Screencasting and Capture: An overview

Prerequisites Time in the classroom is precious – it is an opportunity for you to interact with the workshop leader and other participants through questions and discussions and to share your experiences and concerns. To make the most of this time we sometimes ask you to carry out learning activities ahead of the workshop so that everyone comes into the class with the same basic knowledge. We keep this prior learning to a minimum and often make use of Lynda.com videos. Lynda.com videos can be accessed by University members anytime, anywhere, through a browser or app. The workshop description will tell you if any prior learning is required. If you don’t have an environment where you can do this learning, you can come along to one of our ‘Lynda Labs’. These are scheduled every week, and are a quiet space where you can work through Lynda.com videos or other workshop resources. If you turn up to a workshop without having done the prior learning, the workshop leader may suggest that you come back on another session.

Copyright Traci Huggins makes this booklet and the accompanying slides available under a Creative Commons license (BY-NC-SA: Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike). The Oxford University crest and logo and IT Services logo are copyright of the University of Oxford and may only be used by members of the University in accordance with the University’s branding guidelines.

About the workshop designer Traci Huggins has over a decade’s experience in teaching, she has worked as a Computing Lecturer, Course Leader and Tutor in Further Education writing and delivering courses for Levels 1 to Level 5, she has also co-wrote a new Foundation Degree in Computing Science course in conjunction with Oxford Brookes University.

Traci’s teaching knowledge covers Excel, Business Computing, Information Systems, Web Design (HTML/CSS/WordPress) and SharePoint. She is a highly committed teacher who likes to ensure that everybody has the opportunity to learn to use technology in their study or workplace both effective and efficiently.

Revision history

Version Date Author Comments 1.0 September 2016 Traci Huggins

About this workshop This workshop will give you an insight into the different types of software available to create screencasts and screen capture for use as training or e-learning materials. It will also introduce you to free and open source software that will allow you to create videos for YouTube. You will not be a fully pledged screen caster by the end of the session however it will put you in a good position with the right tools and knowledge to enable you to be creative and create a fully working and adaptable e-learning courses and materials.

What you need to know There is no prerequisite for this course but we will assume that you are familiar with opening files from particular folders and saving them, perhaps with a different name back to the same or different folder. The computer networks in our classrooms may differ slightly to that which you are used to in your College or Department; if you are confused by the differences, ask for help from the teacher or demonstrators.

What is Screen Capture/Screen Casting software? Screen capture, also called screen casting software is a program that runs on your computer (there are also one or two web based programs) that allow you to record what you do on the screen as a set of slides that are played in a desired sequence as a movie. This type of software is sometimes called “an electronic learning tool”. Screen capture software can be used to create videos directly from PowerPoint presentations, software demonstrations and quizzes. You can also create your own bespoke videos.

Learning objectives This workshop covers the following learning objectives; Learning objective One – Understand the different types of screen casting software Learning objective Two – Recognise the different Output Video formats Learning objective Three – Changing the screen resolution and using microphones Learning objective Four – Creating software simulations Learning objective Five – Actions and interactions Learning objective Six – Questions and quizzes Learning objective Seven – Publishing a project I will point you at a variety of resources that will help you in achieving these objectives. They can all be downloaded from the ITLC Portfolio at; http://portfolio.it.ox.ac.uk/resource/course-pack/teaching-overview-screencasting-and-screen-capture

Learning objective One – Understand the different types of screen casting software

