How I Download Flash Videos

Here's how I download Flash video. I'll use YouTube as an example, but I've found that the method works on other flash video, but not by any means all online video.

1. Start playing the movie in Safari.
2. Open the Activity Window in Safari. It's under the Window menu.
3. Find the movie in the Activity window. The Activity window lists a lot of things, like all the graphics on the webpage (and for all open pages.) But I usually find movies because they are the largest--in the MB's not KB's. Also the movies size is usually changing--as long as the movie is downloading.

In the image below, the movie is the file 3rd item from the bottom whose name starts with v6.cache.googlevideo.


4. Select the movie file in the activity window and copy it. This will copy the location of the video.

5. Open a new browser window and paste the movie's location in the address field.

6. Safari starts downloading the video. Download window should automatically open.

7. Wait for the video to finish downloading. Then find the video file. The magnifying glass next to the file in the Download window will take you to it. In OS.10.4 it's probably on the desktop. In OS 10.5, it's probably in the Downloads folder.

8. Rename the file to add the .flv suffix if it doesn't already have the .flv suffix, e.g., get_video.flv. You might as well add a descriptive title too while you are at it.

Now to work with flash video on the Mac, I use the free Perian plug-in. It lets QuickTime recognize the file, so that you can use it in Final Cut Pro or any app that uses QuickTime.

YouTube now has better quality video available on some videos. Check to see if the video you want is in better quality before downloading. If there is higher quality video, then you'll see the link below the movie "watch in high quality."


Click on that link and then follow the instructions above to get a much better looking video from YouTube.

Earlier this summer I posted a link to a post from Final Cut User that recommends transcoding the flash to something that FCP is used to working with, like the DV codec. I haven't had any problems working with Flash video, but it could speed up your workflow if you don't have to render the movies in the timeline.

Summer Blogwad

I'm just dumping some interesting links here to check out.

Digital Rebellion: Recommended QuickTime and Mac OS configurations for Final Cut Pro
A list of recommended combos of FCP, Quicktime, and OS versions. Let's just call this why not to update your systems unless you absolutely need to. On the other hand, it sucks being caught in FCP 5.1.4 world while everyone else has moved on. That's more of a money issue than a technology issue though.

Digital Rebellion: List of QuickTime downloads
A continuation of the theme of don't upgrade if you don't have to. If you have to upgrade but it's not to the latest and (ahem) greatest, then this page will help you find the appropriate upgarde for QuickTime. Similarly, the LAFCUP has a wiki page on Quicktime updates.

Little Frog in High Def: APPLE PRO APPS UPDATE 2008-02
Good advice on downloading all updates to Final Cut Pro even if you don't intend to upgrade. The reason is that Apple doesn't make old updates available for FCP (unlike QuickTime). There are situations where you might want to upgrade but not to the latest version--if you don't have the update then Apple isn't going to help you. You can download updates through Apple's Final Cut Pro page--you don't have to upgrade through the Software Update control panel.

Final Cut User: Using FLVs in Final Cut Pro
Some good tips on using video downloaded from the web from sites like YouTube. I didn't know about using the QuickTime wrapper to help the editing of FLV's--sound like a helpful tip.

"Ten Tips For A Better Final Cut Pro Experience"
This is a good read. An experienced editor wrote down 10 good tips. Good write-up on media management. Also some interesting tips on multicam, amongst a number of other good ideas.

kenstone.net: Color Workflows With Different Types of Sources
By Andrew Balis
Want to work in Color? This seems like a good guide for getting footage in and out for your next go as a colourist.

Overview Video on Sony EX3
I don't think I've talked about the Sony EX3 because I think the MSRP was over $10K and that's my cut-off point for talking about cameras. But it lists for under $10K, and it looks like a good upgrade to the Sony EX1. I've been hearing about and seeing folks use the EX1. Seems like the XDCAM format on SxS memory cards could take off.

ProLost: On Clipping, Part 1
Very tech-y. But interesting to get a theoretical understanding of how video works. Folks interested in Red should read. It helped me understand why there is more grain in dark areas of video than in light areas. Also discusses important differences in how film and video represent light.

ProLost: Go Naked pt. 2
A good example of the guerrilla filmmaking model as described in Stu Maschwitz's "The DV's Rebel Guide." More interesting to me is that Vimeo not only streams HD, but allows downloads too of Quicktime movies (the film shown is downloadable at 1280x720). You can upload up to 500MB per week to Vimeo. An interesting way to share footage encoded in h.264--nice that it allows both streaming and downloading.

stockfootageforfree.com
Not awesome but could help in a pinch. I did about 10 searches on foreign countries, and the only video I got was touristy stuff from Cancun. Some OK shots of D.C., SF, and NYC. [via freshdv.com]

Streaming Video: Quality Comparison and Trends

There's a pair of interesting articles about streaming video at Digital Content Producer:
Encoding Best Practices, Part 1
Encoding Best Practices, Part 2

Part 1 is a report based on samples of what kind of streaming video is out there on the web. It's not a huge sample, but he does look at about 20 sites from broadcast video. So that's a good comparison for Link. Flash and Windows Media far outpace any competitors, like Quicktime and Real. One trend in streaming is growing bandwith and image resolution. Most broadcasters were streaming at a frame size of 460x325 and at a data rate of 500 kbps. Lots of good charts showing trends on this as well as frame rate and audio bit rate.

