OpenScreen is an open-source alternative to Screen Studio
github.com

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404 points

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jskopek

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5 days ago

75 comments

jiusanzhou ・ 11 hours ago

Smart choice using PixiJS for the rendering pipeline — WebGL gives you hardware-accelerated compositing for the zoom/pan effects without needing to shell out to ffmpeg for every preview frame. The auto-zoom feature alone makes this worth it for anyone doing quick product demos where you'd otherwise spend 20 minutes keyframing in a full NLE. Would love to see cursor click highlighting land at some point, that's the one Screen Studio feature I actually miss.

  • avinashselvam ・ 10 hours ago

    pixijs has been great for my saas as well. rendering is blazing fast compared to ffmpeg pipelines.

    • merelysounds ・ 8 hours ago

      Same, only praises; I used pixijs 10 years ago in a resource constrained mobile focused project and I keep using it today.

jlarks32 ・ 14 hours ago

Looks awesome! Super excited to try it. What are pros / cons over Cap? https://cap.so/ - also open source https://github.com/CapSoftware/cap

  • martypitt ・ 9 hours ago

    For one, OpenScreen supports Linux, whereas Cap doesn't. I appreciate it's small minority that appeals to, it's just that I'm in it.

alin23 ・ 15 hours ago

Am I in the minority for thinking ScreenStudio is actually worth the money?

The recent video I did for Cling for example (https://lowtechguys.com/cling) I’ve had many people ask about how I did it because it has just the right amount of motion and highlighting. I did it in a few minutes of editing in the ScreenStudio UI.

I’m not saying it’s a great video, but people say it conveys the info well enough and that’s what matters. It would have taken me days to do the same with DaVinci Resolve because of my inexperience with complex editors.

A $30/month subscription is indeed too much, but I see it as a one time payment for that month when I release something, then I pause the subscription. I need it rarely, very few videos need zooming and motion.

Anyway I love to see alternatives like OpenScreen! What I would miss the most would be presets, not sure if it’s already there, but it’s a nice quality of life feature to have a consistent look to the motion effects between videos.

  • RestartKernel ・ 15 hours ago

    I think it's mostly just that a subscription seems weird for a tool like this. Most users would probably only need it occasionally, and with a subscription you can't just add it to your toolbox to grab when that time comes.

    • edoceo ・ 15 hours ago

      IMO a big disservice to the universe has been done with the recurring revenue drive. Many services could/should offer a one-shot option, with the highest margin. Somehow the world got stuck on SaaS model so hard that one off is completely ignored.

      I know why the capital class loves MRR I'm just mad that OTC is ignored.

      • gobdovan ・ 9 hours ago
        ・ 3 more

        I am struggling with finding a good model for desktop apps. The subscription model always seems to yield the most money, but I too dislike subscriptions.

        One-shot option seems attractive, but the desktop (MacOS at least) app market is actually so niche that the SAM is somewhere in the low thousands. So, if I would offer a one-time 100$ app, I'd have 100k$ before taxes. And for that revenue, there's developing, marketing, plus support and maintenance. So to match a dev's salary, I'd need to make 2-3 successful apps a year, that I'd also have to maintain for a long time.

        I think maybe there's a mid-ground with buy forever, 1 year updates, so people get the product they paid for, and if they want updates or support the development they can re-buy, however I'm yet to hear opinions on this model.

        • feznyng ・ 4 hours ago

          > I think maybe there's a mid-ground with buy forever, 1 year updates, so people get the product they paid for, and if they want updates or support the development they can re-buy, however I'm yet to hear opinions on this model.

          As far as desktop software is concerned, I think this a commonly accepted approach. Sublime Text is probably the most notable example.

        • wongarsu ・ 4 hours ago

          Isn't that just how most software used to be sold? If you buy Photoshop CS5 or MS Office 2023 you get the product as it's released and maybe a year of bugfix releases (but no new features). If you want the new features buy Photopshop CS6 or MS Office 2024

          Personally I like the model, as long as old versions stay truly static and don't get enshittification updates. It aligns incentives on feature development far better than subscription models: if you make genuine improvements you get recurring sales, if you don't then existing users will just stay on the old version. And existing users are protected from features or UI changes they disagree with

    • alin23 ・ 15 hours ago

      For me it would make more sense to have something like “unlock for a week” if the dev wants to keep the ongoing revenue model. Of course a lifetime purchase is even better, not sure why that’s not an option.

      I would be happy to pay $100 for unlimited access and be locked into the current version of the app, maybe only have minor version updates free so you don’t get locked into a buggy version.

      But that’s a more complicated licensing model to implement I guess.

    • whywhywhywhy ・ 5 hours ago

      If you only need it occasionally doesn’t subscription make sense? Just pay for the months you need it.

      I’m cautious of adding subscription products i would depend on to my tools but if it’s something I definitely only need once a year I just buy a month of it.

      Although $30/mo is a bit much for what it does. So if they did go one off presumably it would be about $500 a license.

