My Latest Screencast Video

I started a new video series on ShowMeDo for videos intended for my Introduction to Unix class.  I posted the first one yesterday.  It has really basic Unix stuff. These videos will be available too late to be a benefit much this semester, but will be available for next time.   I decided to post these videos to ShowMeDo, instead of K-State Online so that other people can view and give some constructive feedback.

From a screencasting perspective, it was some firsts for me.

1. First time to produce a screencast recorded on Linux using RecordMyDesktop, although I did get the bugs worked out on that a couple weeks ago.
   
2. First screencast to zoom in on portions of the screen.
3. First screencasts with lots of call outs - highlighting and text
   

The Good:
1.  The technical aspects of the recording the audio were good.

I recorded the audio at home, where there is less background noise than anywhere I've found at work. Being in a quiet place seems to be really important. I also used the newer version of Audacity and have now figured out the microphone placement of my new mic.

2.  The Zoom and Call Outs make it fairly clear.

3.  I'm very pleased about being able to record the video in Linux and then edit the video with Camtasia Studio.


The Bad:

1.  I spent way too much time editing it.

I was going to record the audio from a script, while doing the video.  But I can't seem to do that very yet.  If   just do it off-the cuff with no script, I can record audio and do the video at the same time .  But it ends up being long and has lots of "ums" and "ahs".  If I read a script while trying to do the video, I tend do one or the other.  To keep the video shorter, I want to have audio going while I'm typing on the computer.  So, I ended up recording the audio separate again.  Since most of the video was just typing in the shell, I did zooms between two shell windows.  But it took a really long time to edit it.

I MUST cut my production time down!  As a teacher doing 4 classes, I just can't afford to spend about a day and a half to make a video for one lesson.  More experience with the editor will help.  Maybe I can also make the recording so that less editing is needed.

2.  I'm not very good at using call outs and zooms in Camtasia Studio.

3.  I had a cold about a week ago and still sound a little nasal.

Next Time:

I want to try something different that might help cut down on the editing.  I'll record the audio and video together and go back and forth between speaking and operating the computer.  I'm hoping that I can cut out the dead audio and slide it to while I'm operating the computer and then trim out the video recorded while I was speaking.

Get the Flash Player to see this movie.

Link to the ShowMeDo Video page