R2OK!

FleetingEileenM · Joined: 30 Mar 2010 Posts: 5747 Location: Hampshire

Does anyone know if it is possible to download YouTube items for eventual transferring to DVDs? There are some gems which I would love to have for keeps.

I have tried following the instructions for Macs but always come to a grinding halt and always dread the items being withdrawn and lost to me for ever.

ColinB · Guest

Are you using a Mac? If so, there is a way of capturing the stream but it's very complicated. For you, the best option might be to somple record what you see and hear as a new file. I recommend that you download an application called SnapZ Pro X from a company called Ambrosia ( http://www.ambrosiasw.com/utilities/snapzprox/ ). It's not cheap, and there are freebies available, but I've been using SnapZ on Apple Macs for almost 15 years and it's still the best.

What it enables you to do is record anything and everything you see and hear on the screen (still images, audio only, video, whatever) in very high quality Quicktime files which can be saved to anything and for any use. Playback is indistinguishable from the original - which can be very confusing sometimes!

Recently, I had a job to do for a client who wanted a whole range of competitors' videos recorded so that they could look at them on their iPhones and iPads when on a long flight. SnapZ will let you do this - or just import them into iMovie for editing and export yourself.

Like I said above, it's not cheap (well, not as cheap as "free") but it's the best in its class - in my humble opinion!

FleetingEileenM · Joined: 30 Mar 2010 Posts: 5747 Location: Hampshire

Thank you Colin! I'll investigate SnapZ.

Ian Robinson · Posted: Mon Aug 20, 2012 11:18 am Post subject:

In my Firefox Browser on my Mac, I have an add-on called Easy YouTube Video Downloader - it's free and easy!

Under any video in YouTube (unless it's in a "feed" - in which case, just open in a separate tab) there's a button marked "Download" which you press and simply save in whatever format you want. It's really good!

ColinB · Guest

Has this recently been updated, Ian, because I found that plugin very temperamental in the past. I'll give it a try and obviously Eileen should look at it first as well.

Ian Robinson · Posted: Mon Aug 20, 2012 12:07 pm Post subject:

FleetingEileenM · Joined: 30 Mar 2010 Posts: 5747 Location: Hampshire

Thank Ian, that sounds good.

ColinB · Guest

One thing I would add, Eileen, is that you might consider in which format you wish to keep your downloaded / screen-captured video. YouTube offers up "Flash" videos by default even when they're uploaded by users as higher-quality files such as MPEG-4/H.264.

Although Flash is perfectly OK for most uses, it requires the Adobe Flash Player to view them. I know that Flash is available on all three computing platforms but if you aim to move them over to Apple mobile devices such as iPhone and iPad you won't be able to view them (Apple iOS doesn't support Flash at all and Adobe has now closed its "Flash Mobile" development team). Flash is now in decline.

MPEG-4 is a much better and portable option. So when prompted for your preferred format - select "MP4" rather than Flash. If you do, you'll be able to import the video into iTunes immediately and then sync it over to your mobile devices.

Ian Robinson · Posted: Mon Aug 20, 2012 4:19 pm Post subject:

While we're here, can I recommend Get iPlayer Downloader? It's a standalone app that grabs shows (TV and radio) off iPlayer and ITVPlayer and puts them into iTunes for you. There's probably a few that do this, but this is what I use and it's very handy.

ColinB · Guest

Good idea. Do you think it will circumvent the BBC's DRM? I'm constantly forgetting to watch things on iPlayer before they expire and it would be handy to have on the iPad for catch-up when it suits me.

Edit: I'll try it and find out!

Ian Robinson · Posted: Mon Aug 20, 2012 5:53 pm Post subject:

gazmando · Joined: 15 Apr 2007 Posts: 560 Location: Huntingdon

Hello Eileen,
Not sure if you're sorted now but I use YTD video downloader.
It's really easy to use just RIGHT CLICK the link of the video you like on Youtube and click COPY then go to YTD, hover your mouse over the PASTE URL box and your copied link goes in there.
You then click on download and it saves to whatever folder you choose.
When it's done you can then convert the saved file into whatever format you want (using YTD or any other convertor of your choice)
I use this on my Windows laptop (sorry Colin), hopefully it's available on Mac too.