Capturing Video

The first step in video analysis is capturing video. When you capture video, you are simply putting your video clip on the computer.  You can capture or transfer it from videotape or from the camera directly videoing a performer.  Video capture happens within the VIS software - you don't have to start up another program to capture your video and then transfer it to VIS.

Here's how it works.  First you must have a computer that lets you plug a camcorder or other video signal into it and have the picture play on the screen.    Once you can play your camcorder on your computer, then VIS takes that video clip and lets you begin to work with it.  Simply click on the video camera button and you will see your video playing in a window in VIS.

When video is playing through the computer, VIS is always storing several seconds of what has just played.  You simply decide on how much footage you want and when you want to trigger VIS to capture it.  For instance, on a golf swing, you might decide to use impact as the trigger and tell VIS to capture 2 seconds before the trigger and 1 second after.  As the performer swings, you simply trigger by hitting the Enter key on your computer.  When you hit Enter, 3 seconds of the golf swing is transferred.  In another context, baseball pitching, you might decide to trigger at the end of the pitch and set-up VIS to capture 3 seconds before and 1 second after.  Although a pitch certainly doesn't take 4 seconds, you can easily allow for an inexact trigger by always capturing a little more at both the start and the end of the motion because VIS allows you to easily clip off any extra video footage.

VIS allows you to capture as many video clips as you need.  You just keep triggering the software to capture as the video plays.  Each clip is moved into VIS for you to use as needed.  You can also configure VIS to be triggered off of a sound such as a ball strike, the pop of a ball into a mitt, or a shot putter's grunt.

Want to see some captured footage?  It's short because downloading a movie clip would be painfully slow over the Internet, but will give you an idea of what we mean by your video playing on the computer.

Download a portion of a video clip (but be patient...)