This program seems great, I missed the boat though, came one day late..can someone help me out...dont want to pay 40$, yes call me cheap.

Thanks for the kind words and enjoy the free software!

Remember, if you have any difficulty with installing or using Topaz Moment don't hesitate to email us at support[at]topazlabs.com like many others have done - it doesn't matter if you got it for free, we'll still give prompt technical support.

Here's some solutions for a few problems that you've listed:
1. If Windows Media Player can play your video but Topaz Moment can't, go to Options->Internal Filters in Topaz Moment and uncheck every item in both Source Filters and Transform Filters. Then restart Topaz Moment and try again.

2. If you can't play your video in either Windows Media Player or Topaz Moment, you might need a codec. www.freecodecs.com has the K-Lite Codec Pack which we recommend, however, it's an external package and we take no responsibility for its contents. Also, if installing K-lite doesn't work, try updating Realplayer and Quicktime to their latest versions.

3. Vectored Faces: Try reducing the default Sharpness setting (it's set a bit high on default). In general you usually want to reduce the default settings for Sharpness, noise reduction, and the Auto Color and Contrast settings quite a bit when capturing stills.

I've read the commends and will be considering the suggestions brought up by many posters for possible inclusion in future releases. In any case, enjoy and contact me at eric.yang[at]topazlabs.com if you have any questions, suggestions, or comments.

Again, thanks so much for your interest. Make sure to join our mailing list at www.topazlabs.com - you have the chance to win a free copy of the software of your choice at the end of every month, and you'll always know about the latest news.

Cheers,
Eric Yang
Sales and Marketing, Topaz Labs
eric.yang[at]topazlabs.com

Barring any HUGE issue w/this software, there's little doubt it will be high up on the list of GAOTD's best/favorite '08 giveaway's, maybe even #1.
Easy to use and a whole lotta fun!
Wonderful app . . . a real winner, Albert!

One of the best software packages for capturing stills out of video. I use it daily in creating still images from existing video, for use in Story boarding new video/games. IT does a much better job than the built in capture even from Vegas or other editing packages. It also "auto-paints" the image to improve the "pixelation" I missed this offer due to being out of town. Sad because I needed another system loaded with it.

#128.. – in my seemingly successful WinXP Home installation, no such folder appeared. Maybe only once you actually create and save a still?

It IS after you SAVE a still!

It works ok in XP on my laptop, but crashes on my Vista machine. It doesn't like my nvidea driver, causes it to crash and recover. Then the program locks up. Windows Media Player keeps trying to load up as well. May be conflicting with it. As a result, I tried downloading it to my laptop (XP) and it worked fine. Only tried it with a DVD. Tried to freezeframe a snowy picture and capture it. It smoothed it out with a slight waxy look, but much better than the original. Nice.

#64 I had the same problem with batch captures basically restarting from the beginning of the movie file and running in a loop. Also, when using enhanced mode I don't get the frame I select, I get the image from several frames later. It's a great image, but not the specific one I'm trying to get.

Any suggestions?

# 45 is ON POINT... thanks for the examples! GET IT! Installed w no problem. Stills from video have always been poor at best. This program is phenominal. It gathers adequate info from frames before and after your selected still "moment" and renders a picture that is hard to beat. If you want, further manipulation can be done with a few simple tools offered within the program but it will also call up known editors for your work in progress should you choose. Just spectacular! I always carry my "still cameras" but with this program you might never pull one out unless doing portrait work. It has serious applications and is a time saver for wanting certain shots that you thought you would never have because you were shooting video. BEST results on video that is shot with minimal movement taking place within the frame. Heavy movement still produced keeper pics. Unbelievable Results! Until now you never used a video camera for still work. My Sony DCR-SR80 shoots exceptional video and produces the worst stills. Now I have stills from video that easily fall into the 6 - 8 megapixel catagory. THANK YOU!!! GAOTD!! and Thanks to all those gifted people that created TOPAZ. I will blog this to my friends at VideoMaker Magazine. The average person using a decent video camera can safely leave their "still" camera at home or in the bag. This program is that good! It is a MUST program for anyone's Media toolbox!!! A 10 and 2 Thumbs Up!!

