Video Screen Saver

Introduction

This is a small screen saver I wrote which will randomly pick video clips from a folder on your PC. I was after something like this a while ago and could only find programs you have to pay for; I then realised you could embed Microsoft Media Player as an ActiveX control and could control it using some simple calls.

Installation

To install this on your PC download the ZIP file and extract the file into your Windows folder (e.g. c:\winnt\). It’ll magically appear in the Screen Savers list in the Display Applet (right-click on your desktop and select Properties). From there, select ‘Video Screen Saver’ and press Properties to configure its settings.

Download (for Windows 9x/200x/XP)

Click here to download (8k).
VB6 Runtimes for anyone who doesn’t already have them installed

If you find it useful, a small donation via PayPal (no matter how small) would really make my day.

Extracting Video from DVDs

Getting the video clips to use is a bit more involved. If you’re interested in Digital Video then take a look at the section on my homepage. The method I used was as follows:

1) Get a DVD (of non-copyright material of course!) and find the title + chapter numbers you want to extract. PowerDVD will do the job.

2) Next, use a utility such as SmartRipper to extract the chapters into VOB files

3) Take the VOB files and load them into FlaskMPEG. Export them to an AVI file at a decent resolution

4) Load the AVI files into an editing suite such as Adobe Premier and cut the scenes down to only include what you want in the final clip. Export the edited clip into MPEG1 format, but keep the resolution high

5) Use TMPGEnc to remove the soundtrack (unless you really want to annoy people!) and re-encode to a resolution that suits the spec of your PC

Legal

Disclaimer : A user of this software acknowledges that he or she is receiving this software on an “as is” basis and the user is not relying on the accuracy or functionality of the software for any purpose. The user further acknowledges that any use of this software will be at the user’s own risk and the copyright owner accepts no responsibility whatsoever arising from the use or application of the software.