This guide is designed to help you decide in buying a video card. Creative has a wide range of cards to cater for different needs. Feel free to browse through it... As we are continually trying to update this guide, your suggestions, questions and comments will help us answer as many questions as you may have. Please send all questions to the editor, Creative Hub.
What can I do with a Video Board
How do I:
Before deciding what video board you should buy, it is important to understand what video boards can do. In a nutshell, different kinds video board allow you to do different things:
A video board that allows you to connect your VCR or TV to your computer is called an Overlay board. An example of your an Overlay card is Creative's Video Blaster SE100. All you need to do is to look for the VIDEO OUT connector from your TV/VCR and connect it to VIDEO IN of your Video Blaster card.
Of course, watching a movie from your monitor is not the only thing you can do with an Overlay Board. Boards like the Video Blaster SE100 offer additional features such as Frame Grabbing and Image Manipulation so that you can freeze and save any image you want to as well as modify it. Creative's Video Blaster SE100 offer your powerful software like Photostyler SE, HSC Digital Morph and Asymetrix Digital Video Producer lets you do all these interesting features.
A video technique called Chroma Keying is also possible with the Video Blaster SE100 so that you can superimpose yourself in any background and make people believe that you have visited another country even without leaving your home.
Now if you want to capture video from a VCR or any video source, you will need a Video Capture board. Video captured digitally into your hard disk will never degenerate in quality and you can play them back in any software that supports digital video. The video format for digital video is AVI (Audio Video Interleave) Multimedia producers use video capture boards to capture digital video used in CD-ROMs.
Creative offers a board called Video Blaster RT300. It lets you become a multimedia producer and even provides the necessary software tools such as Adobe Premier so that you not only capture digital video but can also create your own digital movie complete with sound effects. Video Blaster RT300 can capture high quality video at 30 frames per second at resolutions up to 320 x 200.
And because digital video takes up a lot of hard disk space, Creative's Video Blaster RT300 offers real-time video file compression (6:1). That what RT stands for. But remember, if you are serious about digital video, you should at least have more than 300 MB of hard disk available.
Do you know that it is possible to watch a full-length, full screen movie on your PC which runs from a CD-ROM. The technology that has made this possible is called MPEG. There are many CD-ROMs in the market that let you watch MPEG movies. However, you will need a Video board that supports the MPEG specifications. If you are looking for such as board, Creative offers Video Blaster MP400.
Now if you want to do your Powerpoint presentation to a large audience, you will appreciate a special kind of Video board that lets you output whatever you see on your PC to a projector. Creative offers such as board called Creative TV Coder. Creative TV Coder converts your VGA signals to the RGB Video format.
If you intend to produce your own digital video movie, you should know the limitations of what is possible in PC video today. That doesn't mean you can't be a video producer.
First of all, you need a good PC system (at least a DX66 with 8 MB RAM) and lots of hard disk space (at least 300 MB). Bear in mind that the larger the display window of your video source, the more space you require and the slower will be the resulting playback frame rate. To capture from any video source such as a VCR, you need to buy Creative's Video Blaster RT300. Although most video boards let you capture video, all these assume that you have a sound card to capture the audio input as well. So make sure you have a sound card such as the Sound Blaster.
The Video Blaster RT300 provides the necessary software capture utility to capture digital video into your PC. The video format is called AVI (Audio Video Interleave). When the digitized video is played back, it does not require the capture board anymore as it lets you have software playback. Using a Video editing program such as Adobe Premier which is bundled with the RT300, you can combine different video clips, sound, images to create your own digital movie. You will be surprised how easy you can do this as well as add stunning effects and transitions to your clip.
Now if you want to capture a frame from a video source, you can either buy an Overlay board (Video Blaster SE100) or a Video Capture board (Video Blaster RT300). Once you have captured a frame, you manipulate the image by using a graphics / image processing program. The Video Blaster SE100 bundles Photostyler SE. With these two simple tools, you can create your own photo album of digital images. Of course, you will need to have your own video camera!
If you are wondering how convenient it would be to store your computer presentations (done in Powerpoint or Harvard Graphics) on video tape so that you can circulate to a wider audience, here's the answer: You need Creative's TV Coder. With the TV Coder you simply plug it to your VGA card and connect it to your VCR. After a simple installation, you will be able to see your PC output from your VCR. IF your presentation uses digital audio/ MIDI don't forget to connect your sound card to your VCR (audio in) using the cable provided with it. Just press the record button on your VCR and Presto! Your presentation will be saved.
Assuming you have a video camera and want to set up a simple security system, you need an Overlay board such as Video Blaster SE100. Place the Video Camera wherever you want and I find a long cable to connect to your PC which has the video board installed. Once connected, you can watch any activity from your video camera on your PC and even freeze any frame for playback. If you want to program the Video Blaster for specific needs, contact our developer support department.
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