Fine snapper!!

It needs an easier way to open "on-HD" movie files (aka .VOB files), imho, however. Choosing File>Open File/Media only opens a folder-full of .vob files, which really makes finding the exact video portion to Snap, well...more-difficult-than-it-should-be.

Too-bad, too, that it's not constructed as a "plug-in" for any other DVD-player. The one its used (WMP, yes?) is dulls-as-rust. Make it work with GOM or my fav...KMPlayer, please?!

Kind of a slooow procedure to capture, and rather difficult to find an exact spot to start Snap, but that's WMP for lack-of-functionality, and not Topaz-Moment, methinks. A kinda-crude program, sorry. But thanks!

I've wanted a program like this for a long time. Thanks GOTD!

Earlier commenter noted "I like that this program sets up (during installation) a subfolder in my “My Pictures” folder, the subfolder being “Topaz Moments” ... "

-- in my seemingly successful WinXP Home installation, no such folder appeared. Maybe only once you actually create and save a still?

Maybe it's worth adding that registration is accomplished by clicking Help, then Buy/Enter Key ... , then Enter Key ... , and entering the two lines the text file provides. And, as others have noted, no actual call to GOTD's activation server seems to take place.

"I tried a large AVI files on my hard drive, and it wouldn’t play it correctly–it was speeded up. Tried to slow it down, and it wouldn’t do it."

It doesn't defrag my hard drive either, should I delete it?
IT'S A FRAME CAPTURE UTILITY not a video player.

"i got a better result with the print screen button on my keyboard"

If you want to bash a program without knowing what you are talking about please make it believable at least.
I can only imagine you like taking shots of black screens.

And why are so many people so confused over an MSI installer?
Have any of these people owned a pc for more than a day?

*Sigh*
As for critique of the software, this installed perfectly on XP, it does it's job well, better than Power dvd and Vlc which I have used for years and, I assume, paintshop Pro which I have yet to install but I didn't even know edited video.

One more thing.
"Can I edit or delete 3 to 5 seconds of profanity in a DVD Movie?
Anybody know? This would be great, even if I could capture the scene
and delete it out, I wouldn’t mind."
WTF?
IT'S A FRAME CAPTURE UTILITY

I've never known so many ridiculous posts
*Rant over*
excuse me

Great program and picture quality is incredible. Also nice that it plays MKV files (HD movies) without a problem! Here's a group of three HD pictures of Jim Sturgess, Bono and Eddie Izzard in one jpg from the movie "Across The Universe", a movie based on Beatles tunes. Only filter used was "sharpen" and the picture resized.

Stills from "Across The Universe" (www.mustangmods.com/ims/u/257/12221/232274.jpg if link doesn't work)

You can set this program to take a snapshot of the raw file OR have it enhance. Your choice will depend on whether the raw or the enhanced looks better and that will change from one file to the next. The ease of this program in saving a still from a home video file in one click (or two) makes this a winner for me. Thanks!

For those who say the result looks cartoony, in settings you can change the sharpness and noise reduction to make it more to your liking so you can use Photoshop and Noiseware later on the still. Just right-click on the movie window while it's playing or pause and choose Options, then Enhancement. Adjust as you wish.

So far it plays everyting for me,.flv and Quicktime movies too. Made it my default player for all formats and extremely happy with this GOTD.

RE: #103 - GPL issue.
Dear Jim,

I am the developer of the software, answering your concerns of GPL issue. At the time we are considering using MPC as the GUI part, we did contact the author and later on GNU for clarification. It is sufficient to say that we are in compliant with the GPL. We actually tried, unsuccessfully, to have the DLL distributed with the official MPC distribution but it was a long story. If you still have concern, please contact us directly and I will be more than happy to answer your questions.