    • zahradeenie ・ 8 hours ago

      this! i used screen studio maybe 2-3 times over the course of 3 months

  • ergocoder ・ 11 minutes ago

    > Am I in the minority for thinking ScreenStudio is actually worth the money?

    This is a classic question to every paid software. The answer is it depends.

  • thatxliner ・ 15 hours ago

    It used to not be a subscription, and like that it would've definitely have been worth the money

    • vochsel ・ 12 hours ago

      +1 this, I bought it when it was a flat fee for a year of updates. That year's up now and I'd happily pay for another, but not as a subscription...

  • canxerian ・ 7 hours ago

    I used ScreenStudio for a year. Then, when my annual subscription was up for renewal I tried https://cap.so/ and https://screensage.pro/

    After experiencing many bugs and UX oddities with both of those, I went back to ScreenStudio.

    ScreenStudio is reliable and produces the best results for my use case (educational content and client updates)

  • IshKebab ・ 11 hours ago

    I must be in the minority but I find that constant panning/zooming to be very distracting and almost dizzying. The sharp start of the easing curves is pretty awful too. I'm surprised people like it.

    I'd probably do it with arrows or fading out parts of the screen instead.

    • alin23 ・ 10 hours ago

      A lot of the time it is, I agree. I would love the ability to do more highlighting and less panning. But in a small 700px wide video, zooming is kind of necessary to make it clear where the action is coming from. Because the app window is so large and packed.

      And these recording editors don’t have arrows and callouts, not even a freeze frame. I have to plan the recording to the letter and after 10 frustrating takes I just say fk it and try to polish the least confusing take

      Maybe I should start contributing to openscreen to get the ideal recording editor people are looking for instead of paying and complaining.

  • stavros ・ 6 hours ago

    The subscription model for an app I'm running on my desktop is taking the piss a bit. I'm fine paying for stuff I use, but I miss buying apps once and either using them as much as I want, or paying to upgrade.

    Now I'm both locked in to paying every month, and can't keep using the app as it was when I bought it, because it auto updates and most apps will invariably have a server component that will quickly become incompatible with old app versions.

    I hate the direction of "we'll force you to update even if you don't like the new direction, and we'll force you to pay for the privilege", so I'm voting with my wallet on this.

  • unicornporn ・ 14 hours ago

    Uhm, but ScreenStufio is not available for Linux (or Windows for that matter)?

    OpenStudio apparently is and I'm hyped.

  • BoorishBears ・ 13 hours ago

    > A $30/month subscription is indeed too much, but I see it as a one time payment for that month when I release something, then I pause the subscription. I need it rarely, very few videos need zooming and motion.

    If I think something is worth the money, I typically don't need to actively decide to pause the subscription each time I use it.

    • alin23 ・ 10 hours ago

      Right, it’s not worth $30/month all year for me because I don’t use it past demo videos for when I publish a new app or large update. Which happens rarely.

      But if I was that kind of user who did demos monthly, the time saved on one or two videos that month is worth $30.

    • 7bit ・ 9 hours ago

      The commenter you're replying to said he needs it only occasionally. It makes perfect sense to pause a subscription if you don't use it. Not doing so would be a waste of money. How can you critisise that, don't be ridiculous

om252345 ・ 3 hours ago

For non AI era, putting efforts to make software like Screen Studio and charge $30 per month might have made sense. But with AI, burning credits for Open source will become a trend. Hail oss..

josephcsible ・ 18 hours ago

Does this have any advantages over OBS Studio?

  • hackyhacky ・ 17 hours ago

    Speaking as someone who has used both: yes. OBS is a general-purpose recording/streaming system. It gives you a lot of flexibility, but it can take some work to make things look "nice."

    Screen Studio (and so OpenScreen as well) are "opinionated" and are designed to create aesthetic videos with minimal configuration. They can't do a lot of the things that OBS can do, but if all you want is to record your desktop with a webcam overlay, it's a lot easier.

    • triilman ・ 16 hours ago

      can it utilize my accelerator or GPU for best performance. and is it support kind of encode like av qucksync?

  • xgulfie ・ 3 hours ago

    OBS + kdenlive can also get you here, but this product is meant to be purpose-built and time-saving specifically for the computer instructions use case

  • neoCrimeLabs ・ 17 hours ago

    OBS is more focused on live-streaming, even if it can be general purpose.

    OpenScreen is more about screen recording, once recorded it turns into a simple-ish NLE that is focused on editing screen-casts.

  • gargan ・ 11 hours ago

    It's the automatic zooming animations. I've not found any OBS scripts that can do this?

  • csomar ・ 12 hours ago

    Yes. For me personally, I am only interested in creating short demo videos in as little time as possible. OBS is an advanced software that requires me to learn to use it.

    I just downloaded this and had a zoom effect video from the first attempt. The learning curve is roughly zero.

ramkarthikk ・ 11 hours ago

I've been using this for the past month or so and have had nothing but positive experience. It's easy to use and works well. I wish the zoom was a slider instead of preset options, that way I could get finer control. Easily one of the best apps I found recently along with Handy.computer.

gargan ・ 11 hours ago

Also checkout https://screenix.studio/ if you're on Linux

I just tried Open Screen but it didn't work on my machine (Cachy OS) - it didn't detect the screen or my microphone. Hopefully it gets better

karimf ・ 16 hours ago

Nice project. I thought of building exactly this.