The term screen capture may refer to taking a screenshot of the desktop or part of it, or a screencast which is a digital recording that records activity over time. Screencasts are used in a variety of situations, they can be used to create product demonstrations, tutorials or even game videos which are popular on YouTube. Not every software application is suited for all situations though, while all can be used to record the desktop and activity on it, only a few come with capability’s to record computer games or full screen activities. Adobe Captive – Captivate can be used for creating interactive simulations, software skills training, quizzes and e-learning courses, there are versions for both Windows and Mac users. Output files can be in SWF, AVI or EXE video format. It is also possible to export a project as WAV or MP3 (audio) format. Captivate requires a program to be installed on your computer and costs about £22.86 per month on subscription. Free Trial: https://www.adobe.com/products/captivate/download-trial/try.html Camtasia Studio – Is one of the most popular screen capture software applications for Windows and Mac. It has similar functionally to Captivate, can record and expert PowerPoint presentation as movies and has a good selection of output file formats. Camtasia requires a program to be installed on your computer and will cost about £154.23 per year, educational discounts are available (for Windows). Free Trial: https://www.techsmith.com/download/camtasia/ Articulate Studio – Allows you to create online courses, quizzes and other e-learning content with an easy to use tool. Articulate requires a program to be installed on your computer and will cost about £1130.16, educational discounts are available. Free Trial: https://en-uk.articulate.com/store/trial-download.php Lectora – Lectora is an electronic learning (eLearning) development tool, also known as authoring software, developed by Trivantis Corporation. Lectora is used to create online training courses, assessments and presentations. It is also used for the conversion of Microsoft PowerPoint presentation into eLearning content. Lectora costs from £29 per month to £159.00, educational discounts are available. Free Trial: http://trivantis.com/lectora-products-free-trial/ Jing – Jing is a screen casting computer program that was launched in 2007 as Jing Project by the TechSmith Corporation, it allows you to instantly capture images and record video on your computer, then share them with anyone. Jing is widely used for uploading videos to YouTube, it is also free open source software. Jing Download: https://www.techsmith.com/jing-features.html There are dozens of other screen capture programs you can choose from, type “screen casting software” into any search engine and see what’s available, some require a subscription or yearly fee, and others are free.

Learning objective Two – Recognise the different Output Video formats Videos can be exported as standalone exe files. SWF, Flash Video, Windows Media, AVI, QuickTime and more. Most of these formats are widely supported and can be easily imported into any video editing software for more advanced editing. The different types of screen capture software listed above produce output video files in different formats. Some of the programs allow the author to choose from a selection of output file types. Some common video output file extensions and formats you may come across are. .swf - Flash video, application, games or animation .mp4 - MPEG-4 Video file .wmv - windows media Video file .mov - Apple QuickTime Movie .avi - Audio Video Interleave File .exe - executable file to run as standalone presentation .flv - Flash Video File and will only contain a video With some many file formats available how do you choose the one to use? This is something you will have to consider carefully before selecting your screen capture software. If you have a standalone presentation, then an executable file will be best, most screen capture software can create this file type. WMV movie format is also fine if the end user has a windows machine but not if they use another operating system. The right type of output file will be based mainly on your personal preferences and who your target audience is. If you want to integrate your presentation into a web page then a Flash .swf file may be the best format as nearly all computers come with Flash preinstalled. Any flash file you create will play automatically. If however you create your video in some other format, say MP4 the end user may have to download a media player to play your video. It’s worth remembering that promoting a video and then asking the user to download a media player to view it may cause some to abandon the task! Containers and Codecs Now that we have identified several output video formats it’s worth mentioning now that these files are actually called containers. An MP4 file is a container. It holds a combination of a video stream, an audio stream and possibly subtitles or captions. For the purpose of this course we only need to know that a MP4 file is really a container format. We can call an MP4 file a video but it is really a container because it can contain several kinds of media. This is analogous to the way a ZIP file can contain multiple kinds of files within it. The container format defines how to store the video and audio streams in a single file. So we can now watch a video (really a container) that has a video stream, an audio stream and possibly some other information.

Now to complicate matters a little more there are also things called codecs. Codecs are necessary to allow your video player to interpret the container format. Simplistically, codecs decode the files inside the container (MP4) allowing the video player to display a series of images on screen and audio to the speakers.