Best regards,

Albert

#111 read their FAQ it tells you what to do about the black screen.

http://topazlabs.com/topazlabs/03products/topaz_moment/more_information/90frequently_asked_questions/index.html

Hope that helps.

Nice frame captures, even on very poor quality clips. Handy for the DIY section of Youtube ;)

Haven't worked out all the settings yet tho!

If you have trouble getting any video to play, then you are probably missing codecs. I'd suggest the K-Lite Codec pack. http://www.free-codecs.com/download/K_lite_codec_pack.htm The 'Standard' version will probably suffice for most requirements. For those having problems with .flv files, the you need the .flv DirectShow filter which can be installed from the K-Lite Standard or Full packs.

I have Vista Ultimate & used the msi-installer instead of setup.exe to load it. After installing the program I opened it & then put in the key # & GOTD. The program said it was registered & seems to work fine. I didn't have any problems loading.

I tried it on a video I took where the quality wasn't that great to begin with. It did indeed enhance the still shot.

So far I like it.

No problems with CPU memory either.

Thanks GOTD.

I have really wanted one of these since my prt sc failed on me and I could not capture the image. I can't wait to try it out!
Thank you kindly :)

#114, I'm not sure if this is what you are asking, but there is a button to 'select all' to capture. you could do that and then delete the ones you don't want. I downloaded this earlier today, and tried it out, it's great. Awhile back my son sent me a WMV file he made of some property we have, and I've been trying to capture a couple shots the past 2 weeks to no avail. With this program, I've got all the pictures I wanted. Then I had to figure out where they were! Found them in my documents/photos/Topaz folder. This is a wonderful program!!!
And for those of you that are asking about them offering Topaz Vivacity, isn't that the general idea of GOTD free games/programs? Give us a chance to try something by a publisher, and then we buy the other things they have to offer?

Yes! It's giveaways like all of this weekend's that keep me coming back to check everyday even if I only end up downloading one every month or so.

After reading all the comments I can't resist the opportunity to grab this while I have the chance since I've started making lots of my own screencaps. I'm still downloading as I post this so I haven't had a chance to use it yet but I don't foresee myself getting rid of it. Thanks so much for this program.

I already have something I use for captures (a feature built in to my dvd player software) but, I didn't really like the quality of the caps that turned out, the one choice in screencap resolution, or that it depended on me pausing the movie at just the right moment, not to mention how easy it was for me to lose all my screencaps if I didn't save them right away every time I made a screencap. I wanted something that would give me a better quality of caps and save my caps automatically in case the power went out unexpectedly for any reason or I forgot to save them all from the temporary screencap list before closing my dvd player. Which to my embarrassment I've done a couple times. I try to remember to save as I go, but it's always aggravating to have to start capping all over again if I should accidentally lose them all for either of the two previously mentioned reasons.

As soon as I saw #22's comment that this program saves caps automatically I knew this was going to be my replacement software and I had to start downloading immediately. The icing on the cake is all of the other cool features and alternative uses that were mentioned in comments #6, #10, #18, #20, #31, #32, #51, #57, #86

I know people will whine that I haven't used the program yet before I posted my comment and I do agree, because it's comments from those of us who've already tried the program that influences my decision to install, but I wanted to say thank you right away. Thank you to GOTD and to all you posters who left the comments that convinced me to take a chance on this program. I'm so excited about today's offer and the positive comments influencing my decision to download that I had to share my appreciation for offering what looks like the perfect screencap software replacement I've never had the time to search for.

There is a Registration Key in the readme.txt file. This should be used to register Topaz Moment from the Help menu>Buy/Enter key...!

The Registration Name to use is also in the readme.txt file. Enter both as is and you should get a Valid Registration box when you click the OK button.

Ron

#5, I'd be interested in the answers. I didn't have time to read all the posts since. I assumed no video enhancement, but if you could do all the frames that needed it (like a blur where I hit the tripod leg today), that would be nice. Does anyone know?

This is very nice software. Easy to use and install. Picture quality is awesome. Plenty of settings that are easy to understand and change.

