Top Tip! Have a Video Wallpaper as Desktop Background
Windows Vista will have a feature called Dreamscene which will allow us to have a video as a desktop background . Dreamscene will only be available to the people using Windows Vista Ultimate but for people using Windows XP , there is also a way . And that is VLC player . VLC player has a built in feature that can allow you to have any video as a wallpaper . All you have to do is the following things
1) Open VLC and check whether Wallpaper mode is enabled
Goto Settings->preferences->video->output modules->Directx
Just select the advacned option box and you will get the following window as shown below , enable the wallpaper mode , now when you run your videos and right click on it , you will see a wallpaper option .
2) Now to remove VLC from your taskbar go to
Settings->preferences->Interface->Main Interfaces->wxWidgets and uncheck the Taskbar option.
3)Now all we have to do is loop your videos , go to
Settings->preferences->playlists and you will see the required option .
This will work on most of the versions but i recommend you to use the latest version of VLC . I tried it on Windows Vista Ultimate but i got a black screen as a wallpaper which was probably due to some issues with Aero , so if anyone gets it to work in Vista , do comment about it .
via VistaRewired
NONE of this shit works! I have a Vista… I don’t get the Wallpaper on my screen, at ALL… and what exactly do you right-click on, anyway?
X chill out if u have a vista try the uper blog by Clumpen i did as h sad an it works just be patients
anyway you can script vlc to load a video on startup?
[...] How To Have a Video Wallpaper as Desktop Background by Madhur [...]
We can also take screenshot of playing videos in WMplayer by pressing CTRl +I
How do i get the wxwidgets option to appear?
that is awesome!
Happypizza are you a rocket scientist W.^V I got up and running all thannks to you!!!!
You also need to make sure you have “View Desktop Icons” selected otherwise it doesn’t work
thanks for the info on the scripts.
I have VLC and I did all the steps as it said. Then, when I go to the DirectX Wallpaper button, it is grayed out. I can’t click on it. Any one know how to fix this?
P.S. I have VLC 0.9.8a
How do you save the video as Background??? Everytime I close VLC Program the video wallpaper close to..
Done everything like you explained.
My desktop just goes black and that’s it.
(I have WinXPProSP3 and an nvidia 7 series graphics board, if that helps.)
Actually, the VLC wiki advises you to “deactivate overlay”.
I did not know what that was and found a solution:
“ok, Just go to preferences, then go to the bottom left corner and click on all (its in a box that says show settings) then you just click on the item “video” on your left (should be the last item) then on your right it should say on the top “general video settings” go down till you find “overlay video output” and uncheck it, then you can also click on the little triangle (or “+”) that’s next to the item called “video” on your left then click on output modules and on your right should be a drop down list, choose one that you think is the best (usually directx or open gl works fine)”
It’s still not working though. ):
i tried all the steps i even downloaded the 0.9.8 version i have vista ultimate but non of the steps worked..what should i do?
I tried this, but once the video was done, the screen went to an image as a background. How can I continuously loop the video?
Cant seem to get wxwidgets to appear under Settings->preferences->interface->main interface…..any solutions
I ave followed the steps about setting the wallpaper thing and its not selectable still, wat do i do or wat is the problem, its a dell inspirion am using, plz help me any1
So….. do i have to have VLC up to run it. Cause it looks like i have to…
I tried the steps (could not find the widget part in my VLC 0.9.9) and it worked! When I right click the wallpaper option is no longer greyed out, I can click it, and it works! Thanks!
i dont have the time at the moment to read through all of these, but is there a way i caould take a viseo, and set it as my wallpaper with the windows 7 professional OS?
A lot of people on this and other forums have had no success in using VLC to play a video in Wallpaper mode under Vista Home Premium. The cause of a lot of this frustration is that the instructions usually do NOT specify which version of VLC is referenced. I downloaded the latest version 1.0.3, set all the parameters and advanced setting to activate DirectX Wallpaper, but no success. SO, here is a solution that
works for me: Download the older version 0.8.6d and just install it. Open a video file and right click on it. You will NOT see the wallpaper
option. Don’t bother hunting under Preferences>Advanced Options; you won’t find anything about wallpaper or DirectX. Instead, close VLC.
Then, go to the Search function in the lower lefthand corner just above the Windows Icon. Type DirectX. Four VLC icons will appear. Select the one that says “Set Video Mode To DirectX (no video overlay)”. Now fire up VLC again, open a video and right-click on it. Now the Wallpaper option appears! Click it, minimize VLC, and the video is playing as your Desktop background. Do not expect this to keep playing when you close VLC; after all, VLC is playing it. Hope this helps. I don’t know whether this method also works for the
new 1.0.3 version.
I have found this will work even with a live webcam video feed too. I can watch myself watching myself watching myself
Great blog, there is also a video I found on how to do this at youtube, basically the same idea: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZi1GQP5PJo
and I got it to work perfectly in Vista Home Premium so I don’t know why anyone else is having problems, did you remember to set it to Directx video output?