Video Rec Software Suggestions & Alternatives

[Daunt]

What does everyone use to record their gaming adventures?

I've used fraps merely since it seems to be the popular choice but I've had some problems with it before and I don't understand why, so I'd like to try something else.

I get serious stuttering at random times and chunks of my videos get turned into slideshows, even though I've eased the burden the PC has tremendously (nothing else running in the background, etc) This is recording at 30 fps HD mainly iracing.

I realize this can be a hardware thing, mainly that I don't have a super high speed HD / and SSD but i refuse to believe that this is the norm. So I'd like to try 1-2 alternatives (anyone try bandicam?) to see if software is my issue first.

 

[Kenadian]

FRAPS is known as being one of the most system intensive capture programs out there. I still use it now and then but only for capturing iRacing replays but with increasing rarity.

I've used most of them and hold licenses for XSPlit, DXTory, Bandicam and FRAPS and have used the alternatives as well such as ShadowPlay, Action, OBS, etc.

You should know though that my suggestions come from a wanting desire to have raw source files for usage in whatever capacity I desire. I'm also very much Video Rendering limited by Adobe Premiere Pro as it does not support variable framerate video editing, only constant.

For this reason I've settled on Bandicam and Bandicut for capture and XSPlit for streaming.

Bandicam allows for image sequence capture and captures audio in 2 separate files meaning you can split comms and game sounds, awesome! The fact it's image sequence capture means CBR so no sound sync issues when rendering video in Premiere Pro.

The inclusion of Bandicut means you can retain those source files but cut them down so only the bits you want are retained. This can turn a 70GB+ video into a 2 or 3 GB raw capture highlight so no re-compression or loss of any manner to the source video.

I have noticed however a small desync in video when creating my multi-cam perspectives that you often see in my YouTube iRacing Videos. This has always been a problem regardless of what programs I use but it's easily managed with Bandicam capture because I rarely (if ever) drop frames from it like I can in both DXTory and FRAPS.

All I do is link the beginning of the video perfectly then move to the end of the video to see the difference in video sync. I then slow the pace of the video to say 99.98% and voila, perfect sync and no change in audio pitch or clipping of any sort.

XSPlit allows for lower resolution streaming while capturing source at a higher resolution. As an example, I stream at 720p but can record locally at 1080p in a multiple of different quality levels. XSPlit also allows for color correction during stream and capture, something OBS still does not offer.

OBS apparently will offer color correction for streaming in their code rewrite but I have no idea when that will happen?

 

[little P]

OBS to Twitch then direct upload to youtube or (which is a much, much better way in my opinion) Shadowplay which is part of the GeForce Experience software. Absolutely brilliant and never had a single problem with it. I use GFE to control the LED's on my GFX card anyway, and Shadowplay can run in the background with no effect on gameplay or fps. If something funny or awesome happens I can just hit ALT+F10 and it will save the gameplay up to that point at whatever increment I set it at (up to 20 mins). Or you can just manually record by hitting ALT+F9 until you run out of hard drive space lol

So yeah, my recommendation is Shadowplay. Records whatever resolution you want, whatever fps you want, whatever bit rate you want. It's great

 

[Kenadian]

Ya but you stream at 1080p though do you not so for you that's a viable alternative.

If you try to upscale streamed 720p to 1080p or just directly upload from Twitch to YouTube the video quality looks like ass.

If you're streaming at 720p then we need to talk because your video quality is 1000x better than mine as is your video fluidity.

 

[little P]

Yes it's 1080p I stream at Duke although Twitch is very blocky etc. but I think that's just the service itself isn't it.

I really can't recommend Shadowplay enough, when I play a video back it's as if I'm playing it in game, I don't notice any drop in resolution or frame rate at all.

 

[Kenadian]

That's what I thought and the reason ShadowPlay works so well for you. For me I need to work with 2 different resolutions simultaneously which ShadowPlay could not accommodate for.

The blockiness is just the way Twitch handles the Stream. I believe once you get partnered with Twitch you can stream at a higher bandwidth at closer to source which helps alleviate that blockiness.

 

[little P]

Ah I see that makes sense

 

[Daunt]

Thanks a lot guys. I downloaded and used Bandicam last night to re-record a long clip that I recorded with FRAPS but got a ton of stuttering at random spots and it worked perfectly. Very smooth and simple. If it works like it did this time, I'll never bother with FRAPS again.

I'll post the results of my first experiment with Bandicam shortly!

 

[Jerad]

That's what I thought and the reason ShadowPlay works so well for you. For me I need to work with 2 different resolutions simultaneously which ShadowPlay could not accommodate for.

The blockiness is just the way Twitch handles the Stream. I believe once you get partnered with Twitch you can stream at a higher bandwidth at closer to source which helps alleviate that blockiness.

The blockiness would likely be from trying to compress the stream too much I think. I've managed to get mine looking okay at 720p 60fps and it doesn't appear to look like complete garbage on YT. I'm able to upload at 3-3.2mbit though.

 

[Daunt]

After a few errors of my own and some trial and error. Plus I believe a power outage during an upload, I got it to work.

[video=youtube;9PFnhryS--A]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9PFnhryS--A[/video]

Thanks guys for the help. Through trial and error I learned that AfterEffects, where I edit the video and add all the overlays and such, does not like H.264... so when I recorded that way in Bandicam I had to convert it from that to a different codec, then import, then eventually export it again back into H.264.

So more than likely I lost quite a bit of quality that way but at that point I was really tired of rendering. As for the sound issue that occured the second time I uploaded, I haven't a clue. I just re-rendered and it worked.

 

[Noodleguitar]

The audio on the second video sounded like it was running at half-speed or something.

I like the overlay elements, nice and simple and adds a nice bit of extra information that viewers would otherwise miss. I'm just not a fan of the first letters of the first and last name. It's a bit hard to see who is who that way. Why not take the first name only, would that get too long?

If everything goes right I should also be able to give you a scrolling position ticker for on the top the screen. I also got fancy visualizations of position changes in mind, but that will come when and if everything works correctly.

 

[Kenadian]

This video was much better Kyle!

 

[Daunt]

Yeah as we talked about, a scrolling ticker is the ideal, but since it doesn't scroll, I had to save some space. I think with first names and last initial would be ideal. Hopefully you can work your magic. Let me know what your need from me

 

[Jeeve79]

Since i tried OBS , i never looked back. I used FRAPS but imo OBS is way better. I dont have Geforce so no shadowplay here. But OBS 60 fps 720p is ok for me so far.