Storyline / Camtasia Integration

May 28, 2013

Hello,

Yes, I'm from the Dark Side (TechSmith).  No, I don't work for them, just love their products.  Anyway, I'm on a mission looking for new and exciting ways to produce eLearning content (aren't we all .  We're a software company and primarly the productions we create are short (2 - 8 min) videos focusing on specific features of our applications.  Camtasia does a really good job at this but we want more. . .    And Storyline maybe be what we're looking for.

After going through all the stuff here on articulate site and reading a bunch of the posts here on the forum here's what I've come up with.  Do all of my screen recordings, callouts and whatever else using Camtasia, save it as a MP4 and then produce some really cool courseware using Storyline with my Camtasia video include inside of it.  Does this sound like a good plan?

For those Camtasia/Storyline users out there is this pretty much what you've done?  What other tips can you offer?

THANKS MUCH!

18 Replies
Peter Anderson

Hey Ed, welcome to the forums!

Admittedly, my Camtasia experience is next to zero, but if you're only looking to use Camtasia's screen recording feature and use Storyline for the rest, I have to ask: why not use Storyline's screen recording feature? Unless there's something that Storyline's screen recording tools don't offer specifically, it seems like it would save you a lot of development time if you were to stick to just one product...

Just asking more out of curiosity

Alexandros Anoyatis

Hi Ed,

I agree with Peter on this one. Camtasia is great with screen recordings, callouts and the lot, but using SL's screen recording will "magically" sort your video recording to slides (for instance when you want to feature step-by-step DIY instructions), a feature you will miss if you were to import from Camtasia as MP4.

Just my 2c,

Alex

Helena Froyton

Hi Alexandros,

Would you happen to have an example  you could share with me of the feature step-by-step DIY?  I don't have Storyline yet and would like to see what it looks like.  I will probably need to download a trial version to be able to view the example you might send me.

Hi Ed,


Could you show me an example of what you can do with Camtasia?  I started using it more and would like to become more proficient.

If you wold like, you can send me a PM

.

Thanks!

Rebecca Fleisch Cordeiro

Hi Helena,

Excuse me for butting in, but if you'd like, I can provide you with a couple samples of instructional videos (software training) that I created in Camtasia. I've been doing this for several years now and have done probably hundreds of them. I have a couple that I have permission to share, so if you ping me and send me your email address, I'll share these via Dropbox. They're in .avi format.

If anyone else would like to take a peak, I'm happy to share as long as you send along an email address.

Oh, and I also love Camtasia. and Storyline!

RC -

HI Ed -

For what it's worth - the process that you described is exactly what I do - i.e. use Camtasia for Screencasts, publish to MP4, and then import into Storyline.

We record live events often using Go2Meeting and then afterward chop them up in Camtasia.  I like Camtasia more for video editing than Storyline because the timeline/playhead is a bit easier to work with.

Once the video is edited and chopped up, we'll import it into storyline.  One think that will always keep me in Storyline for the hardcore development vs. Camtasia is that it's simply easier to work with when building interactivity due to the layers/variables functionality.  Camtasia groups everything on 1 huge timeline and it can easily get out of control.

Ryan

Ed Boddecker

Ryan Curran said:

HI Ed -

For what it's worth - the process that you described is exactly what I do - i.e. use Camtasia for Screencasts, publish to MP4, and then import into Storyline.

We record live events often using Go2Meeting and then afterward chop them up in Camtasia.  I like Camtasia more for video editing than Storyline because the timeline/playhead is a bit easier to work with.

Once the video is edited and chopped up, we'll import it into storyline.  One think that will always keep me in Storyline for the hardcore development vs. Camtasia is that it's simply easier to work with when building interactivity due to the layers/variables functionality.  Camtasia groups everything on 1 huge timeline and it can easily get out of control.

Ryan

Thanks for the 411 Ryan.  I've just spend the last hour or so playing with Storyline and so far I really like it.  Yes, very different from Camtasia.  I'd say more like a hybrid of Adobe Captivate and PowerPoint.  I like it.  I really like your comments on Camtasia and I would agree that it's a great too for doing all the video work but Storyline does come cool stuff that Camtaia couldn't touch.  Glad to hear you have them playing well together.  I think that's going to be my plan too.

Ed Boddecker

Helena Froyton said:

Hi Alexandros,

Would you happen to have an example  you could share with me of the feature step-by-step DIY?  I don't have Storyline yet and would like to see what it looks like.  I will probably need to download a trial version to be able to view the example you might send me.

Hi Ed,


Could you show me an example of what you can do with Camtasia?  I started using it more and would like to become more proficient.

If you wold like, you can send me a PM

.

Thanks!


Hello Helena,

Here are a couple of my productions that include some (not a lot) of the cool Camtasia features like the Callouts and the Zoom features:

http://youtu.be/Xk7Izov7E9Y
http://youtu.be/pztRf4OpqGk

ed

Brandon Foltz

Hi Ed! I am also an avid Camtasia user and I tend to agree with Ryan's way of integrating the two. Camtasia has also become my video editor in addition to screen-casting and it is very easy to chop up the output using markers. Throw in the layers and triggers and you can make some really nice stuff using the best of both programs. - B

Glenn Preston

I had used Camtasia, Captivate and many others screen capture programs but I honestly only use Storyline screen recording now and here is why...

I record once and then can use the recording as a single video or magically use it for see it, try it and do it without much fuss. Also I can build in stops, branching, wait for learner to select an option all within the one program. Single program use over multiple programs and then integrating them just seems a better way to work.

This also eliminates much of the "video quality" situations referred to by some.

Also, make sure you save all your recording to disk, so you can import them into other Storyline courses and they will work the same way.

Matthew Rosnov

Hey Everyone,

I see that this post is many years old, but, I figure it can’t hurt to ask...do any of you still work with Camtasia and Articulate 360?  I’ve been in L&D for a number of years, but the Instructional Design piece is very new to me and I need some basic “how to” and “get it started” videos, trainings, etc and am wondering if anyone had anything they’d be willing to share or at least point me in the right direction.  Thanks all.  I appreciate any replies. Have a nice day. 
Matt

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