Rudy Viard of the web-based screencasting tool ScreenToaster (@screentoaster) kindly answered my questions about why they’re building a free on-line screencasting service and how the company started.  This interview is one of many in our screencaster interviews collection.

The company is 8 months old, based in Paris with 5 employees and uses the experience gained during 2-years of development on a previous (still growing) web-app company.

Can you provide some background about ScreenToaster and yourself to set the scene?

ScreenToaster was launched by Marco Fucci, our CEO, about 9 months ago using technology and knowledge developed by Iteria (CrunchBase), his previous company (still active), using its peer-to-peer remote assistance service called WizHelp.

We had the knowledge to develop a web-based screencast service and we felt there was a space for a new competitor in this market.

From September to January, we launched and tested our Beta with really good responses in the press (Techcrunch, Download Squad, Digital Inspiration…) then officially released the public version of ScreenToaster in February step by step adding new features.

Building a cross-platform web-based screencasting tool must be rather hard.  Why make it?

The main concept of ScreenToaster is to be able, at every step of the process, to reduce the time it takes to create and distribute videos online.

Only a web-based screencasting tool allows you to capture, upload, stream, share, embed and spread your screencasts in a couple of minutes.  Screencasts were only for specialists, we think people shouldn’t focus on technical aspects but on the contents.

We also tried to keep ScreenToaster as simple as possible. Advanced functionalities (editing tools, new player…) are being and will be implemented step by step.  We don’t want these functionalities to bother users who only want to create good screencasts. Additional functionalities are hidden, e.g. users will be able to choose to “Show more edition tools” or not.

We don’t want beginners to get lost and we want advanced screencasters to get all the functionalities they need. Last but not least, we are working on the user-design for all of the service.

As it’s more accessible, free, faster and easier to use, ScreenToaster opens screencasting to a larger community of users that have never used software such as Camtasia.  This is the most exciting part of the job.

What’s different (good and bad) about ScreenToaster compared to Jing and ScreencastOMatic?

ScreenToaster is simpler than Camtasia: To record a screencast with ScreenToaster, you just need to register then click “Record” and you are ready.

You don’t need to download (and understand) any software to start recording. We’ll never be Camtasia and do not want to copy what they are doing.  Camtasia is a really good tool made for specialists. It includes lots of editing functionalities that you’ll probably never use if you are a simple user.

ScreenToaster is faster than Jing: You don’t need to be in front of “your” computer to publish your screencast with ScreenToaster (Jing needs to be downloaded).  Once you published your video online, the video is immediately online on screentoaster.com, ready to be streamed, uploaded on YouTube in HD, shared, embedded, tweeted…

ScreenToaster is free: Jing Pro costs 15$ (more or less) and Camtasia 300$.  ScreenToaster is free and offers more than Jing and less than Camtasia.

What’s your business model?

Partnerships (thanks to our API) and Premium accounts will be the basis of our business model. I’ll let you know more about it soon as we are still working on packaging the commercial offers.  You can already Beta test the API simply asking us at contact@screentoaster.com

What sort of editing features do you provide?  How powerful is the editing compared to CamTasia or ScreenFlow?

ScreenToaster offers the possibility to capture your screen, add subtitles, audio and an embedded webcam.  For the moment, we do not offer advanced editing tools such as Camtasia.

ScreenToaster enables downloads in .swf and .mov to export your video in third party editing tools. This will be the next step (rework audio, cut, add some music…).

Can videos recorded in ScreenToaster be used commercially to demo web-apps and desktop software?

Bloggers in our community love to use ScreenToaster to review a service or a software.

Does it record at a lower frame-rate compared to desktop tools like CamTasia?

ScreenToaster records high quality screencasts and optimizes the frame rate for the best ratio “fluidity/quality” for  optimal streaming online.

Are users able to collaborate on-line, for example one might make video, one might add audio, another might edit the result and a fourth might add subtitles?

This functionality doesn’t exist yet. Thanks sharing it with us.