Oh, I breezed over here early this morning. Upon seeing the picture, I thought it was another screensaver. I made my way back and here and behold...I now have a superior movie capture program. Works just great!! I have captured several images just to see how they would look. Was going to delete them, but actually 2 of them were so good that I am going to keep them. I like this. Thanks GAOTD!!

Well, it seemed like a potentially interesting program...except, like a couple of others, it doesn't play the movie..just the sound and a black screen. I went to their website, but there really isn't anything helpful there.

The 2 movies that I tried play in VLC and MPC, so I have no idea why they wouldn't work...guess I will try that GOM program that was mentioned.

If anyone finds a solution, please share it.
:-)

-D

#49
Install the program. Click on HELP, then click on User's Manual.
What could be easier?

KILGOR

Thanks GAOTD! This totally rocks!

This looks like it will work well for me. The capture it took of a dark scene came out very clear. Thanks.

Thank you! Now I can do something about those low-quality movies of my grandson...

`_~

im new to the internet iwant to learn all i can so help if you can dennis

According to the installer, this is based on the GPL’d Media Player Classic, but is linked to a proprietary DLL.

Given that the GPL forbids linking to non-GPL’d code, this would seem to be a violation of Media Player Classic’s license.

I’d really like to see a response from the devs on this, as I’d hate to think that GAOTD is distributing this software illegally.

Jim, morally what they're doing is dubious but legally they're fine. I discussed this exact issue with Stallman about 15 years ago the first time this scenario came up, when a company was selling EMACS for Windows, with all the proprietary stuff to emulate unix calls in a separate but necessary DLL for which there was no free alternative. He said that as long as they were not linked together and that the interface was published, someone could in principle write a replacement DLL to do what the proprietary code did and as such it was within the letter of the GPL if not the spirit.

So if the image enhancement procedures were *linked* to the GPL player code, your argument would be correct, but a DLL is not linked code in the computing sense.

Sweet little program!
Tried this out on video taken on my Canon S3is camera
At first I was put off by the colors on the saved image.
Then I figured out Options-enhancements.
Set auto level and auto color to 25 -much better!
Some saved images come out better than others.
But that is to be expected.
Installed on Windows XP sp2, no problem.
Thanks GAOTD.

To "rainspotter" (comment #78):
I didn't "analyze" anything; the Topaz Moment installer actually pops up a notice stating that it consists of a version of the GPL'd Media Player Classic plus a closed-source DLL.

It seems rather unlikely that they've any special arrangement with Media Player Classic's author, as they specifically cite the GPL and even provide a link to where they've provided the source code for their modified version of the player in order to comply with the GPL.

The problem is, they seem to think they can bypass the license and keep part of their code proprietary by separating it out into a DLL; that doesn't work, as the GPL covers the *whole* app, including dynamicly linked code.

I have to say that I find it rather disturbing that the only response I've received is your "how dare you criticize something I'm getting for free" rant. You'd think, at the very least, that the GAOTD admins would be bothered by the fact they're potentially opening themselves to legal action by Media Player Classic's author by distributing this software.

I reiterate: I'd *really* like to see someone from Topaz Labs address this issue.

I've wanted a copy of this software for a long time, so to work around the failure to install under Vista, I've installed it on my WinXP (MCE) machine that I use for our family TV that I normally don't install anything on! That's how much I like it - it's a keeper. Topaz is the leader in this field and not a no-name fly-by-night company like a few we've seen here this year ;-) (You know, the guys whose code gets slammed so badly they have to change the company name before they re-release it so no-one associates them with the original stinker ;-) )

If you think you'll *ever* have a need for framegrabs from a DVD or video, grab this software now.

To the GAOTD software aquisition guys - I take back my comments from last week completely! :-) You did a great job in landing this vendor. I'm praying that they'll follow the model of other vendors and offer more of their products here in the coming month (I'm especially hoping for something like Topaz Enhance - even a subset would be cool - just enhancing video resolution alone without any tweaks would be a great tool; it would be frustrating for them to offer Enhance since I don't have Adobe After Effects :-/ )

G

Problem with Topaz on my XP2.

