Download and Save flash videos for FREE – simple instructions
How to Download and save a Ustream flash video file:
There are many ways to get the file, through software, plugins, etc, but the thing they all have in common is that they allow you to grab the URL (web address) for the video file, which you can then use to save the video to your hard drive.
Before you begin, I advise you to be aware of any Copyright on the material you are trying to save. If you can, try to contact the person who posted the video and ask them to Download it from their Dashboard inside the Ustream interface and send it to you using a service like DropBox. It may be that simple to get your hands on a copy and you’re definitely not stepping on the content owner’s feet.
If that is not an option, then proceed:
- You need the URL of the file. For this task I chose to use a Plugin for the FireFox web browser. If you do not have FF, then I suggest you download it. There are many many useful plugins available for this browser which can make your life easier.
Live HTTP Headers v0.17 is one such Plugin. You can install it from this link. - Once you install LHH, click on Tools–>Live HTTP Headers to open the plugin. You’ll see a screen with a bunch of browsing info. Don’t worry about that right now, but click back to the browser window and open up the link to the Ustream recording you want to save.
- PLAY the video and once the actual video is playing (after all advertisements etc have played) then you will know LHH captured the URL for the file.
Click SAVE ALL button in the LHH window and save the text file somewhere on your computer. - Open that text file with Notepad, scroll to the bottom and click the cursor to set it there. Now goto FIND (edit–>Find or CTRL+F), type in “flv” and select UP for the direction to search the file and FIND NEXT.
- When you see a full URL, like http://upmv08.gblx.upmv.ustream.tv/0/1/22/13150/12345678/1_12345678_26123442.flv?tracking=1234cd_2_1_0_0&ri=12345&rs=123&fs=12345678&foo=02227
you can copy from http up to .flv and open that in another browser window. You should get a prompt to Save the file..go ahead and do that and your video will start downloading. - Once you have the FLV file, you can use any number of video converters to work with it to get it in other formats if needed. Video conversion unfortunately is beyond the scope of this write-up.
Good luck!
Note: This technique only applies to recordings posted on UStream, not to live streams as they are being broadcast.
Hey Mitch, everything is working great so far, I just get stuck when I search flv. The video is already recorded, I really need the footage and I need to train my guys in my business urgently. This is the link *removed*. And what’s a good converter that’s free? You can reply to *removed*
thanks for your help so far.
Hey Scott,
I shot you an email, but wanted to clarify something:
When searching for the words “flv” in the text, make sure you use the link that starts with HTTP. It will look similar to the link I provided in my writeup.
good luck!
Hi, I can’t find flv anywhere in the log, could you help me ?
Hi, I can’t find flv anywhere in the log either, could you help me ?
Just want to say thanks for this, I spent all evening trying to figure out how to DL a video from ustream, this worked far better than any program good.
I use Allavsoft to batch download ustream videos to MP4, AVI, MOV, WMV etc.