Do you have any plans for the future that you’d like to share?

What’s hot ? Our API is being Beta tested, it will be useful for collaborative projects, professional tutorials, users’ support and feedback management, bug tracking and reporting.  We are preparing a new player with new functionalities (rewind/fast forward, gadgets embedded on the video itself…).

Rudy – thanks for your participation.  If you provide something interesting in the world of screencasting and would like to be interviewed, get in contact.

Would you like a free eBook that is all about how to make better screencasts? Our Little Book of Screencasting is in the works, to receive a notification when we release it send an email to: ebook_notify@procasts.co.uk

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Ian is a professional screencaster (ProCasts, twitter) and blogger (IanOzsvald.com).

Sadly JoltMagazine.com seems to have fallen off of the internet.  Back in September 2008 they interviewed me, I’ve reprinted it below as the background should be useful to new screencasters:

I’ve been screencasting for over three years.  Within ProCasts.co.uk I create professional screencasts for companies and provide training, I’m also the co-founder of ShowMeDo.com.  ShowMeDo is a sort of YouTube for training screencasts on open-source software.  The site has a monthly audience of 100,000 world-wide users and over 100 authors, there I’ve personally created over 130 screencasts ranging from Python programming to Firefox to how-to-screencast.

To my mind the most important roles of the professional screencaster are to understand:

1. Who will watch the screencast and what they want to know (why does this tool make their life better than someone else’s?)
2. What the client wants to show (probably their main tool and unique-selling-points)
3. What the client wants to achieve (usually ‘more conversions’!)

Once you know the needs of the viewer and their background you can craft a presentation that conveys the client’s message.  The client probably wants more users to sign-up and try their service or buy a license.  There should be one clear message which is backed by supporting points.

If the client wants more users to sign-up to try a service, that should be the main point.  The supporting points are probably demonstrations of features that make the viewer’s life easier, these all build the viewer’s confidence towards the goal ‘this is the tool for me’.

I prefer to demonstrate the tool working with live action rather than to talk over a static presentation with screenshots, seeing the tool working sticks far more strongly in the mind.  It also shows the user what to expect when they try it, this gives them greater confidence and removes a barrier that might have formed in their mind.

The screencast can end with a call-to-action.  All interested users will want to know what they should do next – if you point them in the right direction after they’ve given you several minutes of their attention then there’s a high chance that they’ll follow that action.

I choose to guarantee my work – if it doesn’t achieve the desired action (e.g. increasing conversions) then I’ve not done my job and I don’t deserve my fee.  Generally speaking multiple screencasts get a discount compared to just one as less time is required overall, complex demos with polished graphics take more time and cost more than simple walkthroughs.  I’m always happy to give feedback on how and why screencasting might benefit a site and help increase conversions.

Professional tips?
Use great tools – on Windows get CamTasia, on a Mac get ScreenFlow.  For Linux you can use tools like ffmpeg or recordmydesktop to make a video but you’ll be stuck for decent screencast editors, I’d suggest exporting back to Windows or Mac for editing.  You could also try using a virtual Linux instance inside Windows or a Mac.

Try to use a good voice microphone.  Built-in laptop mics won’t do.  A quiet environment with a decent mic should give a good result, pro-audio equipment will be much better.  In post-production use an audio editor (Audacity is great and free) to remove breathing, compress the volume levels and remove noise.  If you breathe on the mic a lot, remember to breathe separately from speaking so it is easier to remove the whooshing sounds.

If you have strong sibilants (‘esses’) then play with the microphone’s location, this usually solves the problem, angling it can be very helpful.  If you have plosives (‘p’s and ‘b’s), try a pop-shield.

For the video I’d always plan the entire script.  For new presenters remember that the pause key is your friend, you can cut dead scenes in post-production and pausing lets you get your breath.

Be careful if you’re doing an off-the-cuff presentation, ‘ums’ and ‘errs’ can appear at awkward moments during key scenes and they’re harder to edit out if you’re speaking at the same time as all the sounds cut into each other.

