Camtasia Studio Review: Screen Recording, Video Editing & Interactive Video Creation

Camtasia Studio Review:

Techsmith’s Camtasia Studio goes far beyond screen-capture video creation. It can now incorporate videos from other sources in multi-track editing, including videos with embedded hyperlinks. Gone are the days where screen casting applications only captured your screen movements, Camtasia Studio is now far much more powerful and sophisticated.

If you watch any of the YouTube videos that demonstrate how to edit in Photoshop, use Eclipse, install WordPress or do anything else in a program, there’s a good probability that video was created with Camtasia Recorder, the original core function of Camtasia Studio.

• Camtasia Studio allows exporting for nearly any sort of device or system: Internet, phones, tablets, DVDs, and mobile devices are all covered.

Capturing and showing screen-based activity, such as cursor movement, menu choices, and other interface interactions is easy with Camtasia Recorder. Just click the Record button, and everything you do on your computer monitor is recorded. When you’re finished, click the Stop button. Easy.

The results are nice and smooth because Camtasia’s new capture engine is optimized for high-definition video, and can now record at 30 frames per second.

 

Product	Camtasia Studio
Author About	TechsmithBased in Okemos, Michigan, Techsmith provides over 180 countries around the world with screen capture and recording software for individual and professional use. They’ve made it their goal to give you tools that work just like you do, across multiple devices and locations. With more than 200 employees, Techsmith develops a variety of applications that narrow communication gaps through images, videos, online hosting, and remote usability testing.
Headline	Screen recording and video editing, interactive video creation for anyone.
About	Powerful, yet easy-to-use, Camtasia Studio helps you create professional videos without having to be a video pro. Easily record your on-screen activity or import HD camera video, customize and edit content, and share your videos with viewers on nearly any device.
Price	Individual £206.50 incl. VAT Multi-user copy £172.00 incl. VAT Upgrade £103.00 incl. VAT 30 Day trial – Free.There are multi-user discounts for business, education, government and non-profit organisations. Click here to see prices for your demographic location.
Operating Systems	Microsoft Windows XP, Vista, 7 or 8. Mac OS X

Note: GBP prices are approximate (VAT excluded unless stated). Prices are correct at time of review.

 

What’s Techsmith About?

Techsmith aims to help teachers and educators produce interactive demonstrations and screen casts with their Camtasia family of software.

What is Camtasia Studio?

From Techsmith: Techsmith Camtasia is a reliable screen recording and video editing tool that helps users convey their message conveniently and effectively, from nearly any device. Easily record your screen to capture PowerPoint slides, software demos, webpages, and more. Then enhance your videos by importing existing media or using Camtasia’s wide variety of editing tools to create powerful, professional videos. Videos can be shared directly to YouTube, Google Drive, or our free hosting site, Screencast.com for easy viewing.

What Can the Camtasia Video Editor do?

The new multi-track Camtasia video editor interface can import video from other sources, including MP4, MPG, MPEG, WMV, MOV, SWF, BMP, GIF, JPG, PNG, WAV, MP3, WMA and Zipped Library.

• Display and play several video windows in a single screen.
• Group tracks. Batch edits (animations, zoom/pan, plus effects) can be applied to an entire group.
• Work directly with any object on the Canvas. Simply, click and drag to resize and reposition.
• Anything on the canvas can be animated.
• Anything on the Canvas can now be a clickable hyperlink.

Can Camtasia Studio Make Interactive Quizzes and Polls?

Camtasia has had the ability to include interactive quizzes and polls in your videos for some time, but the implementation in previous versions was cumbersome. Now the Techsmith server works behind the scenes to gather the data and provide reports to the host/teacher.

How Easy is Camtasia Studio to Use?

The improved ease of use with Camtasia Studio is a major advance in easy-to-create interactive videos. The results can be quite stunning even for novice users.

• The main interface is intelligent and simple to navigate. It is arranged logically, with the top?right corner reserved for editing and production options.

The learning curve for Camtasia Studio is quite shallow, it was surprisingly easy to get started and work creatively within a very short time.

• Techsmith offers useful, well-designed video and PDF tutorials.

After your Camtasia Studio download, when you first launch the application, it plays a tutorial with the tracks and clip bin fully populated so you have something to experiment with immediately.

Is Camtasia Studio a Scam?

Definition, SCAM: A person, company, organisation etc. who steals your money without giving you anything in exchange. A fraudulent business scheme; to defraud, a swindle.

• Given the above definition, Camtasia Studio is not a scam.

With Camtasia Studio, you will receive the product for which you are paying.

How Well Does the Camtasia Studio Solve the Problem?

What it Does Well, Pros

• New multi-track video/audio editing.
• Embedded hyperlinks.
• Higher quality screen action capture.
• Anything on the Canvas can now be a clickable hyperlink.
• Optimized high-definition video can now record at 30 frames per second.

What is Does Not So Well, Cons

• Rotation of objects is not applied interactively.
• Recording live from a DV camera is not supported.
• Camtasia Studio seems to import only one video and one audio track from a .mov file. If you know differently, leave a commet below.
• Only SWFs created previous versions of Camtasia Studio can be imported.
• Whilst a clickable hyperlink can be made from anything on the Canvas the only way to share it is by exporting the MP4 with Techsmith’s SmartPlayer. YouTube, Facebook, etc. don’t support the player so hotspots won’t work on such sites.
• A little pricey.

Camtasia Studio Review Conclusion

I had very few problems using Camtasia Studio. It is an excellent choice for the easy creation of slick educational and promo videos.

• You might like to view some of my YouTube videos.

The user interface is clean and self explanatory. You could get this application running with no training but for new users I recommend Camtasia’s excellent online PDF’s and video tutorials.

Camtasia Studio is simply the best screen-capture program there is, especially for those producing YouTube video demos. It’s easy to use, has masses of features and represents great value (even if the price is a little high).

Click the link to download a 30-Day Free Trial of Techsmith Camtasia Studio. Once you’ve finished reading and evaluating the software yourself, do let me have your opinion by entering your views at the end of this page. Thank for dropping by.