Capturing video and still images from video is much more difficult than capturing sound. Because of the multitude of configurations available on the market, the drivers always in development and the numerous bugs, a lot of incompatibilities and problems may appear. So, the video capture could not work all the time, and in some cases cause problems to the application, operating system and even the computer!

Some of the problems that may appear are (but are not limited to):

- Because of the implementation of DirectX, the video Overlay may not be available.

- The TV tuner/capture card could be incompatible with the video card.

- The initialization of capture device could take a long time, and in the meantime the computer may freeze.

-The overlay video may sometimes stay "on top" of all the other windows.

- If a capture driver is selected and the device is not available (e.g. a webcam) the computer may freeze.

In case of problems, shutting down the application is recommended. If there are more major problems, restarting Windows or even the computer may be necessary.

To access the video capture functions, click the "Capture" button (the one with the little video camera).

The combo box will contain the Video for Windows capture devices available in the system. Select the one you want to use.

After the selection the other options will change accordingly. Some devices have only video preview capabilities, other have both preview/overlay. Preview means that the images from the video stream are put on screen as normal Windows images. Overlay means that the video stream is "inserted" directly in the memory of the video card trough DirectX. This way, the overlay will show the stream exactly how it looks, while preview is much slower, depending on the speed of the video card. Anyway the preview has the advantage that works all the time.

Depending on the device, the Display Rate controls the number of frames per second (fps) that shows on preview. As long as this application captures only still images, you can specify whatever value you want. Small values consume less CPU power.

The Source, Format and Display buttons are device dependent and connect to the video device corresponding dialogs. Use them to control the device (image size, attributes etc.)

The video Image Size dispays the real size of the image; because the preview/overlay is automatically shrink when the dimension is larger than the video rectangle in the right. Those will be the dimensions of the captured image.

After click the Send button, an image will be captured and compress to jpeg. The Quality combo box specifies the compression rate. Bigger values mean better quality, but bigger images.

Select the TV channel and chose the appropriate size and attributes. The TV tuners usually have both preview/overlay.

Click the Send button to capture a frame from the TV show and send it.

Use the video in connector of the TV tuner (or a dedicated capture card) to connect with any video source with video out capabilities, such as a VCR, a video camera etc.

Be sure to follow the indication from the device documentation concerning the video standards.

Usually both preview/overlay are available.

Use the Send button to capture and send a frame. Opposite to the TV shows, if the image is not the desired one, rewind the tape and try again.

For a webcam to be used with this program it must have a Video for Windows compatible driver.

Use the webcam options to optimize it for best image quality (not for animation) and assure the necessary light conditions.

Some webcams even have a video in connector, so they can accept video streams from a VCR.

The webcams usually have only preview capabilities and the image size is limited.

The difference from other programs witch are transmitting images from webcam, is that by transmitting only still images, the dimensions could be maximum (when sending animated streams from a camera the image is usually very small).

Be careful what images select to capture. Do not take many captures very fast (wait a few seconds between captures). In time will get used with the speed of the devices and your computer.

Be sure to have the latest versions of the drivers. If the things go wrong, sometimes reinstalling the device software may help. Use the latest DirectX version.