Learning more about containers and codecs is unnecessary for this course but if you are really interested a great place to start is http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/video_codec

Media Players We have already mentioned that a flash file embedded in a web page will play automatically in a web browser (Internet Explorer, Firefox and many more). But what happens if you create a file in MP4 or some other format? If you are lucky your audience may have the necessary player already installed on their computer and the file will play. If they don’t they will not be able to view the video until they downloaded the appropriate player (nearly all are free). Have a look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_media_players and search for the heading Video format capability for more detail on different types of file and the players you can use. Although this is a comprehensive do not reply on it when creating screencasts. It is always best to test your file in the media player you expect your audience to use.

Using Audacity to capture sound Audacity is a cross platform audio sequencer/editor that can record, import, edit and export audio in a variety of formats to suit a wide range of needs – including educational podcasting. The fact that it is widely used in higher education and is very capable in performance ensures its place as an essential tool in creating media. Audacity is also one of the simpler audio editors to learn and is free to download. This means Audacity will work on most computers. Audacity: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ Audacity: http://portfolio.it.ox.ac.uk/resource/course-pack/digital-media-audacity-editing-spoken-word

Learning objective Three – Changing the screen resolution and using microphones There are several things you need to do to set your computer up before creating your first screen capture. The two most important are; the screen resolution you record at and setting your computer up to capture sound. You can create your screen cast first then add your sound after – either way works fine, it just depends on how you prefer to work.

Screen Resolution The screen resolution should be set to the lowest possible setting. This will allow you to record as much of the screen as possible without losing too much quality when the capture is compressed when published. An additional benefit is that when your audience view the video on a screen with a higher screen resolution the capture dimensions will be smaller than their resolution and they will be able to see everything clearly including the text. The screen resolution you should try to record at is 800 x 600 pixels. This ensure the screen capture you create will be visible on all computer screens, something that could not be guaranteed if you recorded at a higher resolution say 1280 x 1024.

Microphones When creating a screen capture it is important that your audience can understand what you are saying when you use sound so they can easily follow what you are trying to show. For this reason it is strongly recommended that you use a good headset or even better a good microphone. It is not a good idea to use the microphone built into your laptop because there is every chance of picking up surrounding sounds. Sounds like other people talking to the sound of the computer fan, these noises will make any sound added to your screen capture sound distant and unclear.

Audacity Audacity is a free open source cross platform digital audio editor and recording computer software application available for Windows, MACs and Linux, it is used for creating and editing sound files, you can download Audacity from the following link: http://www.audacityteam.org/about/

Learning objective Four – Create software simulations

This part of section will all depend on what software you are using to create your screen cast/capture, below is just an overview;

Using Camtasia Recorder:

Camtasia Recorder allows you to define an area of your computer screen to make a movie. Every action you take on screen, such as moving the mouse, selecting options or entering text is recorded in real time. When done you have a perfect replica of everything that occurred while the recorder was on. If you are recording audio, you can record every sound that enters the microphone and any sound the computer makes as well if you want them. If you want the exclude computer-generated sounds you can turn them off in Camtasia Recorder using the Audio menu.

Camtasia Recording Options:

Before you record in Camtasia make sure that you explore the options available to you, here is a brief explanation;

Select area – this part of the recording toolbar allows you to define the screen area you want to include in your recording. Make sure the area you select is appropriate for the recording you are making and will cover all of the options on screen that you are including in your video.

Recorded inputs – this part of the toolbar allows you to set up the webcam and audio inputs.

Record button – this one is simple, click on it once to record. Then it is replaced by some other toolbar selections to set up recording effects, delete the current recording, pause it and stop recording.

Menus – the Capture, Effects, Tools and Help menus contain features and options to operate the recorder.

Captivate Recording Options:

Due to Captivate being such a versatile tool, you can create many different types of projects, pulling from many different types of content. Below is an overview of the Primary Project Types;

Blank Project – create a blank project when you want to build a lesson from scratch and add slides and elements individually. (You can also add blank slides to any project)

Project From MS PowerPoint – create a new project from an existing PowerPoint presentation, where each slide in PowerPoint becomes a slide in your Captivate project. (You can also add individually PowerPoint slides to any project)

Image Slideshow – create a new project from a series of images, where each image becomes a slide in your project. (You can also add individual image slides to any project)

Video Demo – create a full motion video of what you do on your computer.