Whenever I open a pre-existing video, it plays the audio, but there is a blank screen. Any ideas how to recttify?

Thanks...

What a cool program! I just downloaded and tried it out and it did what it said it would. The still picture I captured was from some video of my 10 month old son (and I have tons of that! lol) and the shot was very clear. I give this a thumbs up!! Thanks, GOTD.

Installed and used without any problems. For those of you who either miss out on today's offering or would like other options, check out Image Grabber at http://paul.glagla.free.fr/imagegrab_en.htm. It's free and can be set to capture by number of frames or seconds so offers some more flexibility but not as high a resolution as today's offering. If anyone out there knows of any other freeware or open-source offerings please let me know as I like to have as many options and flexibility as possible. Thanks GAOTD!!!

Later,

Larry Johnson

#82- I agree, The enhancement is up for debate. I was able to get "better" results, but it still would need correction with Photoshop or similar program. Not worth the asking price for the results, I hope they improve this because it ia a niche that needs filling in the media world. Removing or deinterlacing the frame ( I use Flash Video Encoder) and then capturing, seems to work better from my tests and pass experiments/ use.

Great Idea- Poor Results. Keep at it Topaz Moment I think you are close.

I did have mixed results depending on the frame chosen and some were better than others, but all would need some correction.
MB

This does capture a better image than a paused still, and the use of multiple framws is great. My tests show that it is a good app, but installing was strange. I used the setup and then clicked on the next icon and repaired??? what was working already (I did register it first) but what is up with this second install??? Oh well, I have an app that for free works like they said it does, Thanx GAOTD.

It's okay, but it would not load *.flv files without a problem, saying it didn't have the proper codecs, for which I know I have as complete a set as you need for viewing almost any media.

I tried a large AVI files on my hard drive, and it wouldn't play it correctly--it was speeded up. Tried to slow it down, and it wouldn't do it.

I have found PowerDVD better, though obviously difference in cost. For someone who isn't using something like this a lot, it could conceivably be the best solution for them, but for someone who needs to do a lot of screencaps, I'll stick with the PowerDVD.

I do like the idea of an enhanced image, though I take almost everything to Photoshop when necessary to clean up artifacting.

Do appreciate the chance to experiment with new programs, though, and see which one bests suits my needs. :-)

Can I edit or delete 3 to 5 seconds of profanity in a DVD Movie?
Anybody know? This would be great, even if I could capture the scene
and delete it out, I wouldn't mind.

After installing the software, I clicked on the help menu then on enter registration code. Kaspersky anti-virus popped up a warning about a malicious process. Here are the details it provided:

Invader

This category of malicious program injects its code into the user’s address space and then passes the execution flow to the code. This gives it all the same access rights as the user. There are four main subdivisions in the "Invader" category, all of which are detected by the Proactive Defense Module.

The software is a small application that does what it says. It is easy to use, and if you have any need to grab stills from video, it is great. I will use it.

Tried installing on my Vista Home Premium. The program installs just fine but the registration program crashes every time. I get the usual "Windows is searching for a solution to the problem" and then it closes the program. Help!!! I would love to use this program.

#68 KGR..concurred,
Since two weeks McAfee Site Advisor reversed its message for GAOTD from "GREEN" to "RED" stating ".. found downloads on this site that some people consider adware, spyware or potentionally unwanted...".
Would GAOTD please clarify!

Just have time for one trial at the moment, and it failed to play an .flv vignette. Looks like a nice program, however.

"TopazMoment could not render some of the pins on the graph [huh?], you may not have the needed codecs or filters installed on your system." Then it provides a button to search for codecs on the web.

Some folks with XP, or especially Vista, might try using Sysem Restore before installing new programs. I always make a restore point before any installation.

@81 doggy:
You CAN re-install this every day you like, even after reformatting and reinstalling windows, see comment #21.
GAotD forgot the date-check, there's no activation !!!