Storyline « Record Screen » vs Captivate (software simulations)

Oct 07, 2014

Hi,

Long time users of Captivate for building software simulations and exercises, we manage to use the “Record Screen” function of Storyline.

 

It seems that the output folder is larger in SL (probably due to .flv and .mp4 files), but one good thing is that there are several small files instead of one large .swf file from Captivate.

 

What are the pros and cons of swtiching from Captivate to Storylune (2) for software simulations ?

16 Replies
Tracy Buthe

Hi Quentin,

Not sure if Captivate can do this now or not. It's been a long time since I have used it. But to me the main benefit of Storyline is the Action Fine Tuning feature. If you haven't used it yet, I would say give it a try.(Just right-click on the slide and choose it from the drop-down menu) It allows you to change the start and end points of the screen simulation. For instance if you want the user to have pick an answer from a drop down menu and the screen capture shows the correct selection highlighted, you can use Action Fine Tuning to move the start and end points of the Screen Recording so the learner has to think about it and not just click the highlighted selection.

Like I said, maybe this is in Captivate now, I don't know, but this was a huge selling point for me for moving from Captivate to Storyline and I have NEVER looked back. 

One other quick thing, The ability to put the slides in the course in 4 different ways (Video, View Mode, Try Mode, and Test Mode) is also amazing!! Love it!!

Hope that helps!!

Tracy

Quentin Hua

Thank you Tracy for sharing your experience.

I totally agree with you, the 4 ways to insert a recording is awesome!

We use Captivate 5.5 and I don't think it has the feature you mentioned.

Would you say that  in comparision with Captivate, using Storyline to build software simulations will:

A: save time

B: need more time

C: need more or less the same time ?

Michael Hinze

The ability to simultaneously or separately record a demo, assessment and training simulation has been around since at least Captivate 5.5. Also, you could always do a fullmotion (aka 'video') recording. You can also adjust the slide durations (the equivalent of 'action-finetuning in Storyline) and add click boxes, slidelets, butons, etc. as needed for a realistic simulation.

Quentin Hua

Hi Michael, it seems we don't know so well Captivate 5.5

One other reason we want to move to Storyline is that with Captivate, we need to integrate the .swf files in another Flash Templates to aggregate them. And as Flash does not work well on Ipad and Android tablets, we are seeking for an alternative.

Thank you for sharing.

Michael Hinze

Quentin Hua said:

Hi Michael, it seems we don't know so well Captivate 5.5

One other reason we want to move to Storyline is that with Captivate, we need to integrate the .swf files in another Flash Templates to aggregate them. And as Flash does not work well on Ipad and Android tablets, we are seeking for an alternative.

Thank you for sharing.

I'm not sure what you mean by 'aggregate' but isn't it easier to add one Captivate .swf file to a Flash template rather than an entire Storyline folder structure? Anyway, HTML5 publishing options for use with mobile devices are available in both tools. Good luck with your search.
Quentin Hua

Hello,

So we now use Screen Record of SL instead of Captivate. It is pretty cool except that the .story files are big, and it may take a while to insert a View / Try / or Test scene or fine-tuning your slides.

It is upmost important to split your project into several recordings and have separate .story files.

Is there  a way to delete the recording to have a smaller .story file ? Of course, we cannot do fine-tuning afterwards.

Thanks.

Daniel Sposato (Philly)

To add to this topic, as I am currently about to begin a new project that requires both the creation of a "Watch It" version of a course and a "Try It" version, I have discovered one big difference between SL2 and Captivate.

Both softwares allow you to do both options but in very different ways. Creating a "Watch It" seems to have little difference, as far as a final result goes, after the capture. However, a "Try It" course recorded in Captivate is way different if you have to simulate something that includes motion that pans, includes 3d, animation, video or any kind of rapid screen changing as it drops frames from the process (at least this has been my experience with Capt 8 so far). Where SL2 captures all in the form of video and splits it up for you by slides with every click you make in the recording process. And even better is that, after you capture it, you can save it as the "Try It" and then convert it to a "Watch It" version! Then you just save that conversion with a new name and a lot of the work is done.

The obvious winner is SL2 in this scenario overall. And unfortunately we just found out today that the client is requesting the "Try Its" be done in Capt 8 and the "Watch Its" in Camtasia. So what could have been a pleasant grouping of projects to bang out before the holidays has become an unpleasant mess of double the work as far as I can see. =(

Daniel Sposato (Philly)

Not sure to be honest. I was just told that that was what they requested. Though later yesterday I also found out that there wouldn't be any animation or video related content to cause the issue I mentioned above. I speculate that they want the "Watch It" versions of courses done in Camtasia because they probably have staff that are at least familiar with it already. But I haven't been given a solid reason as to their choices.

I will mention to my boss your offer, but it may not matter at this point. He has a pretty good understanding of my findings but I think it's out of his hands. I'm sure he agrees that SL2 would save us a lot of time on this clump of courses we have coming in but it seems like the client is pretty insistent that we do the courses with specific software for whatever reason.

But on a positive note, we are developing our higher level 3 course examples and interactions all in SL2. Everyone here at SoftAssist really only wants to work in SL2 for elearning development. Especially after doing 2 big set of courses for Novartis in Captivate 7 about a year ago. Those projects were a nightmare!

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