I aim for 2-3 minutes for a marketing demo for first-time visitors and up to 8 minutes for a tutorial when the user is prepared to watch for longer.  Long videos for first-time visitors will make them bored so keep it snappy.

(Jolt) What are the worst mistakes you’ve seen?
Most people can create a credible demo if they plan and practice, have a quiet room and a decent mic.  Always get feedback from someone else before releasing the result to an unsuspecting world.

Some of the worse audio I’ve heard comes from cheap mics which are humming due to electrical interference.  The user then knocks the microphone a few times causing loud thumps and they breathe on the mic causing constant Darth Vader-like sounds.  Add in line-noise and street-noise and you’ve got a presentation which is really hard to listen to, it certainly won’t sound professional.  Post-production on the audio can only treat some of this, a good mic in a quiet room is always to be preferred.

With video I’ve seen people choose not to use audio (because they didn’t like their voice) and to compensate they’ve used a number of visual fade effects  and unhelpful annotations.

Rather than using 1 or 2 short fades, they’ve used a set of the whizziest ones for 5+ seconds each – this produces an inconsistent result with unhelpful graphical effects.  Unhelpful annotations might ask questions of the user which aren’t answered or present feature lists rather than showing benefits.  Leaving the user *more* confused is about the worst crime you can commit with a screencast!

Some presenters also forget about their screencast tool’s highlight effect and instead choose to whizz the mouse around in circles, this just looks odd.

Useful Links:
Examples at Procasts – http://procasts.co.uk/examples.html
ShowMeDo – http://showmedo.com/
Over 130 tutorials by the author at ShowMeDo – http://showmedo.com/videos/?author=2
Screencasts about screencasting – http://showmedo.com/videos/screencasting

Contact:
ian@procasts.co.uk

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Ian is a professional screencaster (ProCasts, twitter) and blogger (IanOzsvald.com).

Bob and Pat of Startup Success were kind enough to interview me last week on the subject of how and why you should make screencasts to demo your software product.  At first we reached out to the readers of the Business of Software forum to ask ‘Screencasts – what would you like to know?‘.

The Art and Science of Screencasts (mp3) is interview #21 at Startup Success, the mp3 runs for 42 minutes:

“In show #21 Bob and Pat interview Ian Ozsvald, founder of ProCasts on the art and science, mystery and drama of creating great screeencasts for your startup’s product or web site. Ian generously shares his expertise about how to target your screencast, techniques that make a huge difference, a range of free and non-free tools, ways to improve your video communication abilities and more. If you want to know how to create a screencasts that shines, this is the show for you!”

Would you like a free eBook that covers all of this (and more)? Our Little Book of Screencasting is in the works, to receive a notification when we release it send an email to: ebook_notify@procasts.co.uk

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Ian is a professional screencaster (ProCasts, twitter) and blogger (IanOzsvald.com).

Remy Sharp runs jQuery For Designers, a screencast education site for jQuery users.  He screencasts using iShowU on a Mac with a pro microphone and is a local here in Brighton.

Please tell us about your background

My name is Remy Sharp (@rem on Twitter).  I’ve been working on the web for over 10 years and have been coding for a lot longer. I have always been obsessed with the problem-solving aspect of the developer role.

I was the second man in to a company called Digital Look back in 1999, and learnt pretty much every aspect of running web sites over the following years.  My background is in server-side programming  but scratching my own itch I got (back) in to JavaScript around 2005 and I’ve made this the focus of many of my projects today.

As I learnt the tools of my trade, the company started taking on employees, people that I would come to mentor and manage. This where I first got a real taste for teaching other people how to go about solving problems.

Today I run my own freelance consultancy called Left Logic working with JavaScript and the LAMP stack.

In my spare time I run my screencasting web site called jQuery for Designers.

Why do you use screencasts on jQuery for Designers?

The initial reason for using screencasts was quite simply that I could convey more information than typing out an article.  It was my way of taking a slightly lazy approach to blog posting.

