Even tried creating copies of an original DVD? If yes then you must be knowing that this isn’t any easy job. A DVD containing movie is copyright protected and the security feature won’t permit you to create copies easily. But that is why I write this blog. Workarounds to make life easier.

Official laws do not do not permit you to create copies of original movies and I request you to use this method to create backups for your personal use only.

DVD shrink is the best freeware available to backup your DVD on your hard drive or use it simultaneously with your DVD burning software to replicate the DVD on another empty DVD.

Usually movies in a DVD come in two formats - the regular DVD5 single-layer DVD, or DVD9, also called dual layer DVD, which has almost double the capacity. Movies in DVD9 format cannot fit on recordable DVD5 (DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD+RW, or DVD-RW). DVD shrink compresses the video files and omits the unwanted files (like trailers and making of movie etc.) so as to fit the DVD9 format in your empty DVD5 DVD.

From the website:

Most DVDs are designed to prevent you from making copies.

The first preventative measure is encryption. Commercial DVD titles are often encrypted, which prevents you from either copying them to your hard drive, or if you manage to do so, being able to play the resulting files. DVD Shrink overcomes this problem with built-in decryption algorithms.

The next problem is not so easy. Most DVD video titles are simply too large to fit, without modification, onto a single recordable DVD-R disk. DVD Shrink overcomes this problem by compressing or “shrinking” the data from your original DVD.

DVD Shrink also allows you to re-author your DVD. You can make your own compilation from one or more source DVDs, or select only the parts of a DVD which you intend to view, thus preserving more space on your backup for the highest quality viewing.

Last but not least, why use DVD Shrink? Because DVD Shrink is free!

You can backup your DVD in two ways - Full Disc and in Re-Author mode.

Full Disc Backup (default)

This is the default option and here you can remove the files which you do not need in your backup to reduce the final file size. You are permitted to change the compression settings to no compression, Automatic or Custom Ratio. Check Edit > Preferences > Target DVD Size to change the default options for automatic backup.

Re-Author Mode:

This mode gives you better control over your backup files and it allows you to build a compilation from more than one movie DVD source.

When you click on the backup icon to view the backup dialog box you will find a Target Device tab where you can choose where to store your backup. Under the DVD Region tab; you can choose your backup to be region-free. The quality settings tab is very useful considering you are compressing the file to 4.3 GB. There is Deep Scan Analysis option, which encodes your DVD in two passes - this will improve video quality but will take time. In addition when video is compressed some errors can creep in which are removed by comparing the original video with your final compressed video.

DVD Shrink will open the DVD writing application if you had chosen to backup your DVD in another DVD.

Download DVD Shrink

Capturing screenshots of a video running in Windows Media Player isn’t just a click of a button easy. Many times when I had tried to capture screenshots of a movie running in Windows Media Player using “Print Screen” button I used to receive a black image. Recently I came up with these easy methods to capture screenshots which require little tweaking of the Media Player settings. Starting with the easiest method:

While a movie is running or paused in Windows Media Player and you want to capture the screenshot of that movie then instead of pressing “Print Screen” try pressing “Ctrl+I”. A window opens where you can choose the path to save the image file.

Now if you like using the “Print Screen” button for the job then you need to do little easy tweaking in Media Player settings just once and you will be done. So here we go:

• Open Windows Media Player
• Go to Tools>Options
• Select Performance Tab
• Click on the Advanced button down below
• Uncheck the “Use Overlays” option.
• Click Ok and then click Apply
• You are done

Now you can use your “Print Screen” button to take screenshots of video in Windows Media Player.

“Hey Watch” is a dedicated online video encoding platform, which lets you get any videos and encode them in the format you want. Hey Watch after there launch on December 25th, 2006 opted to end the beta version on January 10th, 2007 instead of staying in beta for ever…

How HeyWatch works:

• Register yourself as is the case with any other online service.
• Enter the URL of the online video or browse through your hard disk to upload the video locally.
• Upload the video.
• When uploaded, the video is displayed in RAW video section.
• Choose the encoding setting and you are “done”.

The supported video sources are:

• Online video services (Youtube, Myspace, Google Video, Metacafe, and more).
• Video Podcast feeds.
• Video links (direct or from a webpage).
• Videos from your hard disk.

The output formats and supported devices are:

• Formats (DVD, zune, iRiver H3×0, Divx, iAudio X5, TiVo DVR, mov, MP4, flv, swf, asf, Real, vcd, svcd, 3GPP2…).
• Devices (Mobile phone, iPod, PSP, NDS, Archos, Pocket PC, Creative Zen,…).

The Hey Watch service is free for 10 monthly encoding sessions, then requires a $4.99 monthly fee for more than 10 months, and up to 100 monthly encoding sessions.