Quick question about Camtasia videos, can you help?

[mmurtha]

Hey guys,

Are Camtasia videos like tutorials usually large files? I just created 2 very simple tutorials - one is 22.31 mbs, and the other is 42.28 mbs.

Is this normal, or is there a way to cut these files down but keep the quality of each video?

Thanks ...


Mary

[lakshaybehl]

Hi Mary!

It depends upon three things....

1. Length of the video
2. Size of the video window
3. Format of production

Now I keep to minimize the length be pre planning as well as the dimensions of the video. In a video you just display what is absolutely required and nothing else. A lot of people have a lot of things in the beckground which are captured when the video is recorded and makes the video heavy.

Format is something to take special care of. I use WMV's... they are pretty light weight as well as clear. But if you are going to post a video on a web page in a FLV format, then I guess it will be a little heavy no matter what. It all depeds upon the codecs.

So yes if the video is like 40 minutes with 640*480 dimensions, then it is OK to have that kind of file size.

[mmurtha]

Hi lakshaybehl,

Here are the specs I used:

Length: 4:53.5
size: 22.31 mbs

Audio format:

Rate: 22.050 KHz
Sample: 16 bit
Chanles: Mono
Format: PCM


Video format:

width: 1140
Height: 884
Colors: 16M
Frames: 4404
Rate: 15 frames/second


Btw, these files are for downloading.

What would you recommend I change?

Thanks btw ...


Mary

P.S. I've never used Camtasia or created videos before so have no idea. Guess I have to learn sometime.

[Allen Graves]

If it is in flash video, then it doesn't really matter because the video will be loading as the end user is watching it, right?

But if downloading, then you may want to shrink them!!!!

Dang...I'm a lot of help, ain't I?

[Josh Anderson]

Hi Mary,

Your audio settings are good and optimized for minimizing your master file size.

Your frame rate is good for minimizing your master file size.

I would not say that the video files themselves are abnormally large assuming that they are in .avi format?

What I recommend is that if you are going to distribute them for download that you use either Quicktime Pro ($29) or Windows Media Encoder (free) to encode the master AVI file to .mov .mp4 or .wmv

Using quicktime pro you can encode to .mov or .mp4 using the h.264 codec and setting lower audio and video bit rates and maybe even reducing the dimensions if you want to get very small highly compressed video files.

You might try 300-400kbps for the video bit rate and 32 kbps for the audio if you are using Quicktime Pro and h.264. You should get some nice small file sizes with acceptable resolution for screen capture video.

I have not done much testing with windows media encoder because I consider it to be an inferior option but you can still get great results for downloadable files and you can experiment with the video and audio bit rates to get the quality you want with the small file sizes.

[mmurtha]

Chris and Josh,

Thanks for taking the time to explain this stuff in full detail.

I will definately give you a yell Chris if I need to.

Josh,

I never thought about using Quicktime, and I do have it on my Macbook.

The only question I have using this software is ... Can almost anyone open these file formats without having to download something else to their computer?

The simpler I can make it for the users, the better.

Thanks again guys ...


Mary

[Josh Anderson]

The only question I have using this software is ... Can almost anyone open these file formats without having to download something else to their computer?

Yes, because quicktime player is OEM software on many computers on most computers, is bundled with itunes, and is required for all iphone and ipod users...

Also its a free download and you can always link to it.

But if in doubt you may want to go the Windows Media Encoder route... or both.

[mmurtha]

Hey Josh,

Originally Posted by Josh Anderson

The only question I have using this software is ... Can almost anyone open these file formats without having to download something else to their computer?

Yes, because quicktime player is OEM software on many computers on most computers, is bundled with itunes, and is required for all iphone and ipod users...

Also its a free download and you can always link to it.

But if in doubt you may want to go the Windows Media Encoder route... or both.

Okay great! I knew it use to be standard, but I'm not sure now since Vista came out. Mac users should be fine though.

If it's free, that shouldn't be a problem for most people.

Thanks, I appreciate the help.



Chris,

Yup! I'm already one step ahead there, but YouTube will have to wait. I have some private tutorials I'm creating and I didn't want them up for public view.

Good idea though ....


Mary