Jing Pro Released

If you have been a Jing User you will be happy to learn that TechSmith has released Jing Pro today for only $14.95 a year. So what do you get with the release of Jing Pro:

So, what's new with Jing Pro? Betsy Weber, TechSmith's Chief Evangelist sums it up

• YouTube support. You can upload a video to YouTube directly from Jing. Jing also gives you the link to your video.

• For screencasts, in addition to the SWF file format, Jing Pro now offers a H.264/MPEG-4 AVC format video option. Without getting too technical, this format excels at capturing video with a lot of motion, is much more suited for editing, and is supported on YouTube. And, for those of you who have been wanting to tweak your Jing videos, you can now import them into Camtasia Studio 6 or iMovie to edit, merge or anything you want.

• Branding removal. At the end of a Jing Pro-produced video, there is no Jing logo and branding.

You can upgrade to Jing Pro for $14.95 a year. And, we're not forcing you to upgrade to Jing Pro. The free version of Jing is still available complete with complimentary hosting on Screencast.com (2 GB of storage and 2 GB of transfer bandwidth per month). And, we also have free tech support for both Jing and Jing Pro. There is a great Help Center for Jing that is full of tips and tricks.

Camtasia Studio 6- Impressive!

As a long time user of Camtasia Studio, I was excited to learn that TechSmith had just recently released Version 6. For those of you who have been using Camtasia Studio 5, you will feel right at home with the latest version- which is a good thing. I am always concerned when software companies make drastic changes to the interface when they release new versions of the software. Having stated this up front, TechSmith has spent considerable time and taken user input in designing this latest version. I for one feel that the workflow is much smoother and some of the subtle changes in the interface make the whole experience of using Camtasia Studio 6 much more enjoyable. From the first time you record a session you will notice a whole new recording interface which is much more intuitive and allows you to set up your recording features without the need to jump through a whole lot of screens.
Everything is right there in front of you as you see in the screenshot. You can now easily adjust your audio, select your screen size, as well as your webcam from the Record pane.

When you are ready to record just click in the big Record button and you are ready to record high quality video and audio form your computer. You will be happy to learn that you can now use Camtasia Studio to record in High Definition (HD- H.264) should you need to. After recording your video you can quickly preview your video in the newly designed Preview screen. The interface is very clean and neat and it is very clear how to save, edit, delete or produce your video. By clicking on the edit button you are taken to the very familiar Camtasia Studio screen to edit and produce your work. While not much has changed with regard to the interface there is lots of changes under the hood which will benefit all of us who work with this wonderful tool. This is the first version of Camtasia Studio that lets you decouple the video and audio which will make it easier to make edits and re-record the audio for retakes. TechSmith has now added a number of Hotkeys which will allow us to quickly add captions, callouts, zoom, and markers to the timeline. Just today I created a video and wanted to add a zoom in- and by simply pressing the letter z, I was able to bring up the Pan and Zoom dialog box and insert the zoom. This is certainly going to reduce the amount of time it takes to create and produce my videos. Like I said before, a lot of work has gone on under the hood which we will greatly benefit from. When it comes time to produce our videos TechSmith has really listened to our call and with the Production Wizard we can now output our videos to some of the most popular formats without the need to worry about the settings. We can now produce videos in High Definition (HD), SWF, as well as produce it for YouTube, Screencast and for the iPhone by going through the Production Wizard. In every case you will get perfect video and audio for that platform which is extremely important from my perspective- no need to guess. If you have a Screencast account you will appreciate just how easy it is to store and post your videos to your blog or web. The integration is seamless and within minutes you can have your video on your web or blog.


TechSmith has done a great job of listening to its users and making it even easier to produce high quality screencasts. It is the subtle changes and the work under the hood that will change your workflow and make you more productive using Camtasia Studio 6. The videos that I have recently recorded with Camtasia Studio 6 are very sharp with excellent audio fidelity. If you are on the fence about the upgrade to Camtasia Studio 6 take the plunge and see all of the benefits that you will derive with this very substantial upgrade. You can also download a 30 day trial of Camtasia Studio 6 form the TechSmith web site.

Adobe Captivate 3- Awesome!

While attending the NECC Conference this summer in San Antonio I had the chance to stop by the Adobe booth and connect with some of my colleagues who work for Adobe to find out what is the latest and greatest. At the Adobe booth I was shown several of the new releases which included Captivate 3, Adobe Acrobat 9 Professional, and Presenter 7. One of the Sales Engineers gave me a tour of Captivate 3 which really wowed me. Many of you know that I have been producing software video tips and tutorials for the past year or so for the Mindjet Newsletter which goes a long way for showing others how to accomplish tasks using MindManager 7 and JCVGantt Pro 3. Using screencasting software to demonstrated how to accomplish tasks with a particular software product makes the process of providing "just in time training" a reality and can cut down on support calls at the workplace. I want to thank Jody at A&R Edelman for providing me with a copy of Adobe captivate to review and to RJ at Adobe for doing a great webinar with me on Adobe Captivate 3.

