HuffYUV video codec is very fast. Incredibly fast! <div class="gmail_quote"><div class="gmail_quote">Video files are big, but you can compress them afterwards how you want. HuffYUV - Lossless codec from BenRG Bit-for-bit identical with the original input! HuffYUV is a lossless video codec created by Ben Rudiak-Gould... "Lossless" means that the output from the decompressor is bit-for-bit identical with the original input to the compressor, given that no color space conversion takes place. Huffyuv's algorithm is similar to that of lossless JPEG-LS, in that it predicts each sample and then Huffman-encodes the error. VLC media player and MPlayer <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huffyuv" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huffyuv</a> Step 1: Record the screen ffmpeg -f x11grab -r 25 -s 1392x1040 -i :0.0 -vcodec huffyuv -sameq Lossless-HuffYUV.avi Result: Lossless-HuffYUV.avi - it can be played with VLC and MPlayer This works on Ubuntu 9.04 It should also work on Ubuntu 8.10. No recompilation of ffmpeg is required. 2 minutes Full Screen => 250MB Lossless-HuffYUV.avi Step 2: Convert HuffYUV AVI to Mpeg2 video ffmpeg -i Lossless-HuffYUV.avi -f mpeg2video -sameq Mpeg2.mpg Result: Mpeg2.mpg - it can be played with VLC and MPlayer This works on Ubuntu 9.04 It should work on Ubuntu 8.10 too. No recompilation of ffmpeg is required. 2 minutes Full Screen => 100MB Mpeg2.mpg Step 3: Convert Mpeg2 to Microsoft MPEG-4 4.2 video mencoder -forceidx -mc 0 -noskip -skiplimit 0 -ovc lavc -lavcopts vcodec=msmpeg4v2:vhq -o Windoze-MPEG4.avi Mpeg2.mpg Result: Windoze-MPEG4.avi - it can be played by any player, including Windows Media Player. This works on Ubuntu 9.04 It should work on Ubuntu 8.10 too. No recompilation of ffmpeg or mencoder is required. 2 minutes Full Screen => 12MB Windoze-MPEG4.avi On Ubuntu 9.04 you can also encode to mpeg4 and XviD and mp4 (libx264): Step I: Convert HuffYUV AVI to mpeg4 video ffmpeg -i Lossless-HuffYUV.avi -sameq mpeg4.avi Result: mpeg4.avi - it can be played with VLC and MPlayer 2 minutes Full Screen => 6MB mpeg4.avi Step II: Convert HuffYUV AVI to XviD video ffmpeg -i Lossless-HuffYUV.avi -vcodec libxvid -aspect 1.3333 -sameq XviD.avi Result: XviD.avi - it can be played with Totem, VLC and MPlayer 2 minutes Full Screen => 5MB XviD.avi Step III: Convert HuffYUV AVI to mp4 (libx264) video ffmpeg -i Lossless-HuffYUV.avi -vcodec libx264 -sameq libx264.mp4 Result: libx264.mp4 - it can be played with Totem, VLC and MPlayer 2 minutes Full Screen => 2MB libx264.mp4 You can add an audio file to avi with ffmpeg or mencoder. VLC allows to play a video file with "an external audio file". You can edit your videos with ffmpeg, mencoder, or Avidemix (GUI), or else. </div> </div>