Does anyone know how I can easily capture a screen shot from a .mpeg file and save it as a picture file (jpeg, bmp, whatever).

Cutting a boring long story short , you need a screen capture program that supports overlay , if you go to www.videohelp.com and search for Windows Media Player Classic , this installs a media player that if you go to the menus , can capture a picture from an mpg or any other video .

Windows Media Player Classic , does depend on you hitting the pause button at the right time though .

just click the "print screen" (print scrn) key on the keyboard, then open an image-software, type in the resolution of your screen and press ctrl+v

then you should have the screenshot in that image file, then save it as you usually do with other pictures. ;)

just click the "print screen" (print scrn) key on the keyboard, then open an image-software, type in the resolution of your screen and press ctrl+v

then you should have the screenshot in that image file, then save it as you usually do with other pictures. ;)

When you play back a video file on a PC it uses overlay , which is like a video screen over the top of your windows screen , "Print Screen" doesnt capture overlayed video , it captures a black screen , image capture needs programs screen capture programs that support overlay .

deleted double post -> doh doh and triple doh :D

deleted triple post , how the hell did I do it ? I dont know , I didnt even press post , doh and doh again

^Heard you the first time^ ;)

sorry I pressed a button and it came up thrice somehow

thanks for the reccomendations! i shall give it a shot now.

 

the print screen thing was the first thing i tried and ran into the whole problem of it not really working.

The other program is "VirtualDub MpG2" available here - http://fcchandler.home.comcast.net/stable/index.html , unzip the program to a folder and -

1.use it to load the MpG of your choice , you`ll see it load

2.scroll through the video with the scroll bar until you get to where you want to save a picture/frame - use the cursor left and right keys to inch through the frames one by one for an exact frame

3.go to the Video menu and select the option to "Copy Source Frame To Clipboard" , this will save the left hand picture to the clipboard .

4.start up your paint program and select Paste to insert your picture

 

VirtualDub is a very powerful video editing program but for your purpose it will save your pics , allowing you to accurately select which frame/picture you want .