Using Camtasia Studio to Record Skin Previews
Tuesday, November 18, 2008 by Island Dog | Discussion: Personal Computing
in my work, I need to be able to record high-quality videos of my desktop without a lot of hassle, and have flexible options on what to do with that video when done recording. One of the most common tasks I do is to create videos of .dreams, or animated wallpapers which are used by Stardock’s DeskScapes. I use Camtasia Studio 6 from TechSmith to create these videos, and I wanted to share some tips with users. They are one of our prize sponsors in the 2008 GUI Championships, and I wanted to show some uses for Camtasia Studio in relation to skinning.
You can get a fully function trial version of Camtasia Studio here.
http://www.techsmith.com/download/trials.asp
If you are a .dream creator, you can use Camtasia to either capture the .dream running on the desktop, or use it’s editor to edit down the video and process it for use in a variety of formats.
The image above shows the Camtasia Recorder which is the starting point for recording. This has a brand new interface in version 6, and from here you can set it to record the entire desktop or just a specified part. Recording the entire desktop is perfect for recording an animated wallpaper. Sometimes I want to record just a section of the desktop, and a great example of this is when I want to show-off a really cool start-menu animation.
Other recording uses:
- Show an interactive preview of a WindowBlinds skin, icon pack, etc.
- Give a walkthrough on how to use a widget, gadget, etc.
- Record a tutorial
Once you have your recording or video ready, then we can move over to Camtasia Studio where the editing can begin. The screenshot below shows the main screen.
There are many ways you can edit your video, really only your creativity is your limitation. Camtasia allows you to add transitions, callouts, audio, etc. to your video. It also has extensive zoom and pan functions so you can get a close-up view of something going on in your video. The tools are easy to use, and are very intuitive, even for people who aren’t real familiar with video editing.
You spent all this time creating a video, now you have to find the best solution on how to share it with others. Camtasia supports producing videos in a variety of formats including:
- Flash
- MP4
- iPod/iPhone/iTunes
- CD/DVD (AVI)
- WMV
- QuickTime
- Animated GIF
- and more
Another very cool and handy feature is the ability to produce into multiple formats. This is great if you want to share your video on several different types of platforms. Of course, you can always create your own settings if you are looking for more control over the output.
As you can see, creating top quality skin previews with Camtasia Studio is a snap. Visit www.techsmith.com/camtasia.asp for more information and free trial download.
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