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Downloading Flash Video to my PC

Posted: Sun Apr 13, 2008 10:18 am
by titan
So, I've been trying to figure out how to download a flash video -- the one I'm trying to get in particular is SWF -- to my PC so I can watch it later. I've been having a little trouble finding the software to do that as all my searches want me to go to Adobe. Obviously not what I want. Additionally, the video I'm trying to download is from my school, and the video is on a secure server (HTTPS). On top of that, I need a way to play it on my PC as well.

A question Im sure a lot of you will want an answer to is why I need this. It's so I can watch the video on my notebook while I'm at work. I have no internet access there.

Re: Downloading Flash Video to my PC

Posted: Sun Apr 13, 2008 10:50 am
by nerdrage
For the standalone player software, I use FLV player. To save the files themselves, I use Keep Vid. Hope this helps.

Re: Downloading Flash Video to my PC

Posted: Sun Apr 13, 2008 10:58 pm
by titan
Thanks for the links, but KeepVid doesn't do the trick.

Re: Downloading Flash Video to my PC

Posted: Sun Apr 13, 2008 11:08 pm
by crazybus
I use the Fast Video Download plugin for Firefox to download FLV and Media Player Classic with FFDShow to play it back.

edit: I think Fast Video Download only works for specific sites. If you know the url to the swf file then you can just put in the the address bar, hit enter, then use the browsers save function to get a copy of it. You should be able to use Media Player Classic to view it. Or just open the file with a web browser.

Re: Downloading Flash Video to my PC

Posted: Sun Apr 13, 2008 11:22 pm
by just brew it!
Depending on how the page containing the Flash animation is coded you may be able to find the URL of the SWF file by viewing the page source. Then just open the SWF file's URL in its own browser window (copy-paste the URL into the address bar), then do a "File -> Save Page As" to save the flash file to your hard drive.

Assuming you've got the Flash plugin installed, you should be able to play the video from your hard drive simply by dragging and dropping the file into an empty browser window.

Edit: IE apparently doesn't let you save .swf files using File -> Save As, but Firefox does. So use Firefox for this.

For example, let's take a look at http://badgerbadgerbadger.com. If you view the source and search for the string "swf", you discover that the Flash file is /badger.swf (i.e. it's full URL is http://badgerbadgerbadger.com/badger.swf). Open the URL in an empty browser window, then save the page.

You now have a local badger.swf file that you can drop into any empty browser window to play the animation.

Edit #2: If you're a Linux user, or have Cygwin installed on your Windows box, you could also use the wget command line tool to download the .swf (once you know its full URL).

Re: Downloading Flash Video to my PC

Posted: Mon Apr 14, 2008 1:13 am
by UberGerbil
In FireFox, you don't have to grep the source: use the Media tab on Page Info (Tools menu) to get the URL (you also may be able to save it from there directly, but a lot of servers don't use a simple static address for their streaming media). Some of the download add-ons probably help with this too.

Re: Downloading Flash Video to my PC

Posted: Mon Apr 14, 2008 9:12 am
by titan
Thanks for the suggestions guys. I still haven't found the solution yet. Trying to save the page only results in a 34KB file. Trying to save it from the Media tab under Tools>Page Info also resulted in the same result. Fast Video Download isn't available for 3.0b5. Is this because of the video being on an HTTPS server?

Re: Downloading Flash Video to my PC

Posted: Mon Apr 14, 2008 9:31 am
by steelcity_ballin
AFAIK if you've viewed the flash file in a browser, like anything else, it should be in your temporary internet files cache. You should be able to just grab it from there. Alternatively, try saving the webpage to your desktop. It should be in there. So for example, I saved this posting page in IE7 and in FF 2.0.

FireFox created a nice folder for complete with the GIGABYTE flash ad in it, swf format. IE created some propriertary crap, avoid this. however if you must use IE6/7 - head to your temp folders (C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files) and check there, my swf's are there as well.

Re: Downloading Flash Video to my PC

Posted: Mon Apr 14, 2008 10:01 am
by SuperSpy

Re: Downloading Flash Video to my PC

Posted: Mon Apr 14, 2008 2:55 pm
by titan
I am now pretty convinced that something screwy is happening here. There is no temporary file for the video. I can't download it. the information I did find stated that the 34KB file was all of one frame. I guess I'll just have to suffer without being able to download the video for now.

Re: Downloading Flash Video to my PC

Posted: Mon Apr 14, 2008 7:47 pm
by Dposcorp
just brew it! wrote:
Depending on how the page containing the Flash animation is coded you may be able to find the URL of the SWF file by viewing the page source. Then just open the SWF file's URL in its own browser window (copy-paste the URL into the address bar), then do a "File -> Save Page As" to save the flash file to your hard drive.

Assuming you've got the Flash plugin installed, you should be able to play the video from your hard drive simply by dragging and dropping the file into an empty browser window.

Edit: IE apparently doesn't let you save .swf files using File -> Save As, but Firefox does. So use Firefox for this.

For example, let's take a look at http://badgerbadgerbadger.com. If you view the source and search for the string "swf", you discover that the Flash file is /badger.swf (i.e. it's full URL is http://badgerbadgerbadger.com/badger.swf). Open the URL in an empty browser window, then save the page.

You now have a local badger.swf file that you can drop into any empty browser window to play the animation.

Edit #2: If you're a Linux user, or have Cygwin installed on your Windows box, you could also use the wget command line tool to download the .swf (once you know its full URL).


Those sort of instructions have worked great in the past.......I have a ton of .swf files.

You need to know the file extension. If .swf, the above should work.
If .flv, you need something else.

I used this to convert a .flv file.

http://vixy.net/

However, the fact you are getting it from a secure server could be a issue.


Of course, Superconverter has done wonders for me in the past, and it says it supports both .flv and .swf.

http://www.erightsoft.com/SUPER.html

You still gotta get the video to your PC somehow no matter what form it is.