WGC Capture Library

Problem Statement

Modern applications and games require efficient screen capture with support for:

• 3D graphics (DirectX, OpenGL)
• Protected content (DRM, Netflix)
• HDR content
• High frame rates
• Low latency

Traditional screen capture methods (GDI, PIL, PyAutoGUI) have significant limitations:

• Cannot capture 3D content (shows black screen)
• Do not work with protected content
• Have high latency
• No HDR support
• High CPU usage

Solution

Windows Graphics Capture (WGC) API provides a modern solution to these problems:

• Direct access to DirectX frame buffer
• Support for all content types
• Minimal latency
• Efficient GPU utilization
• Low CPU usage

Performance Comparison

The graph above shows the performance comparison between different capture methods:

• FPS (Frames Per Second)
• Frame capture time
• Frame delays
• Non-empty frame percentage

Features

• High-performance screen capture
• Real-time frame processing
• Support for multiple monitors
• Low latency capture
• HDR content support
• Protected content support (e.g., Netflix)
• 3D applications and games support

3D Content Support

Windows Graphics Capture (WGC)

• Full DirectX support
• OpenGL applications support
• Games capture support
• Hardware-accelerated video capture
• HDR content support
• Protected content support
• Best performance for 3D applications

MSS (Multi-Screen-Shot)

• Basic DirectX support
• Limited OpenGL support
• No HDR support
• May have performance issues with 3D content

GDI (Windows GDI)

• No DirectX support
• No OpenGL support
• No HDR support
• May show black screen for 3D content
• Suitable for static content only

PyAutoGUI

• No DirectX support
• No OpenGL support
• No HDR support
• May show black screen for 3D content
• Suitable for basic screen capture

PIL (Python Imaging Library)

• No DirectX support
• No OpenGL support
• No HDR support
• May show black screen for 3D content
• Suitable for static images

Installation

pip install wgc-capture

Usage

Basic usage:

import wgc_capture

# Initialize capture
capture = wgc_capture.WGCCapture()

# Get frame
frame = capture.get_frame()

Performance Testing

Run the performance test:

python test_capture_comparison.py

This will test different capture methods and generate a comparison report.

Performance Metrics

The test measures:

• FPS (Frames Per Second)
• Frame capture time
• Frame delays
• Non-empty frame percentage
• Memory usage

Requirements

• Windows 10 version 1803 or later
• Python 3.7 or later
• DirectX 11 compatible GPU

Building from Source

python setup.py build_ext --inplace

License

MIT License

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit a Pull Request.