Since it's much easier to port source code to other languages now, I'd love to see more projects like written in Swift, or C#.

steveharing1 ・ 9 hours ago

This is really useful when it comes to recording product demo videos as well as UI is so clean and minimal that it feels like modern open source.

fodkodrasz ・ 12 hours ago

I see that this is for MacOS. Isn't there a stock feature for screen recording, like on the iPhone, or on Windows (snipping tool can do screen recordings since Windows 10 or 11)?

  • addandsubtract ・ 9 hours ago

    There is, using QuickTime. The repo just fails to mention the benefits of this by assuming everyone knows what Screen Studio is and does.

    • JCharante ・ 8 hours ago

      to be fair if you don't know about screen studio why are you looking at an oss alternative?

      • bigfishrunning ・ 6 hours ago

        I don't know about screen studio, but if I were looking for a way to edit screen recordings I wouldn't be searching for an "open source alternative", I would be searching for "open source software"

        Defining your project as an open source alternative to another program is a mistake I think

      • addandsubtract ・ 6 hours ago

        Fuck me for being interested in projects posted on HN, I guess.

Nevin1901 ・ 18 hours ago

Thank you so much for making this. Screen studio was unbelievably expensive for what it was

tuzemec ・ 11 hours ago

That's pretty cool!

Btw, it seems that "How trimming works" screen has some missing translations.

__mharrison__ ・ 12 hours ago

I'd rather have the metadata from click and typing events and use that to create a davinci project...

dhruv3006 ・ 14 hours ago

Great project - but screen studio is actually pretty awesome!

marktolson ・ 17 hours ago

Genuinely impressed with this! Thank you!

SilentM68 ・ 18 hours ago

Nifty app!

Just tried the AppImage version on Linux, simple to use, and works Ok on my end.

Suggest you add preferences dropdown to floating bar, and ability to highlight parts of an area for record, ability to set the default save location or change it at will. Also noted that though I closed the app via the customary way, and removed the AppImage, the apps ICON remained present in GNOME's notification area.

Will keep an eye on its progress since OBS (what I used) seems to have stopped receiving updates :)

  • josephcsible ・ 18 hours ago

    > OBS (what I used) seems to have stopped receiving updates :)

    No it hasn't: https://github.com/obsproject/obs-studio/commits/master/

    • SilentM68 ・ 14 hours ago

      Hmm, for the longest time, the Flatpak version of the app in my Linux OS was warning me that a particular older org.freedesktop.Platform runtime was end of life, and that OBS project should update their compatibility hence OBS was being classified as a security risk during the update process.

      Having said that, and reading your reply, I stand corrected and I take it back as I did an update and the error is nowhere to be found. Not sure how the runtime was updated to the latest, 25.08, but assume it was the obs project.

      :)

youniverse ・ 18 hours ago

Now we need an open source self hostable Loom.

  • crummy ・ 17 hours ago

    Haven’t tried it, but here is one: https://github.com/MarconLP/snapify

    • DougMerritt ・ 15 hours ago

      1. It says it is $8/month, which is not mentioned on the github page, so I had been thinking it was free in addition to being AGPL-3.0; it links to https://snapify.it/ which is where I see the fee.

      2. It says "for everyone" but looks like it might be Linux-specific, and it doesn't say anything about which OSes are supported.

      • josephcsible ・ 13 hours ago

        IIUC, the fee is just to use their instance, and hosting your own instance is actually free. Also, it looks like the client side of it runs in a browser, so it will support pretty much any OS.

lofaszvanitt ・ 4 hours ago

"OpenScreen is your free, open-source alternative to Screen Studio (sort of)."

If you rip something off, at least have the decency to not compare your product to it. I mean, why is it good to have zero revenue and at the same time killing revenue for something else, that existed for a long time?

What's wrong with people, why are they biting their own hand? FOSS is a trojan horse and look, how many borderline idiotic manchildren kill their livelihood and offer their arz on a platter and at the same time killing revenue streams for others. And for what? So someone could expropriate it in an instant???

I mean what on earth is wrong with people???

  • jskopek ・ 3 hours ago

    To be clear - I didn't create this app, but I do think it's cool that good open source alternatives are emerging and felt like this might be interesting to the community

  • gumby271 ・ 4 hours ago

    What the fuck?

colesantiago ・ 18 hours ago

Thanks to open source and AI, we don't need every software to be a subscription or an enshittified SaaS.

Screen Studio at $29/mo is unusually and extremely expensive for a video recorder app, and not counting the fact that it is proprietary, which means they can change pricing at any time.

Thanks for building this.

  • danpasca ・ 17 hours ago

    Yep. I've had ChatGPT build many simple python scripts or browser extensions that I can use for free instead of paying for subscriptions that shouldn't be subscriptions in the first place.

mc7alazoun ・ 18 hours ago

Thanks for sharing! I'll give it a go and send back my feedback.