Documentation:Video

You can play video files, video clips and others using the VLC media player. You can resize, change the aspect ratio, crop videos, load subtitles, deinterlace, save snapshots, and convert videos as DirectX wallpapers.

Video tracks of the .asf, .avi, .divx, .dv, .mxf, .ogg, .gm, .ps, .ts, .vob, and .wmv formats are supported.

Playing a Video Track

There are two main ways to open and play a video track:

1. Select File => Quick Open File... or key CTRL-O.
2. Select a video track and double-click it.

The selected track is played.

Loading Subtitle Tracks

A subtitle is a textual version of a movie’s dialogue. Subtitles are helpful if you are viewing a movie in a language that is not understandable to you. You can load subtitles for video tracks. Subtitles of the formats .cdg, .idx, .srt, .sub, .utf, .ass, and .ssa are supported.

VLC can read subtitles for the media such as DVD, SVCD, OGM files, and Matroska (MKV) files.

To enable the subtitle for a track:

1. Select Load under Subtitle from the Video menu. The Open Subtitles File dialog box is displayed.
2. Locate the file which contains the subtitle and click on Open. The subtitle is displayed.

Zoom

You can enlarge videos in different sizes. This option is useful if you want to change the size of a video track which is being played. The supported sizes are 1:4 Quarter, 1:2 Half, 1:1 Original and 2:1 Double.

To view a video in a particular dimension, select a dimension from Zoom in the Video menu. The track is resized based on the selected dimension.

Deinterlace

Deinterlace refers to a process where interlaced video signals are converted into non-interlaced signals. VLC provides the Discard, Blend, Mean, Bob, Linear, and X deinterlacement methods.

1. Select Deinterlace from the Video menu. The Deinterlace menu has a sub menu which contains a list of methods.
2. Select a method and observe the change in the video being played.

Aspect Ratio

Aspect ratio refers to the width of a picture in relation to its height. For example, the ratio 4:3 means four units wide to three units high. VLC provides a list of aspect ratio values and they are Default, 1:1, 4:3, 16:9, 16:10, 2.21:1, and 5:4.

To select an aspect ratio, select Aspect Ratio from the Video menu. The video is adjusted based on the selected ratio.

Crop

This option is helpful if you want to capture a small portion of a video as an image. This also helps crop the black bars of the top and bottom of a video.

The cropping values that are supported are Default, 16:10, 16:9, 1.85:1, 2.21:1, 2.35:1, 2.39:1, 5:3, 4:3, 5:4, and 1:1.

To crop a video that is played, select a value from Crop in the Video menu. The video is cropped based on the selected value.

Full Screen

This option is useful if you want to watch the video in the full screen mode.

1. Select Full Screen from the Video menu. The video occupies the entire screen.
2. To return to the original mode, press Esc on the keyboard or right-click the mouse and select the Leave Full Screen option. The video returns to its original mode.

Note: When you switch to full screen, the controls may appear for a short period of time. To restore the controls after they disappear, move the mouse or press any key on the keyboard.

Always on Top

This option is useful if you want the VLC media player to remain on the top of the screen always when other applications or files are open.

1. To make the VLC media player appear on top of the screen, select Always on Top from the Video menu.
2. If you do not want VLC to appear on the top of the screen, select the Always on Top option from the Video menu and manually minimise the VLC application.

DirectX Wallpaper

This option is useful if you want to display the video which is being played as your desktop wallpaper.

To view the current video file as wallpaper

1. Select Advanced File Open from the Media menu. The Open dialog box is displayed.
2. Select a file and click Play.
3. Select DirectX Wallpaper from the Video menu.

The wallpaper mode displays the video as the desktop background. Note that this feature works only if you deactivate overlay under Windows XP.

Snapshot

This option is useful if you want to capture a portion of the video as an image.

1. Select Advanced File Open from the Media menu. The Open dialog box is displayed.
2. Select a file and click Play.
3. To capture an image from the video, select Snapshot from the Video menu.

The image is captured as a .png file and is saved in the C:\My Pictures folder by default.