Storyline vs Captivate for software training and interactions

Storyline and Captivate are very similar and create what you are looking for, but they go about it slightly different. While I find Storyline easier to use and develop interactions, it's not as customizable as Captivate. Replay is really a simple screencast tool, not for building interactive courses. If you have to source files, you could import the old file into captivate and update anything that needs it.  If you need to recapture a majority of it, then you could decide on either software. I suggest to do a a demo/test file. Capture a few slides, insert some interactivity in Storyline, then try to make it the same in Captivate (or vice versa). Then ask yourself which did you like better? Which software allowed you to work faster?  If you have any question on captivate you can PM me. My company works in Captivate alone. I've been trying to make them switch to Storyline since I started.

I 'left' captivate after CS4 and must say I find the Storyline functionality better than what I was used to. That being said, it always takes a while to switch as you are used to doing things a certain way...

Hi Jacinta! Looks like you are getting great feedback from Jerson and Jeff with their experiences.

Thanks for the responses, everyone, but I'm still a bit lost. I've found the 'edit video' button in Storyline, but it doesn't seem to offer me much. How do I add buttons/hotspots and captions in the middle of a video? How do I set up triggers to start and stop play of the video? Are there any tutorials on this? I can see that I can still access the 'insert' menu from the 'edit video' screen, but I don't know how to strategically place objects in the video. 

Hmm.. Starting to see some results in bumbling through this. Managed to get a button to stop and start the video. Still, any tutorials would be great. I'm sure to hit a snag along the way here.

Hi Jacinta!

I thought I'd share some reference materials that may assist you:

Sharing and seeking: ideas for making videos more interactive

Continuing a video when user clicks

Jacinta,

Here's a good getting started tutorial on screen recording: http://community.articulate.com/tutorials/products/inserting-and-customizing-screen-recordings.aspx.  Start here and on the right hand side of the screen, you'll some getting started tutorials.

The key to customization is really about how you choose to insert the video (view, try, test).  Once you insert, you'll be able to go in and work with the captions, etc.

Mike

Thanks, Leslie and Mike.

Mike, that was exactly what I needed to read, though I've obviously been looking straight past it. I had made the assumption that inserting a video would be like inserting an image, but clearly that isn't the case. All I needed to know was to insert it as step-by-step slides and suddenly my world became a whole lot lighter. I was thinking I would have to learn Captivate as well, so I'm glad to know that I'm still developing my knowledge of one very good program.

(Wow, that's one evil smile icon!)

Haha! Glad that Mike was able to help you out here Jacinta and thanks for the update