Learning objective Five – Actions and interactions

Actions are commands that can either be triggered by the student (such as clicking a button) or triggered automatically (such as reaching the end of the slide). Actions let you customise the functionality of the course and make it more interactive. Depending on what software you are using will depend on what Actions and Interactions are available to you, below are some examples of Objects and their Actions;

Object: Action Options:

Rollover Caption

A text caption appears when the student rolls over the hot spot

Rollover Image

An image appears when the student rolls over the hot spot

Rollover Slidelet

A mini slide (with text, graphics, audio, etc.) appears when the student rolls over the hot spot. You can add an additional action for when the student clicks the hot spot

Learning Interactions

You can create interactive diagrams, games and other interactions from templates using your own text and media

Slide

Although this technically isn’t an interactive object, you can assign an action for when the slide starts and finishes

Text

You can use text hyperlinks to perform most actions

Click Box, Button, Text Entry Box, Quiz Question

You can select one action for when the student clicks/answers successfully and/or one action when failing to click/answer successfully after a specified number of attempts

Learning objective Six – Questions and Quizzes Questions, quizzes, tests, scenarios, interactions are all course elements that often make the difference between telling someone something and teaching them something. They allow both you and the student to reinforce and apply the content, assess the learning, uncover opportunities for re-teaching, and evaluate the course effectiveness. Captivate and Camtasia among others offers in some cases up to 9 questions types you can use to create a graded format and/or survey results, some examples of the types of questions available are listed below;

Multiple Choice Student chooses one or more options among several possible answers o Can have up to 15 answer choices o Available as graded or survey

True/False Student decides between two options o Can change “true” and “false” labels o Available as graded or survey

Fill in the Blank Student types a word into the space provided. o Can be case-sensitive o Can allow more than one correct

answer o Can be formatted as a multiple-choice

questions with a drop-down list o Available as graded or survey

Short Answer Student types in a longer answer to a question o Available as graded or survey

Matching Student matches items in one column with items in the other o Can have up to 8 options per column o Available as graded or survey

Hot Spot Students clicks on one or more designated hot spots on a graphic image o Can have up to 10 hot spots o Available as graded or survey

Sequence Student arranges a series of items into the proper sequence o Can be formatted as a drag and drop

or drop down list o Available as graded or survey

Rating Scale (Likert) Students evaluate statements and rate them on a scale o Can have up to 5 points on the scale o Available as survey only

Learning objective Seven – Publishing a project

Again depending on which software you have used to create your video will depend on the different options available to you when you want to publish. There are various settings that can and will affect your finished output – things you might want to consider are;

1. Whether to include a control toolbar that lets the student control the progress of the finished movie.

2. Whether to send tracking data to a learning management system (LMS) 3. How much to compress the output to accommodate slow connection speeds.

Once you have happy with your finished result you need to save this to your documents / shared drive or wherever you store your files locally. You can then upload this file to a VLE (Weblearn, Moodle, Websites, SharePoint…) for everybody to watch.

To Do: ….

You have now had the opportunity to look at the different software options available to create and work with screencast and screen capture. The following link will take you to a playlist in Lynda.com which will give you the opportunity to dip in to the following software; Camtasia, Adobe Captivate, Articulate Storyline, Articulate Studio, Lectora - Screencasting Fundamentals: https://www.lynda.com/SharedPlaylist/7af53f33150e40b38cac27ec3ae10554?org=ox.ac.uk

Further information - Getting extra help

Clinics

The IT Learning Centre offers bookable clinics where you can get pre- or post-course advice.

