

Once you're happy with your choice, then left click to start recording. Once you have enough footage then press f10 to stop. A message telling you the file's been saved should pop up, along with Windows Media Player showing you the file you've just recorded.

MAKING YOUR OWN WEBCAM

Now it's time to use Manycam. You can go to the sources page and choose your webcam, but what fun would that be? What you need to do is choose Movies

Navigate to the folder you saved your lad's footage in earlier, and choose the file you want to use. Once you've picked one, you'll see it displayed

Go to the effects tab now, and click on text over video

Make sure that the "show ManyCam.com logo" option is unticked, or your lad will see it's name on the footage.

To further convince your lad that it really is your webcam, you can go to the time tab and add a clock to the image

What about faking up a broken webcam? The easiest way would be to choose "Blank image" as your source, but if you choose "still images" and have some Photoshop knowledge, I'm sure you can whip up a pretty convincing fake webcam image to use.

SETTING MANYCAM UP IN YAHOO MESSENGER

Open up Yahoo Messenger, then click on "Messenger" (top, left hand corner of Yahoo Messenger), then on "my webcam" You'll see this.

Click on File, then Preferences and you'll see this.

Click on "Camera Source", then select "Manycam Virtual Webcam". That should allow you to see the fake webcam in the window.

To show your lad your new "webcam", look at the top of the chat window and click on webcam.

Now your lad can see "you" or your broken webcam.

MAKING STILLS OF YOUR LAD'S WEBCAM FOR TROPHIES

To play your file, you can use any video player you want. When you get a part you want to save as a still image, pause the player and open SimplyCapture. It doesn't matter if SimplyCapture is covering the area you want to save. Left click on the small box inbetween "Capture Image" and "New" and a small menu should pop down for you.

Click on "Selected Area" and the program will vanish. Your mouse pointer should turn into a cross. Move it to one corner of the area you want to capture, press and hold down the left mouse button and move it to the other corner of the area. You should see a red dotted rectangle as you move the mouse pointer. Once you're at the other corner, let go of the mouse button and you'll hear a camera clicking noise. Then the program will pop back up with the image you captured in it.

Click on the "Save" button and choose where you want the image to be saved to. Now that you've captured an image, you can repeat the process with any other parts of the video you want. The files are .BMP which are larger than the .JPG files people usually post online, but when you upload them to a PHOTOBUCKET account, it'll automatically convert it for you and give you a link to post to show your trophy off using.

The finished product.

Have fun with your new tools. Remember that ManyCam will let you use it as the webcam source on multiple IM programs at once, so you're not just tied to the one if you want to look for lads elsewhere.

Some people have said they had problems using AutoScreenRecorder, so here's an alternative program you can use. It's called VIDSHOT CAPTURER

Once you've installed and run it, you'll see this screen.

The first thing to do is to name your video file. You'll have to do this for every file you save. Click on the button with three dots next to the Video File window, then choose a location and file name. It should look like this then.

Select "Window", then move your mouse pointer to "Select window". Press and hold down the left mouse button and move the pointer (a green + in a green square) to the window you want to capture. You'll see green corners appear on the windows as you move the pointer. Once it's on the webcam image you can leave go of the mouse button. It should look like this now.

Don't let any other window cover the webcam while you're recording it or it'll record that instead!

Click on the "Start" button to start recording your webcam footage. To stop it, you have to press the F9 button or click the Screen Recording tray icon on the right hand side of the taskbar. It'll then process the video and ask you if you want to see the finished result. If you installed Xvid, you might see a window like this.

If you do, you can close it down. Now you've saved your video file and can use it with ManyCam.