For the past several years I have been using Camtasia Studio 5 extensively to do my screencasting work and find it to be an outstanding product to get my work done. Camtasia Studio 5 lets you record your screen and then provides you with post editing tools to fine tune your screencast. Camtasia's approach to screencasting is similar to that of taking a video camera and pressing the record button. With this approach every screen and all of the audio is continuously being recorded. Any mishaps or errors while doing the recording will need to be post edited or in some cases need to be re-recorded. Adobe Captivate 3 takes an entirely different approach to capturing your computer screen which has some real benefits. Adobe Captivate 3 captures individual screen shots only when you move the mouse, click on the screen, or type some text. When you are finished capturing your screens Adobe Captivate 3 pulls all of the screen shots together and builds a Flash video of your demonstration. You also have the opportunity to add audio to your demonstration while you are creating your video or after the process is complete. One of the really nice features of Adobe Captivate 3 is the ability to not only create demonstration-but you can in one fell swoop also create simulations, training, and assessment videos. You can watch my screencast to get an idea of how Adobe Captivate 3 works.

I have found that using Adobe Captivate 3, I can create custom demonstrations videos very quickly, with Adobe Captivate 3 doing a lot of the work for me. What do I mean by that? When I am creating a video demonstration Adobe Captivate 3 will automatically include captions when I am selecting menus, dialog boxes and clicking on the screen. Watch the video to see what I mean. In the demonstration video you will see a number of captions that have been generated by Adobe Captivate 3. All of the captions can be edited and formatted if you need to. Having Adobe Captivate 3 generate the captions saves a lot of time when producing these videos. I have chosen not to use audio in this demonstration but if I wanted to I could always go back and add narration to the demonstration video. As I work with Adobe Captivate 3 I I find it an outstanding tool to work with to create video demonstrations and training scenarios. I will over the next couple of weeks share with you some other tips and tricks that I have learned about Adobe Captivate 3 - so stay tuned.

Where did the Summer Go?

As I write this post, I am reflecting on the past several days as my wife and I got my daughter situated and moved into her college dorm. If you have never moved a child into a a dorm or an apartment it sure is a lot of work! Once again another transition, as all of us move into our respective lines of work. Tomorrow I am back at the College of St. Elizabeth to start the Fall 2008 semester. It is hard to believe just how fast the summer went! I am eagerly awaiting to see my graduate students and look forward to sharing with them the trends and the new and exciting products that will soon be released. There is no escaping the impact that Web 2.0 has had on the field of educational and assistive technology as more and more mainstream tools on the web find their way into the work that we do. With free text to speech applications and the range of applications like Google Docs, Buzzword, Jing, and Jott- just to name a few, the combinations are endless as we craft our recommendations for the students we work with. As more and more teachers become aware of the power of wiki's- they can really begin to help students make their curriculum more accessible for those students that need it. All this summer I have been working with teachers on a math grant applying the principles of Universal Design for Learning into their math lesson plans. It has been exciting for me to watch how the teachers have embraced the UDL theory and have been able to plan accessible lessons which have been scaffolded with technology.

Reflecting on my trip to NECC 2008- this year will go down as the year of the netbook. If you haven't had a chance to look at these ultra small notebooks now is the time to do so. The netbooks will be seen as just one more vehicle for students to have a rather inexpensive tool to access the internet with. Weighing in at about 2.2 pounds these devices will will run Window XP and in many cases a variant of Linux. Asus, Acer, and HP have jumped into the bandwagon and soon Dell will announce their new netbook which will probably be released later this month. Schools will begin to look at these devices more seriously because of the cost and their functionality for the money. Many of the netbooks start at around $300 dollars and up. It should be interesting to watch as schools begin to adopt these tools.

Teaching at the college gives me another perspective from the vantage point of higher education as to how technology is being applied for instruction. At the college all students have access to Blackboard which is used as a portal for instruction. I have created some very rich courses using Blackboard that provide my students with a multitude of resources. Over the years I have developed many learning resources for my students using Camtasia Studio, a wonderful application for creating screencasts and video tutorials. At NECC 2008, I was introduced to Adobe Captivate 3 which I will add to my einstruction toolkit. Adobe Captivate 3 not only allows you to create video demonstrations, but also allows you to quickly develop compelling interactive media which you can output to Flash. I will be posting some more information about Adobe Captivate 3 in some later posts in September.

Certainly, collaboration is the buzzword and I'm sure going forward you will be hearing more and more about this as developers add these features into their existing applications. But you only have to look to Web 2.0 technologies to see that the foundation is already there for example in Google Docs and Buzzword, just to name a few. For this reason it will become even more important when we are educating our students and preparing them for the world or work that they have opportunities to work in teams and to collaborate with others outside the context of their school. Do what you can to seek out the exciting projects like the Flat Classroom Project that are taking place on the web to give your students these invaluable opportunities and experiences. I have learned that, yes the world is flat and having tools like Skype, Oovoo, CrossLoop, Yuuguu, Adobe ConnectNow and Dimdim, have allowed me to conduct the work that I do effortlessly without the need to leave my office. So reach out beyond your school and district and challenge your students to use these rich sets of tools to make learning more meaningful and rewarding.

I trust that this will be an exciting start to the school year and I look forward to sharing my ideas and experiences with you as I continue to explore and use new tools. Please feel free to email me with your comments and suggestions.