Guide to Demo Recording, Video Editing, and more

[Azimuth]

Foreword: This guide isn't professional by any means and is based on my own experience and things I've learned over the years making videos myself. The Artistic Direction section is subjective and based on my own opinion, you're welcome to create things as you feel free.

Anyone that has any additions, advice, or information that they would like to add, or has any questions relating to the content contained within, leave a reply here in this thread and I will attempt to get back to you when I can. Before asking though, please read through the entire guide, watch the supplied videos and read through the Links provided in Useful Links section before posting. Otherwise I will either ignore your post or refer you to the relevant sections.

Contents:
<snip>

1. Recording

1a. Recording a Demo File

-How To-
Recording:
1. Enable Developer console. Options>Multiplayer Options>Enable Developer Console "Enabled".
2. Open Console. Default key is ` (Tilde).
3. Type "record demofilename". eg. record farmhouse. Your game may 'lag' for a second as it starts recording.
4. The demo will continue recording until you open the console and type "stop", leave the server or change maps (this will stop current demo recording and create a new demo with the "demofilename_1" suffix. eg. farmhouse_1.
Playback:
1. Open console. Type "playdemo demofilename". eg. playdemo farmhouse.
2. Hold shift+F2 to open demoui. This can be used to pause/play/skip ticks.

<snip>


2. Useful Console Commands

cl_crosshair_alpha 0 - Makes crosshair invisible. Needs to be reset manually.
cl_glow_blur_scale 0 - Turns glowing outlines off.
cl_interp 0.1 - Sets lerp value to 100ms to make sure animations are smooth in demo playback. It will cause things to not align 100% ie. it will make it appear as though you're not shooting where you're aimed at.
cl_playerspraydisable 1 - Disables player sprays.
closecaption 0 - Disables captions.
hidehud - Has plenty of different options, these options can also be combined, to do so add the numbers for each option together. Ie. to use 1, 64 and 128 together use hidehud 193. Type hidehud to view the base numbers and what they affect.
mat_monitorgamma_tv_enabled 0 - Disables extra gamma (best to add it post-production).
mp_gamemode coop - Can be used to get rid of the survival timer.**
r_drawothermodels 2 - Draws wireframes for infected and survivors - useful for showing shots through the wall. r_drawothermodels 1 to return to default view.
r_drawvgui 0 - Disables all hud elements including survival timer. Best to use a bind to turn it on/off as it disables the menu and console from appearing as well.
r_drawviewmodel 0 - Removes player's gun from screen. Does not remove player's legs* unfortunately.
r_flashlightbrightness 0 - Removes player flashlight.
thirdpersonshoulder - switch camera to third person.
voice_enable 0 - Disables in-game voice chat. Remember to reset to 1 before playing.

Also, for those using low violence (-lv launch parameter) remember to remove this from your launch parameters before recording, as your video will look much nicer if you don't have bodies disappearing instantly. You will have to remember to put it back in when you've finished recording though.
*The legs only apply to L4D1.
**Only applies to L4D1.


3. Demo Smoother

There are 2 different methods for demo smoothing, the first is quicker and easier to use, but requires you to be a spectator, whereas the second method gives you a greater degree of control and input but also takes longer and is far more prone to crash (nothing you can really do about that -and you will lose all your work).

3a. Autokeys

Credit goes to guyguy for discovering this method and to Licksore for teaching me this method.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nT9908ak-e8

Advantages: -Easy to use
-Quick
Disadvantages: -Very little control over camera angles
-You cannot change the angles once the demo has been recorded

3b. Manual Smoothing

All credit for this video goes to Xezium.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4z3pKNl9TmM

Advantages: -Free reign with control over the camera
-Can create complicated shots
-Does not require you to be a spectator
-If you don't like the camera angles you can reposition them
Disadvantages: -Crashes a lot. You lose all your work on smoothing if this happens.
-Time consuming and tedious.


4. Demo Editor

I originally learned about this method for slow motion from a youtuber/versus movie maker named Xan - his original video demonstration is no longer available on Youtube, so I made my own demonstration quickly (although it's not very good).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnmkF8XwBtM

I also made this second video using the demo editor to show some of the other things that are possible with the use of it. I made this video at 4am though, so I made quite a few errors, the command I use/should use to turn on/off the wireframes is r_drawothermodels 2;/r_drawothermodels 1;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVmK6tE6Ehc

<snip>

6. Colour Correction - Magic Bullet Looks

Magic Bullet Looks is available as a plugin for both Adobe products and for Sony Vegas, it is by far the best colour correction program around, it's so much better than the default colour correction that other programs come with that I won't even waste my time by providing a tutorial on how to use those.

Here is a video showing MBL being used/how to use it for colour correcting Left 4 Dead footage. All Credit for the following video goes to Ytmisd.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPzewMXpveM


7. Motion Blur - RSMB

This is probably the best motion blur in my opinion, the following video by Prodigysim shows the difference between using it and not having blur. It also shows the difference between using resampling and no resampling in Sony Vegas.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_acD6C7MzDQ


8. Sony Vegas - Resampling

The following video by Erza shows the difference that resampling makes to your video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3j2-1aqsVo

This video also by Erza shows how to set resampling to off by default in Sony Vegas.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBlKmlhsLpA

<snip>


10. Useful Links
https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/1722171?hl=en#

[guyguy]

Forgot about this until now but good work. Maybe you should turn it into a steam guide and it will get even more readers.

[Azimuth]

Originally posted by guyguy:

Forgot about this until now but good work. Maybe you should turn it into a steam guide and it will get even more readers.

It's not really L4D related outside of the demo recording, smoothing and editing and I don't really feel like continually answering questions/nor is it of a high enough standard to bother.

[Azimuth]

I cut a lot of the useless or outdated information and links from the original post. Not that anyone even looks at this guide any more/ever did. I don't want to be spreading outdated/wrong information.

[Zhorium]

Hello, about the "Demo editor" how to use the "TextmessageStart"?. I can't find any information about it or if both that editing command and the Zoom FOV command are not working.

[conker]

wonderful