However my feelings quickly changed as I realised I had a responsibility to my readers. Screencasting was more important than it just being a tool for me to get my ideas out faster.  It is a powerful education tool.

Today, after running jQuery for Designers for over a year, I’m a huge fan of using screencasts to educate.

One side effect I never anticipated also convinced me that screencasting is a great method for teaching: the mistakes I make.  As I’m recording, depending on the degree of mistake I make, I’ll work out the problem and continue with the screencast.

Many viewers have commented on this as though I’ve dived right in to the session and included all my mistakes, and how this is one of the most valuable aspects of the screencasts.  They get to see how someone else would approach debugging a completely unrelated bug during development.

Why do you think screencasts work?

The real killer aspect of screencasts is that you can convey two methods of education: audibly and visually, and as such there’s very little effort and commitment required from the viewer.

The comparison is easy: I could read the newspaper and it would take me 15 minutes.  Alternatively I watch the news on the TV which would take me 5 minutes but I’ve taken in even more information in a much shorter time.

It is simple to see the benefits given how busy people are in today’s world.

This is only for education screencasts.  Screencasts as sales tool are powerful mediums to demonstrate a product and win a customer.  The visitor to your site has to give very little, i.e. a simple click on an image to start the video, before they’re given an introduction to using the product.  Without a screencast, the sales tool would be a feature list and some screenshots.

Text and images certainly have their value, but to me, the screencast is the extra value, the icing on the cake if you will.

Do screencasts ever replace text+pictures for explaining certain topics?

I wouldn’t say that screencasts should entirely replace text & pictures – or certainly not for tutorials.  Indeed all the screencasts on jQuery for Designers also comes with a complementing article.  Some articles go in to more detail than others but I still feel it’s important to explain the topic in some written form, even if it’s briefly.

The primary reason that I provide the full article is for both the visitors that would prefer to only read the tutorial but also for accessibility and for SEO.  If I were to only post a screencast, search engines would only have the title to index.  Whereas posting a written tutorial it is fully indexed, and new visitors could enter my site via Google searching for a specific answer.

There’s other issues with replacing text & pictures with just a screencast, often relating to now the content is accessed.  For example, screencasts can be many megs to download, if there was a written article summarising what the visitor will learn, they can make that decision before downloading.

If a screencast is available for a tool that you’re interested in – would you watch it?

Always. When a screencast is used to promote a product, or to give a preview of how something is used, it’s much more telling than screenshots.  With a product or a tool, as a user I already have an idea of what I should be able to do.  By watching a screencast, it will nearly always finalise my decision as to whether I want to download or purchase a tool.

I think this works particularly well for software.  There’s no better sales tool, than to show a potential user how to interact with the software.  The Apple web site use this tool for all of their key products and include demos of how to use the software as a sales tool to get people interested in all the things they could do with their software.

What hardware and software do you use to screencast?

My very first screencasts were run on a MacBook Pro via the internal microphone.  This works fine if you’re doing quick and dirty screencasts.  However the biggest problem, aside from bad sound, was that after a while of recording, the fan would kick in and it could be heard in the audio.

Today I record on an iMac, 2.8Mhz 2Gb machine.

I also have a separate user account set up that I can switch to record the screencast.  That way I can prepare a specific wallpaper – which includes brand, Creative Commons information and URLs, a specific screen resolution (800×600) and desktop icons for the session.  This allows me to record the full screen to include everything I do during a session.

I use a Samson CO1U mic, which I set to record in AAC mono 22.050 kHz.

The video is compressed using H.264 at 12fps.  These settings keep the size down for the visitor but maintains a good end quality screencast.

The software I use for recording the session is iShowU.

Once the session is completed (for my posts I don’t edit the video, I try to get a single uncut take – but this is because of the nature of the subject I’m screencasting) I will convert to iTunes compatible MP4 and to raw FLV.

This way I can make both Flash and QuickTime versions available on from my web site, and the MP4 version available on iTunes (which has to be 640×480 – so some video compression takes place).

