NuGet-Packages:
| Package | Description |
|---|---|
| ScreenCapture.NET | The core-package required to use ScreenCapture.NET captures or write your own. |
| ScreenCapture.NET.DX11 | DirectX 11 based capturing. Fast and supports the whole set of features. This should always be used if possible! Note: This might not work on windows hybrid systems (check the docs and this issue) |
| ScreenCapture.NET.DX9 | DirectX 9 based capturing. Slower then DX 11 and does not support rotated screens and GPU-accelerated downscaling. Only useful if the DX11 package can't be used for some reason. |
| ScreenCapture.NET.X11 | libX11 based capturing for the X-Window-System. Currently the only way to use ScreenCapture.NET on linux. Quite slow and can easily break depending on the X-Server config. Works on my machine, but it's not really a high proprity to support at the moment. Does not support rotated screens and GPU-accelerated downscaling. |
Usage
// Create a screen-capture service IScreenCaptureService screenCaptureService = new DX11ScreenCaptureService(); // Get all available graphics cards IEnumerable<GraphicsCard> graphicsCards = screenCaptureService.GetGraphicsCards(); // Get the displays from the graphics card(s) you are interested in IEnumerable<Display> displays = screenCaptureService.GetDisplays(graphicsCards.First()); // Create a screen-capture for all screens you want to capture IScreenCapture screenCapture = screenCaptureService.GetScreenCapture(displays.First()); // Register the regions you want to capture on the screen // Capture the whole screen ICaptureZone fullscreen = screenCapture.RegisterCaptureZone(0, 0, screenCapture.Display.Width, screenCapture.Display.Height); // Capture a 100x100 region at the top left and scale it down to 50x50 ICaptureZone topLeft = screenCapture.RegisterCaptureZone(0, 0, 100, 100, downscaleLevel: 1); // Capture the screen // This should be done in a loop on a separate thread as CaptureScreen blocks if the screen is not updated (still image). screenCapture.CaptureScreen(); // Do something with the captured image - e.g. access all pixels (same could be done with topLeft) //Lock the zone to access the data. Remember to dispose the returned disposable to unlock again. using (fullscreen.Lock()) { // You have multiple options now: // 1. Access the raw byte-data ReadOnlySpan<byte> rawData = fullscreen.RawBuffer; // 2. Use the provided abstraction to access pixels without having to care about low-level byte handling // Get the image captured for the zone IImage image = fullscreen.Image; // Iterate all pixels of the image foreach (IColor color in image) Console.WriteLine($"A: {color.A}, R: {color.R}, G: {color.G}, B: {color.B}"); // Get the pixel at location (x = 10, y = 20) IColor imageColorExample = image[10, 20]; // Get the first row IImageRow row = image.Rows[0]; // Get the 10th pixel of the row IColor rowColorExample = row[10]; // Get the first column IImageColumn column = image.Columns[0]; // Get the 10th pixel of the column IColor columnColorExample = column[10]; // Cuts a rectangle out of the original image (x = 100, y = 150, width = 400, height = 300) IImage subImage = image[100, 150, 400, 300]; // All of the things above (rows, columns, sub-images) do NOT allocate new memory so they are fast and memory efficient, but for that reason don't provide raw byte access. }
If you know which Capture-provider you're using it performs a bit better to not use the abstraction but a more low-level approach instead.
This is the same example as above but without using the interfaces:
DX11ScreenCaptureService screenCaptureService = new DX11ScreenCaptureService(); IEnumerable<GraphicsCard> graphicsCards = screenCaptureService.GetGraphicsCards(); IEnumerable<Display> displays = screenCaptureService.GetDisplays(graphicsCards.First()); DX11ScreenCapture screenCapture = screenCaptureService.GetScreenCapture(displays.First()); CaptureZone<ColorBGRA> fullscreen = screenCapture.RegisterCaptureZone(0, 0, screenCapture.Display.Width, screenCapture.Display.Height); CaptureZone<ColorBGRA> topLeft = screenCapture.RegisterCaptureZone(0, 0, 100, 100, downscaleLevel: 1); screenCapture.CaptureScreen(); using (fullscreen.Lock()) { IImage<ColorBGRA> image = fullscreen.Image; // You can also get a ref image which has a slight performance benefit in some cases // RefImage<ColorBGRA> refImage = image.AsRefImage(); foreach (ColorBGRA color in image) Console.WriteLine($"A: {color.A}, R: {color.R}, G: {color.G}, B: {color.B}"); ColorBGRA imageColorExample = image[10, 20]; ImageRow<ColorBGRA> row = image.Rows[0]; ColorBGRA rowColorExample = row[10]; ImageColumn<ColorBGRA> column = image.Columns[0]; ColorBGRA columnColorExample = column[10]; RefImage<ColorBGRA> subImage = image[100, 150, 400, 300]; }