Gamma Movie Tuner
Software  that sings.
 

Gamma Movie Tab

Move the mouse Over the image.
Monitor Check Box - Applies to all tabs.
The monitor check box puts Gamma into an alert state where it waits for a DirectX game.
Engage Gamma only after all of the other parameters have been set.
Uncheck to disengage Gamma.
The top message box is for general Gamma status like what game has been engaged etc.
Movie Format Section

Use this group af radio buttons to select the color format for the movie.
GMA1 12 bit produces the smallest movie files and is a good general choice.

  • RGB 16 common to almost all video cards and should be available.
    This format produces fast movie capture but exhibits banding in the color shades.
  • RGB 32 is 32 bit XRGB color and is useful for best color results. It should only be used
    for information and to determine the best that can be done. There is not additional processing used in this cormat.
  • GMA1 16 is UYVY 16 bit color using shaders for encoding and the Gamma codec for viewing.
    It produces no banding and is a good color choice. It requires 2 bytes of storage space for each pixel.
    This color mode downsamples the red and blue by 2:1 in the horizontal direction (width).
  • UYVY 16 is the same as GMA1 16 but uses the system codec for viewing.
  • GMA1 12 is 12 bit IYUV color and uses shaders for encodin and the Gamma codec for viewing.
    It uses 1.5 bytes of storage space per pixel. It produces no banding and exhibts fair to good color.
    It down samples 2:1 the red and blue on both the horizontal and vertical axis.
 
Movie Frame Rate
This sets the rate the game is captured at and affects the movie. It does not control the game.
The capture frame rate should be set high enough to remove objectionable jerkiness of motion
and low enough to lower the file size and reduce the load on the computer.
A very slow rate may also miss important events in the move such as a gun shot flash.
The input box allows a custom frame rate which is also useful for fractional rates.
 
Movie Frame Size

The size should be as large as possible and still allow good game play.
Small sizes save on disk storage and lower the load on the computer.
If Gamma has to shrink or expand the video card frame size to match the selected movie size
there may be some aliasing and which may not be objectionable. Even with filtering there will always be some aliasing.
The very best condition is to record at the same size you play the game in. Using 1024x768 for both the game and the movie gives good results. Aliasing shows up where there is fine line detail in the scene, for example, a US flag at a distance. The red and white may blend together or a line may be skipped. You will need to experiment some to satisfy your needs. The input box allows a custom frame size to be entered for the width and height. Due to the way the encoder works in the various color modes you can only enter widths in multiples of 4, and heights in multiples of 2.

 
Movie Name Mode
Autonamed Movie Files
Everytime you press the Record hotkey to toggle capture on during the game Gamma will create a new movie clip and use the name of the game as the base appending the time and date. When you toggle record to off the movie will be closed. Each clip will thus have a unique name.

Buffered Movie Files.
The first time you press the Record hotkey to toggle capture on during the game Gamma will create a movie using the name supplied by the create file dialog. If the file already exist Gamma reopens the movie and over writes the data without truncating the file. This allows Windows to reuse pointers to sectors that are already allocated saving on filing time. This method should have the minimum impact on the system. If the file is create new then it will have no advantage over the Autonamed system. The Recording control now acts like a Record/Pause/Resume control. Gamma will assume the last name you used is the one to use for recording unless you rename the file fom the movie tab.

Gamma uses the nearest frame to the frame time slot for setting the FPS of the AVI. This allows the game to run at its own FPS thus having the least impact upon the game play. If the game scene freezes and misses the slot Gamma will repeat the last scene to compensate. The audio typically continues uninterrupted.

The data rate for a frame size of 1024x768 pixels, 16 bit color produces a data rate of 16.875 MB per second and is a steady load. This requires a fast disk drive capable of writing at the sustained data rate.

 
Low Disk

The movie files grow very large very fast. For example at 1024x768x12 bit the movie file grows 0.9887 GB per minutes. Running out of space will produces serious freezes in the game. If the disk storage space drops below the low disk threshold then Gamm stops recording but leaves the game running. No alert is thrown to destroy the game play. The only indication of this condition is the letter "L" will be appended to the FPS display.

The Low Disk defaults to 128 MB. To change enter the number of megabytes in the low disk edit window.

Hot Keys

The Hotkey entry boxes allow you set the key to use for the specified action. Choose a key to use for each option. The key will replace the key if defined within the game. You may have to work out the conflicts by either choosing a different key for Gamma, changing the games key assignment, or accepting the key replacement.

  • Record Movie is used to toggle the Record mode on or to stop the recording process.
  • Stats is the control for the frames per second display.
  • Graph controls the display of the performance counter graph.
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