The Screenr Blog

Freecast Your Way to Better Screencasts!

Tue, 22 Dec 2009 12:00:00 -0500

This guest post is written by Articulate’s David Anderson. You can find out more about what David has to say here.

Whether it’s a quick how-to for a co-worker, a project-demo for a client, or a special effects tutorial, all of us want to create screencasts that are effective and engaging.

That’s why one of the most common questions we’re asked is, “How can I learn to create better screencasts?”

It makes sense that questions around style, technique and delivery are more common than technical, “how-to” questions. The software is the easy part, right? Click record and off you go.

So how can you create better screencasts?

Freecasting

One of the best ways you can improve your Screencasting is by something I call freecasting. Freecasting is the screencasting equivalent of freewriting.

Freewriting, made famous by Jack Kerouac, is a writing style often called spontaneous prose or stream-of-consciousness-writing. The idea is that by writing freely, without concern for quality, grammar or punctuation, you’ll learn to “write without consciousness” and with less inhibition.

That’s exactly what freecasting is designed to do: get you recording. Freecasting helps release your attachment to “sounding good” while strengthening your presentation and improvisational speaking skills.

How does it work?

Time limits. Set aside 5-15 minutes a day when you can record without interruption. Once you click record, you screencast until your predetermined recording time is up.

Don’t stop recording until the time is up! This means you don’t stop or pause the recording for mistakes, do-overs, coughs, sneezes, phone calls, IM chats or to check your Twitter stream. If you run out of things to say, start narrating about the fact you can’t think of anything to say. You don’t stop talking and recording until the timer’s up.

Screenr’s 5-minute time limit is a perfect timer for practicing.

Select a structure. Focused screencasting is structured around a specific topic or lesson. Focused screencasts may require you first prepare your applications and recording area before you record.

Unfocused freecasting is looser and guided by your immediate thoughts. Unfocused can be as spontaneous as selecting the first application or window you see and screencasting whatever comes to mind during your recording session.

Each approaches offers unique value so it’s a good idea to work both types into your routine.

After your freecast

Review your recording. Your freecasts are private and not intended to be shared. They’re designed to improve your overall screencasting skills.

If you choose to delete your recordings, try playing each video back a few times. Take notes on what you like, don’t like or wish to improve. You may even uncover new ideas for presenting your screencasts.

So give freecasting a chance and please share your feedback in the comments.

How to Add Your Webcam to Your Screencast

Tue, 27 Oct 2009 11:43:33 -0400

You already know that Screenr can record your desktop. But did you know that Screenr can also record your webcam? It’s a great way to add that personal touch to your screencasts.

Here are some easy steps so your webcam recordings come out great.

Go to Screenr and click Record to bring up the recording frame. Don’t click the actual record button yet.
Open your webcam preview (iChat, iSight, Windows versions) so you can see yourself in the webcam preview window.
Resize Screenr’s recording frame to suit your screencast. You can record only the webcam window or your entire desktop - whatever you like.
Click the record button to record your session

Remember ALT+D will pause your recording. That’s a great way to pause when you’re adjusting your camera or moving the camera to show something new.

Screenr user @minutebio created a great screencast that shows these steps in action which can be seen below.

View this Screencast on Screenr.

Screenr now a Top 5 Twitter app

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 11:21:00 -0400

Wow! All you have voted and pushed Screenr into oneforty’s top 5 list of popular Twitter applications.

oneforty helps you to find, rate and share the best Twitter applications. Check out what GetAdam has to say about oneforty in this screencast.

Watch this screencast on Screenr

View the Screenr listing at oneforty here, and make sure you add a review and a rating to help us to get to #1!

Thanks everyone!

Case Study: How to provide customer support with Screenr

Tue, 13 Oct 2009 11:37:00 -0400

This inspiring 3 minute Screencast from Screenr user @ScottSkibell demonstrates how you can become a customer support hero with Screenr.

Thanks for sharing your story with us Scott!

Watch this screencast on Screenr

Going Beyond Mic Recording – How to Record System Sounds

Wed, 23 Sep 2009 15:19:00 -0400

You already know you can record your microphone when recording your screencasts. But every so often Screenr users ask us how they can record system sounds – the sounds they hear playing through their speakers.

This post will show you how you can record system sounds.

What you need:

A 3.5mm Stereo Male to Male cable. Don’t have one? No sweat, you can pick one up from Amazon for under $3.00, shipping included.

A 3.5mm Speaker (Line-out) jack and a 3.5mm Microphone (Line-in) jack on the back of your computer like the ones highlighted below.

How to get started:

Insert one end of the cable into the green speaker jack on your sound card.
Insert the other end into the pink microphone speaker jack.
Launch the Screenr recorder
Select the Primary Sound Capture Driver from the list of microphones
Click record

Primary Sound Capture Driver

See this in action:

Check out the recording below where we were able to capture audio from Second Life.

View this screencast at Screenr

Engage Your Audience By Embedding Screencasts In Your Site

Fri, 04 Sep 2009 11:27:35 -0400

Embedding Screenr screencasts is a great way to add life to your site, add context to an instructional post, or give your site some personality. Here’s some embedded screencasts we’ve seen in action.

ThemeForest
Check out what the guys over at ThemeForest are doing with Screenr. They created a Quick Tip video series where they answers questions directly from their community using a quick Screenr screencast.

MattFlies.com
Matt over at MattFlies.com has done some pretty cool screencasts with Screenr on customizing the wildly popular Thesis Wordpress theme. We love what you have done Matt, and hope to see more screencasts from you soon.

The Rapid E-Learning Blog
Articulate’s own Tom Kuhlmann has been adding Screenr screencasts in his blog. His screencasts walk his readers through cool tutorials like this post on creating an envelope icon using PowerPoint. Tom’s screencast makes it easier to follow difficult concepts.

Cool stuff guys, we can’t wait to see the other ways that people are embedding screencasts in their websites and blogs!

Seen cool embedded Screenr screencastst? Leave us a comment and we’ll check them out.

What People Are Saying About Screenr

Tue, 25 Aug 2009 16:31:50 -0400

Screenr is one week old today. I took this opportunity to capture some of the great things you guys are saying about Screenr. (Thank you!) Check out a few highlights in this screencast:

Viewing this on your iPhone? Click here to watch this on Screenr.

Should you want to dig in, here are the pages (in order) seen in the screencast:

How ABC News Uses Screenr

Fri, 21 Aug 2009 07:32:00 -0400

We’ve been browsing the Screenr public stream and are blown away be the interesting ways people are using Screenr. Of course, people are using Screenr to create some really cool software demos and tutorials, but we’re also seeing some amazing uses that we never anticipated.

Take this one from the Rhode Island ABC television news affiliate. ABC6 Chief Stormtracker Meteorologist Fred Campagna is using Screenr to post realtime updates about Hurricane Bill.

Doing something really cool with Screenr? Let us know about it by posting a link to your screencast in the comments below.

Welcome to the Screenr blog

Wed, 19 Aug 2009 14:15:00 -0400

Hey everyone and welcome to the Screenr blog!

We just launched Screenr yesterday and we’re amazed by the response we’ve received already. So far, there’s been thousands of enthusiastic tweets posted about Screenr. I’ve collected a few dozen typical tweets about Screenr here. To say we’re flattered is to put it mildly.

Major blogs are also beginning to cover Screenr. Like this one or that one. This stuff makes us very proud.

So have you created a screencast yet? Give it a whirl, it’s easy. For now, I’ll leave you with this screencast posted about an hour ago from the folks at TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog. Nice screencast guys!