About Lynda.com

Lynda.com is free to all members of the University. Visit courses.it.ox.ac.uk/lynda and sign in with your Single Sign-On (SSO) credentials. Some courses recommend pre- and/or post-course playlists of Lynda.com videos to support your learning. You can watch these anywhere, anytime, and even download them on to a tablet or smartphone for off-line viewing. If you need a quiet place to work through playlists away from distractions, the IT Learning Centre offers frequent Lynda Labs that you can book on to.

About the ITLC Portfolio

Many of the resources used on the IT Learning Centre courses and workshops are made available as Open Educational Resources (OER) via our Portfolio website at portfolio.it.ox.ac.uk.

About the IT Learning Centre The IT Learning Centre delivers over 100 It-related classroom-based courses, and gives you access to thousands of on-line course through Lynda.com.

Our team of teachers have backgrounds in academia, research, business and education and are supported by other experts from around the University and beyond.

Our courses are open to all members of the University at a small charge. Where resources allow, we can deliver closed courses to departments and colleges, which can be more cost effective than signing up individually. We can also customize courses to suit your needs.

Our fully equipped suite of seven teaching and training rooms are available for hire for your own events and courses. For more information contact us at courses@it.ox.ac.uk

About Academic IT Services The IT Learning Centre is part of Academic IT Services (AcIT). AcIT engages with the University in all aspects of the use of IT for teaching, learning and outreach, including the development of the University’s Virtual Learning Environment (WebLearn), research data management advice, technology enhanced learning, and digital media services including the Replay lecture capture service. If you think AcIT can help you, contact us at academicit@it.ox.ac.uk

1

Traci Huggins

Traci.Huggins@it.ox.ac.uk

Screen Casting and Capture:An Overview

Your comfort is important..

• The toilets are along the corridoroutside the lecture rooms

• The rest area is where you registered

• The swivel seats are adjustable

• You can adjust the monitors forheight, tilt and brightness

The Course Handbook ..

Contains notes on each topic + slides

Tasks for you to practice during today’s course

Work at your own pace

Follow up work

Continue with exercises after the session

Course Clinics and Lynda Labs

Screen Casts / Capture ??

What are they?

Why would we use them?

Are they difficult to master?

Is the software expensive?

Replay Lecture Capture Service .. Adobe Captivate 9

2

Camtasia … JING ..

Output Video Files ..

.swf – Flash video, application, games or animation

.mp4 – MPEG-4 video file

.wmv – Windows media video file

.mov – Apple QuickTime Movie

.avi – Audio Video Interleave File

.exe – executable file to run as standalone presentation

.flv – Flash Video File and will only contain a video

Audacity ……

Develop a Screencast Plan….

What does my viewer need?

Do they need to perform a task or are theyto visit a website

What do you want your cast to look like

Where will it be shown; TV, YouTube, MobileDevice

Before you record your Screencast…

Clear your desktopRemove desktop icons, distracting wallpapers

Minimise interruptionsClose down notifications, email, instant messaging etc.

Use a quite roomRehearse, be familiar with the pause button!

3

Things to consider ..

• Mouse Movements

Editing your Screencast ….

Remove long pauses from the beginning and end ofvideo

Zoom in so that your audience can easily see what youare doing

Adjust the audio volume if it is too quite or too loud

Add “Callouts” such as arrows, boxes or circles to drawattention to a specific area of the screen

If you’ve recorded a “bad take”, you can edit it out

Finally ….

As you can see there are lots of things to think about whenyou’re creating a screencast.

However once you have finished it, you’ll have a valuableteaching tool that you can share with;

Students

Co-Workers

Friends

Anybody else that wants to learn…

Exporting your Screencast …

Example …. Example …

4

JING Download …..

Use the URL below and download a copy of JINGto your computer;

https://www.techsmith.com/download-jing-win-thankyou.html

Follow the instructions on line to create anaccount

Traci’s Quiz …

This presentation is made available under a Creative Commonslicence: Attribution, Non-Commercial, Share Alike.Individual images are subject to their own licensing