Leiosoft Video Capture V2.0 FAQ

Questions

How to reduce the size of  the recorded avi file?

How to reduce the USB bus bandwidth usage to enable more USB cameras?

Which configurations are global settings?

How to start/stop a scheduled recording?

How to start motion detection?

How to add/remove/modify internet connection settings in LVC?

Where is the timestamp information in recorded avi file?

Give me some hints about the motion zones settings.

Answers

How to reduce the size of the recorded avi file?

    Leiosoft Video Capture (LVC)  use the technique of sequential frames compress method to compress and save avi frames. There are lots of compressor shipped with Windows, but most of them generate large compressed frame, some of them even cannot be initialized (MS H263,MS H261). The speed of compressing a single frame are different as well. It is strongly recommended  to install the codec from DIVX company, the driver can be downloaded from www.divx.com. In a test, with a 3.11 version Divx codec driver,  it takes only 52MB disk space to save a 38 minutes movie.  

  So the tricks to do this are:

• Choose a good codec
• Choose a smaller image size.
• Choose a lower capture rate.
• Choose  a lower compress quality.

How to reduce the USB bus bandwidth usage to enable more USB cameras?

    The USB bus bandwidth usage depends on the camera driver. For example, the driver of the USB camera  "Logitech Quickcam Express"  is hungry of USB bandwidth and CPU clock, while the driver of USB camera " PC Camera 6029 CIF" from Taiwan  just use very little. 

    In LVC 2.00 a new feature was added, which support two capture mode "Leisurely" and "High speed", the "leisurely" mode can greatly reduce CPU usage, but it can not greatly reduce the USB bus bandwidth usage because it depends on the driver.

   So the tricks to do this are:

• Choose a good camera. You can use multiple cameras of the same model in LVC, it can distinguish them.
• Choose a smaller image size.
• Choose a lower capture rate. For motion detecting purpose, a capture frame rate from 2 to 5 FPS is enough.
• Use the leisurely video capture mode.

Which configurations are global settings?

    Please look at the tool bar of the main window, it is separated to be 4 sections. Those buttons in the second section will work on every camera individually. Those buttons in the third section will set global settings. The settings on the pop up menu of every camera will work on every camera individually too.

How to start/stop a scheduled recording?

    Use the schedule setting dialog box to set individual schedule for every camera. Choose the time to start and stop recording, then choose the weekdays that you want to schedule. Once you push the OK button, the schedule will begin to work. You may change it at any time. Once  the scheduled recording (or just motion detecting ) is started, you may cancel it manually by uncheck the menu item of the camera windows' pop up menu.

How to start and stop motion detection?

    There are four ways to do so: 

•  Use  the "detected now" tool button.
•  Use  the "detected now"  pop up menu item..
•  Set daily record schedule and check "Do not record immediately, just detect motion and trigger events" check box. This will start motion detection during the "start" and "stop" time.
• Check the "start motion detection" check box on the startup settings dialog box, every time when a camera window is opened, it will start to detect.

  How to add/remove/modify internet connection settings in LVC?

    Sorry, You should add/remove/modify you ISP connections by using the Windows control panel outside of LVC.

Where is the timestamp information in recorded avi file?

    LVC saves the timestamp into AVI file as an individual text stream. You can see timestamp by using Windows Media Player, in the View menu, check the caption menu item.

Give me some hints about the motion zones settings.

    On the motion zone setting dialog box there is a help button, it include all of the rules of zones.

Change Log

version 2.01:

•     Fix a small bug caused by an unusual character in a special camera driver name

version 2.00:  A new milestone

• Completely changed the graphic user interface and the GUI toolkit.
• Changed the video capture process method, added "leisurely"  and "High speed" capture mode.
• Add new function to set the image motion sensible zones.
• Emphasized the design to be used as a surveillance tool. 
• Enhanced email function to support more ESMTP server.

version 1.12:

•     For the request from a registered user who is using two video capture cards,   the image buffer was adjusted, now it can support a big  image up to 1024*768*24bit.
•     Make "enable motion detect" and "hide control panel" as two other startup options.

version 1.11:

•     Add new features to enable some automatic actions on startup.
•     Change the video capture process strategy for better performance.

version 1.09:

•     Add new feature, now user can specify the shortest AVI recording duration time in seconds when motion is detected.
•     There is a compile bug  in version 1.08 that may cause the program crash at all of the JPEG file concerned operations, i.e. when saving snapshot to JPG or recording motion to JPG file. Please do not  use version 1.08 any more!!!

version 1.08:

•       According to the report from some video capture card user,   the motion video recording codes was modified to reduce  the system resource usage. Now it is much better, even under a high capture frame rate situation with a large image size.

version 1.07:

•     Fix the bug that if there is a colon in the name of the camera's device driver,  AVI file can not be created.

version 1.06:

•     Some modification on FTP codes. The FTP course will be recorded in log.txt now.
•     User interface modifications.

version 1.05:

•     Every time when send mail to SMTP server, all the communication  data (sent and received) will be recorded into log.txt, which is  saved    in  the installation folder. 
•     Add the ability to accept the authentication test by ESMTP server before send email.
•     some small changes.

version 1.03:

•     Fixed the bug which cause the snap shot image  file can not be saved correctly.
•     If an ADSL or any non-RAS dialup internet connection is  already available, the software will not tried to build a RAS connection any more.