From Techsmith's Chief Evangelist, Betsy Weber:
One of the steps in software development is to beta test the software. And, we could use 50 – 100 beta testers for Camtasia for the Mac. Interested? Just fill out this shortly survey here.
More details: "We Need You! …To Beta Test Camtasia for the Mac"
I'm excited because there've been lots of hopes about this for a long time, and I use Camtasia on Windows to make my video tutorials. I was even featured in their Visual Lounge earlier.
I'm still on Camtasia Studio 5 because version 6 has a bug where it can't highlight just Second Life's viewport without the window chrome, and manual precision select is no fun done repetitively.
On Mac, I currently use iShowU but it's been crashing on me. It's only a capture app without editing, so it looks like Mac Camtasia will be going head to head vs. Screenflow (it's even mentioned on the survey). One area where Camtasia could have a huge advantage is in better audio quality: the Windows version has a handy dynamic compression tool to level out your voice and make it more broadcast-friendly. Screenflow recently added a "Presence" audio effect, but it's disappointingly limited.
As I've called out before, more apps that can record audio (in addition to video) need built-in limiters. It's unthinkable to have a photo editing app without brightness and contrast, so why should sound suffer?
{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
Thanks for the heads up. I've been having issues with iShowU too. The last time I tried to record with it, it randomly kept splitting my audio onto new tracks in the Quicktime file so I had to resync it in Vegas.
Torley, are you using iShowU that's compatible with Tiger, or iShowU HD that's for leopard only? The reason I ask is they are totally different in both performance and (in my experience) stability. The leopard only iShowU HD is vastly superior.
As for having an included editor, I think that's fine for quick and dirty stuff, but to be honest, having started using Final Cut Express, I'm never going back to an integrated editor again, especially for non-documentary, fun machinima stuff. The internal editors just can't hack it for anything other than straightforward screencast type movies. For anything creative, "real" video editing software just makes you never want to look back.
Hi Torley,
Thanks for the info. Signed up for the beta. I do use iShowU (not the HD update), Leopard, and haven't had any problems – edit in iMovie09 – which is turning out to be a great little program – but I'm a MacNut.
I found this new thing on the internet that records in high quality, you can add subtitles, change the recording box size(though it will not follow your mouse), records sound, and probably best of all, it's all online. It's called ScreenToaster ( http://www.screentoaster.com/ ) It does allow you to either save it on the site, Email it, embed it, put it on many things such as YouTube, Twitter, and Yahoo Buzz just to name a few.
@radar: Leopard iShowU HD. And I think Neil's support is great but it's been acting oddly when I'm in the heat-of-action.
On the Windows side, I still insist on putting most of my Camtasia files into Vegas unless it's something I want to get up really quickly. The convenience vs. quality equation is one I wrestle with daily.
@Alca: Ooh, I wonder what's the drawback — previous things like that I've tried have either had Java inelegance, low framerates, nonstandard file format, or some other caveat. I'll check it out, thx for the tip!