Phone Safety Tutorial GIF – captured by Subhash VCDPlayer and rendered by GIMP

In 2000, I created a software named after myself called Subhash VCDPlayer. It can play video and audio files on all Windows operating systems from Windows 98. It is jam-packed with features and one among those feature is the ability to slow down or speed up the playback in decrements/increments of 5%. It has another feature that allows you capture still images from video files. Now, this is an ancient software based on Windows Media Player 6.4. While the player can play any audio/video format (if you have installed Media Player Codec Pack), its playback speed adjustment features works only with really old media formats. I suggest you use Format Factory to convert your videos to MPEG-1 (mpg) format. So, convert your FLVs and MP4 to MPG first. Then, press the 1 key (yes the number key) as many times as is required to slow down the playback. Press D to set the image capture folder. Right click on the player and enable the option to set the capture image as the desktop wallpaper (under Preferences). This will let you preview the captured frames. You may have to reduce hardware acceleration in Windows graphics settings. (In Windows Vista and later change the theme to Aero Basic.). Then, as the video plays slowly, start capturing frames by pressing the S key. After you have capture enough frames, open the first image in GIMP. Then drag and drop the rest of the images on the Layers tab. (Very important. Be careful.) Resize the image and crop it. Otherwise, file size will be very big. The save the image as a GIF file. In the Save Options dialog that GIMP throws up choose “Animation”, “replace”, 100ms, “all”. Then open the GIF in an image viewer or a browser.

Making of Mobile Phone Safety Tutorial GIF.

You can get FOSS software GIMP at GIMP.org. Choose Windows Binaries if you are on Microsoft platform.
http://www.gimp.org

Subhash VCDPlayer is available for download from
http://www.softpedia.com/get/Multimedia/Video/Video-Players/Subhash-VCD-Player.shtml

You will need to install the v2.4.2 patch to make it work with the latest operating systems.
http://www.vsubhash.com/article.asp?id=15&info=Subhash_VCDPlayer#patch

You will need to install Media Player Codec Pack to ensure that the player can play all formats.
http://www.vsubhash.com/article.asp?id=15info=Subhash_VCDPlayer#play_new_formats

In Windows 8, you need to enable .NET 3.5 Framework in Control Panel.

More information about the software is at:
http://www.vsubhash.com/article.asp?id=15&info=Subhash_VCDPlayer

Subhash VCDPlayer is FOSS software too. Source code is available under GPL v3 at
http://www.vsubhash.com/article.asp?id=15&info=Subhash_VCDPlayer#source_code