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Creating high quality screencasts starts with how you capture your video. If you set up your recording correctly from the beginning, the end result will look sharp, clean, and professional.
One of the best tools for this is Camtasia. It is easy to use, affordable, and powerful enough for both beginners and experienced content creators.
Recording Your Video
To produce true HD quality, begin by recording your screen at 1280 x 720 pixels. Before you start capturing, configure Camtasia with the following settings:
1. Set the frame rate to 30 FPS
Open Camtasia Recorder, go to Tools > Options, select the Inputs tab, and set the “Screen Capture Frame Rate” to 30 frames per second.
2. Set high quality audio
Use PCM, 44,100 kHz, 16 bit stereo for clean audio recording.
3. Set your capture size
Specify 1280 x 720 as the capture resolution. This ensures your final video meets HD standards.
Once these settings are configured, you are ready to begin recording.
Editing Your Screencast
After recording, import your video into Camtasia Studio for editing. If you plan to upload the video to YouTube or another video platform, keep in mind that many viewers will watch at 640 pixel resolution or lower. To ensure readability:
- Add manual zoom and pan effects during important moments.
- Do not use Camtasia’s auto zoom and pan feature, as it often produces poor results.
Manually adjusting zoom points gives viewers a much clearer view of what you are demonstrating.
Producing Your Video
When exporting your final video, use these recommended settings:
- Format: MP4 or MOV
- Codec: H.264
- Resolution: Match your recording resolution (1280 x 720)
This will maintain HD quality while keeping file sizes reasonable.
If You Plan to Edit in Another Video Tool
If you want to do additional editing in software like Sony Vegas or Adobe Premiere, export your Camtasia recording in the highest possible quality before compressing it later. Produce the video at your capture resolution and save it as an AVI file.
Use these codecs depending on what you captured:
- Screen only: TechSmith Screen Capture Codec
- Screen + webcam video: XviD or MPEG4 Codec
Once your high quality master file is ready, you can perform additional editing and apply compression in your preferred video editing software.
Final Thoughts
These principles apply to nearly any video editing platform, not just Camtasia. The keys are recording at the right resolution, maintaining proper frame and audio settings, and exporting with the correct codecs.
With a little preparation, you can create clean, professional looking HD screencasts for the web. Good luck with your projects!