Part 2 is a quality comparison of h.264, on2 vp6, and VC-1 (Windows codec.) VC-1 gets the lowest marks. Both articles are interesting reads. I found them over at FreshDV.

Adobe--Photoshop and Future Technologies

PHOTOSHOP FOR VIDEO
With Photoshop CS3 Extended, you can now bring in video to Photoshop. Why would you want to do that you ask? What about After Effects? What about Color? Well I just came across a cool site/podcast that gives you a number of interesting ideas about how to harness Photoshop to make your video better.

Here's a video from the Photoshop for Video site that shows you how to use the Shadows-Highlights command on video. I recently used the shadows and highlights command in iPhoto to save some snapshots, and I was thinking "if I can do this on software that's practically free, why can't I do this in Final Cut Pro?". Well I still don't know how to do it with FCP, but I could correct my video this way with the latest & greatest version of Photoshop.


Back to the issue about Color. I haven't used it yet and frankly I'm not thrilled about learning a new interface. Now I have the option of harnessing my knowledge of Photoshop to do some cool tweaking. Also, for you folks who don't know Photoshop, I think this website/podcast is good way to pick up knowledge about the best image editing application out there.

Here are some other cool videos from Photoshop for Video at Adobe TV that I recommend:
Spot Color Grading
Making Alpha Channels for Logos (I do this lots)

So this appears to be regularly updated via a podcast--good way to use podcast subscription to do some regular learning if you're interested in Photoshop. Oh, video in Photoshop only just got added to the Extended verison of the latest Photoshop. But not everything on this site is about this feature, good stuff that can be done in older versions of Photoshop is available too (e.g., the alpha channels for logos movie.)

ADOBE'S FUTURE TECHNOLOGIES
While on the topic of Adobe, there's another interesting video from NAB where Adobe talks about some future technologies. The most interesting one for me is what they call "End to End Metadata". In particular, they were demoing speech recognition that generates transcripts for movies. Then that transcript can be leveraged in editing (Premiere Pro) and in delivery to the web (Flash video.)

Avid has already deployed some of these tools with their Script Sync, which I wrote about on this post. Basically you can hop around in the text of a script or transcript, and the software know where people are saying that bit of dialogue. But I like how Adobe takes it another step further by allowing delivery of the text too--think subtitles, think closed captioning, think searchable text on the web.

I don't know about the voice recognition engine creating automatic transcriptions. I can't believe voice recognition is that good--on the other hand, I'm sure our government is spending billions on voice recognition software so that they can monitor everyone's phone calls. Eventually that technology will filter down to us mere mortals--just another great benefit brought to us by the Bush Administration.

Here's the outline of the Adobe technology presentation if you are interested in any of the other stuff:
1. Cinema DNG
2. End to End Metadata
3. Mobile Delivery
4. Interactivity without scripting

So I found out about these video over at Pro Video Coalition, which is turning into my main source for video news.

MPEG Streamclip Review

Here's a gushing review of the free MPEG Streamclip. I haven't used MPEG Streamclip in a while. This article recommends it for converting DVD's to DV but I never got that to work with interlaced footage. Maybe I should try again with the newest version. Mentions that it does a good job transcoding Flash videos and also includes some iPod presets for h.264 encoding. The article talks about how to edit with MPEG Streamclip. I also wrote about this a while back in this post.

UPDATE: A second post goes into a lot of basic how-to's for all kind of copying and trans-codings for DVD's and Flash movies. Includes a "Mac All-Star Video Software Links".

Real video helps with saving videos

Real video seems to have fallen fatally behind in the video streaming arena, now that Flash has emerged as the dominant streaming video format and the powerhouses of Apple and Windows stay strong with their online media presence. But it sounds like Real is putting some interesting features into a new version of their player. They are making it very easy for users to download and save videos in a variety of formats (Flash, Windows Media, Quicktime, and, of course, Real.) They are also offering some features to burn video to discs for playback in DVD players. Read about this over at hardmac.com.

TubeTV--Save and Convert Online Flash Movies

This looks like a handy app. It is is for downloading and converting videos from YouTube and Google Video. Has a built-in little browser where you search and navigate to the movies that you want. It will handle conversion to H.264 for your Apple TV or iPod. It says that Macs need the Perian Quicktime Component to watch FLV movies in QuickTime.

I've written about keepvid.com before here. It's a website that helps with downloading flash fiiles from a bunch of websites.