BASICS
A Counter-Strike movie is made in several steps:
1. Recording Demos
2. Turning the demos into .avi clips
3. Constructing a video from the .avi clips using a video editting program
4. Rendering the final product using a codec to compress the video
Here, I'll break down each step to help you better understand and be able to follow step by step, how to make your first video. These breakdowns are basic. More advanced information on each step can be found by navigating the links on the main page. All programs used in this tutorial can be found in the 'Links' page linked on the main page
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Recording
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1. While in-game, open the console by pressing '~'
2. Type in record demoname whereas demoname is the name you wish to call your demo
3. Press enter and it should say Started Recording to demoname
4. After you have finished recording what you want, open the console again and type stop to complete the demo. It should say Finished Recording to demoname
5. The completed demo will be located in your cstrike folder (C:/Program Files/Steam/SteamAccounts/[email protected]/Counter-Strike/cstrike) named demoname.dem whereas demoname was the name of the demo you chose
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Demo to .Avi
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There are two main ways of compiling a .avi out of a .dem (demo) file, using Fraps or Videomach. Either are arguably better than the other and it more depends on your computer. Fraps is much easier in that it produces a .avi with a press of a button with in-game sound pre-synced but Videomach is said to produce slightly higher quality .avi's. I will be covering both here. Keep in mind that before you compress your .avi's, they will take up large amounts of harddrive space (about 1gb/min)
Making .Avi's with Fraps:
1. Open up Fraps and go to the 'Movies' tab
2. Click '30 fps' and 'Full-Size'
3. Set the bind for the key you would like to use to start and stop. I personally use 'f10'
4. Open up Counter-Strike and go to console, type in viewdemo demoname whereas demoname is the name of a demo previously recorded
5. The demo will start playing. Pressing 'esc' or 'f2' will bring up the demo menu which will say either Playing demo demoname or Loading demo demoname. To ensure no glitches, wait for it to load completely and say Playing demo demoname.
6. Using the control features in the demo menu, such as fast-forward, find the part in the demo which you would like to start making the .avi
7. With the demo menu up, pressing 'esc' will make go back to the demo, do this and press your bound key in fraps to start making the .avi (for me, I'd pres 'f10'). In the upper right hand corner, the number that displays the current fps should turn red, then go away while the .avi is being made
8. Press your bound key again to stop making the .avi
9. Your completed .avi will be located in your Fraps folder by default (C:/Fraps) and named hl-lots-of-numbers-here.avi
Making .Avi's with Videomach:
1. Follow steps 4-6 of the 'Making .Avi's with Fraps' section
2. In console, type startmovie moviename 30 whereas moviename is the name of the movie (it really does not matter). 30 is the number of frames produced in a second (in an advanced technique, 90 is used instead of 30, this can be found in the 'Advanced' section). Make sure to press 'esc' to close the console and menus.
3. The demo should start to seem a bit laggy and choppy, this is normal. When you want the clip to stop, open the console and simpy type in endmovie
4. Open up Videomach and perss the folder looking button in the middle left of the screen
5. This will open a file browsing dialogue, find your way to your cstrike folder and highlight all of the .bmp's named moviename##### whereas moviename is the name you typed in as the moviename and ##### is the number of the .bmp in the sequence. Once you have them all selected, click 'Open'. This should load all of the bmps in a list on the bottom left of the screen
6. Click the floppy disk looking button in the middle of the screen and it should open a dialogue
7. Where it says the filename, browse to the directory of your choice and type in avi-name.avi whereas avi-name is the name of the .avi you would like. Select 'AVI, Windows Audio Video Interleaved' as the Format
8. Click the 'Video' tab and click the 'Format Options' button
9. A list of available codecs should appear in the left hand side of the dialogue, scroll down and find 'Full Frames Uncompressed'. Highlight it and click 'Ok', 'Ok'. This should bring you back to he main Videomach screen
10. Press the Play looking button in the middle of the screen and it should start rendering your .avi in the directory you chose
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Video Editting
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I will be covering video editting in Sony Vegas 5 in this tutorial, the basics as shown here can be replicated in any Vegas software. I will not be covering Adobe Premier because I find it slower and a bit more complicated (although it is much more professional and capable in my opinion). Special Note: If you would like to make your .avi soley as a clip to send to friends or post on the internet, procede to the 'Compressing with VirtualDub' section under 'Compression'
1. Open up Vegas and navigate to File->Open, this should bring up a file browsine dialogue
2. Select the .avi you wish to add to the timeline first. Add as many as you'd like
3. The timeline works exactly as its named, the clips play from left to right, pressing the Play button will preview the movie in the button right hand corner. So sequence your clips in the arrangement of your likings
4. Go to File->Render As and from file format, select 'Video For Windows (.avi)' and hit the 'Custom' button.
5. This is where we go into compression...
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Compression
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Compression is a very skillfull technique and is hard to master. The standard alloted file size is 25mb/min and as you can see from your clips, 1gb/min is way too high. Compression is the sizing down of a file while trying to keep the original quality. The problem with compression is that the more you size a file down, the worse the quality becomes. Examples of excellent compression are that top latest movies such as 'the Underground' and 'Ruination'. I will not go in dept on compression in this tutorial but under the 'Compression' page linked on the main page, you can find out a lot more useful techniques that produce a higher quality product. I split this into two sections, 'Compressing a Whole Movie in Vegas' and 'Compressing a Short Clip in VirtualDub'. You can compress a short clip in Vegas, and you can compress a whole movie in VirtualDub, but this is how I do things because they are faster and more efficient in my opinion.
Compressing a Whole Movie in Vegas:
1. Find your way up to step 5 in the 'Video Editting' section
2. From here, go to the 'Audio' tab and select MPEG Layer-3 as the format and '128kBit/s, 44,100 Hz Stereo'
3. Click he 'Video' tab and select DivX as the video format (whichever version you have)
4. Hit 'Configure' and set 2,000 or 3,000 as the bitrate (higher bitrate means higher quality but larger video size), leave the rest of the settings alone for basic compressing
5. Press 'Ok', 'Ok' and save as the .avi file you would like, click 'Save' and it should start rendering
6. Once it's done rendering, your completed, compressed .avi will be located in the directory you saved it to
Compressing a Short Clip in VirtualDub:
1. Open VirtualDub and select File->Open Video file and open your uncompressed .avi file
2. Select Video->Full Processing Mode
3. Select Video->Compression and select 'DivX' (whichever version you have) and 'Configure'
4. Set the bitrate at 2,000 or 3,000 (higher bitrate means higher quality but larger file size)
5. 'Ok' yourself back to the main screen and select Audio->Full Processing Mode (steps 5 through 8 only apply to Fraps users)
6. Go to Audio->Compression
7. Select 'MPEG Layer-3' from the list and set the bitrate to '128kBit/s, 44,100 Hz Stereo'
8. Click 'Ok' to bring yourself back to the main screen again
9. Select File->Save as AVI and type in the filename and location of your choice and hit 'Save'
10. The completed, compressed, AVI clip will be located under the filename and location that you chose