General Mac software discussions forum: How To Take Screen Captures In Apple's DVD Player?

software you are using.
Are you using Grab or are you using the OS X keyboard to capture the screen?

Just tried it with Grab and it works perfectly

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I've always used the software SnapNDrag or EasyCrop for my DVD captures with no problems. I have not been able to find the Grab feature on my Mac OS X Pro and never cared for it anyway, I want more control of my DVD captures than it allows. Any software that can take care of this? Thank you.

try deleting the SnapNDrag preference file which you will find in your Library > Preferences folder.

It's called SnapNDrag.plist Drag it onto the desktop and launch SnapNdrag .

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I did what you said mrmacfixit and still no luck, thank you though. I appreciate you trying to help.

I was trying to use GRAB to select the menu from a DVD in DVD Player, and I also got the dreaded checkerboard. Is SnapNDrag part of the OS? I see GRAB in Applications but not SnapNDrag.

you will have to download it

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MrMac,

I downloaded SnapNDrag from the CNET site and it's everything the default GRAB program should have been.

Thanks,
Dan

Still get a checkerboard when I take a screen capture in Apple's DVD Player no matter how I do it. Is there a screen capture app that will take screen captures while using Apple's DVD Player? Help, this is driving me crazy. Thanks.

SnapNDrag does only capture a checkerboard from DVD Player. Odd, I believe the old keystroke screen capture method would capture a DVD image, but it would also capture everything else. I wonder if the image from DVD Player isn't in the layer of image pixels that are in the screen content were SnapNDrag or GRAB can't see it. But for everything else, SnapNDrag works better than GRAB.

I did a Google search for "DVD Player Screen Capture" and found this on Random Tech. I haven't tried it yet.

<div>To Take a Screenshot of DVD Player in
OS X </div>Ever since OSX came out, Apple made sure that it would not be possible to take a screenshot ofa DVD. When DVD Player is open, you can't capture the screen with Grab. Command-Shift-3 and Command-Shift-4 both do not work when DVD Player is open. This makes no sense at all. If you own the DVD, you should have ever right to do whatever you want with it. But that's another story. However, Apple forgot one thing...

1) Put your DVD in your computer and open DVD Player. Go to Video->Maximize Size, or hit Command-3. Fast Forward to the frame you want to capture, or select the scene to start at.
2) Open the Terminal (Applications -> Utilities -> Terminal). Type this, or copy / paste it right in the Terminal:

screencapture -i -/Desktop/dvd.png

Your mouse should turn into crosshairs. Now hit the space bar. Your mouse should now be a camera. Click he window the DVD is playing in. A file called "dvd.png" will appear on your desktop. <div>
</div>

I just tried using Terminal. My mouse pointer did turn into crosshairs, then a camera after pressing the space bar, but the DVD.png image that was saved still had the checkerboard. Geez, I wish I still had the old OS in my old Mac.

I will try this later tonight. This apparently works:

Simply use a different DVDplayer app:
VLC http://www.videolan.org/

Hey Dan, I also read that article about Apple making it impossible to take screen captures in the DVD Player. I was going to ask if anyone knew of a free app that will play my DVD's, so thank you for all the info and help. I'll download VLC and give it a try. I've actually wanted to try this app before but did not think I had a use for it. Hopefully it will work. Thanks again.

Screen caps for high speed video is not something authors of software break on purpose. The reasons I'll give are simplified since I must type it in.

Most apps write to some frame buffer that the OS maintains and this is where the capture gets a copy from. Why this is, is left to a discussion about operating systems and more.

In the case of high speed video where any lag will have the users screaming about lip sync or such the makers give us a direct path to the video display system.

I hope this is enough explanation why it was not broke on purpose.
Bob

bob,
That explanation makes perfect technical sense. But it would have been nice if there was a way, when a perfect picture/audio/sync wasn't needed, to be able to simply take a screen grab. My old iMac was able to do it and it came in handy when I needed to capture and print an image of a WWII Douglas Dive Bomber for my kid's school report and the only image was available from a DVD. Thankfully there are people who develop alternate programs that work. Take for instance when I upgraded to Snow Leopard on my Mac and my scanners and printers didn't work. Ooops. Was Apple able to help? No. Were the scanner/printer companies able to help? No. But third-party companies wrote programs that allowed the devices to be recognized again.

You are my hero! I am creating storyboards for a tv spot I'm concepting and have tried all the snap and capture plugs to no avail. I thought I would have to go back to my client with my tail in hand apologizing for not having storyboards, but this saved my hide! Thank you so much!!!

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