I recently had the misfortune of having to make a video to showcase Bubble Burster. The results were not pretty. I was literally laughed at by friends when they saw it. The problem is that while you can take screenshots of the iPhone screen, there is no way to capture video. I could have used a screen capture program but those cost around $100 (yes I am very cheap). The best solution I could come up with was to use the built in iSight on my MacBook to show the app.

In order to improve the quality of the video, I created a SIMBL plugin for the iPhone simulator. Basically it captures a screenshot every frame and then saves it to video. It overlays a circle for the pointer and a gloss iPhone frame.

It does not record audio at this time.

To install the plugin, place it in “~/Library/Application Support/SIMBL/Plugins”. create it if it doesn’t already exist. You will need to install SIMBL as well. Right now it is only for Snow Leopard but there isn’t anything major that is keeping it from working on Leopard other than some convenience methods.

If you end up using this plugin, please let me know in the comments.

Download

Update: I uploaded the demo video I made for Bubble Burster. I used a custom build that ignores the accelerometer. I then used After Effects to rotate the video to match my actions. I think I should have paused a little though, because in parts it looks unnaturally fast.

Update: Thanks to John Scott for getting it working with 3.2. It now works in 3.2 and 4.0. iPad, unfortunately, does not record correctly yet. The cosmetic settings, like setting a fake time, are not functioning either.

Update: Fake time, fake apps and fake carrier have been fixed for 4.0. A Github repository has also been created.