Are there any other screencasting sites that web-developers should know about?

Other than jQuery for Designers the biggest screencasting site I would recommend is CSS-Tricks run by Chris Coyier.  He publishes screencasts primarily covering CSS but also other web topics, such as Photoshop and jQuery.

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Ian is a professional screencaster (ProCasts, twitter) and blogger (IanOzsvald.com).

Here Horst Jens, another long-time author in ShowMeDo, tells us about his background working with kids and open-source and how he spreads knowledge via screencasts.  He takes charge of the interview later on and sets his own questions that he has to answer.  Horst mainly uses Linux with RecordMyDesktop.  Note – I’m a co-founder of ShowMeDo.

What’s your background?

I work and live in Vienna, Austria as an programmer/computer teacher and have founded my own company spielend-programmieren.at (“programming while playing”) with the focus on teaching young students the joy of open-source game-programming.

What sort of screencasts do you make?

Usually screencasts about themes of the Linux/Open-Source world. I like to work with  students and kids. See my ShowMeDo page.

Why do you think screencasts work?

I think there is no better way of learning than having to explain a topic to someone else. Producing screencasts force the students to learn a topic to be able to explain it.  I see it as a learning tool for the screencast-maker first, for the screencast-watcher second.

showmedo.com (where I publish almost exclusively) has a good feedback function and I get emails nearly each day, encouraging me to make more and better screencasts.

So, the motivation aspect  works for me

I suspect that most of the watchers of “my” screencasts don’t learn so much from the video itself; more get the feeling like: “hey, it’s that simple, even those kid on the video could do it” and the watcher does the little required actual learning by looking up the documentation.

However I noticed that many people learn not by watching what the teacher says but instead by watching what their neighbor does.

Maybe screencasts support this way of learning.

Do kids like making and watching screencasts?

Until the kids find out how much hard work it is to produce even a very small video: yes.

Having to be silent while one kid tries to speak a single sentence over-and-over again is sometimes hard for the other kids.

The good thing is that kids become experienced fast and it pays to make several screencast with the same group of kids at different times.

Do screencasts ever replace text+pictures for explaining certain topics?

I hope not, (functional) illiteracy is a big enough problem that I see while teaching in a rich, developed country like Austria.

The biggest problem for me with screencasts is that you are stuck with the creators speed. In a book, I can turn some pages forward if I’m bored or read a chapter slower if it’s difficult. While technically I can fast-forward and rewind on a video, it is less practicable (streaming) and more difficult to find the next “chapter”.

Ian Ozsvald encourages authors to do series of smaller videos instead of one big video, that is a good idea.

To answer the question: hopefully not replace but complete.

What software do you use to screencast?

Getting a kick out of being 100% open source I work with xvidcap on linux. My newest version of Ubuntu Linux don’t like xvidcap so I work with RecordMyDesktop at the moment.

I never found a good video-editor on Linux (there exist several but are all too complicated for me) so I work in a very arcane way with mplayer command-lines to include subtitles and logos, cut pauses etc. See Ubuntu video editing for notes. For editing sound I use Audacity.

What hardware do you use?

Different laptops, and a Logitech webcam. I found out that the microphone built-in to the webcam is better than the cheap external microphones I have used in the past.

How long does it take to get a new person making a screencast?

As a rule of thumb you need 10 times the “film” time to record a screencast. So to produce a 6-minute clip you need a full hour (with no post-production). If you have experience this time decreases dramatically.

Does watching a screencast about a commercial tool help you decide whether that tool is the one you need?

“About a commercial tool” ? Could not say, I prefer open-source tools

I experimented with the idea of making a screencast about a “close-sourced”-computer game (YouTube) but I doubt that anyone will buy the game because of my video I see screencasts more in a support role, for users that already bought a software rather than an marketing tool.

From a customer perspective, I would prefer a product that inspire users to produce lots of  screencasts over a product that provide only company-made screencasts. So I could use number and quality of user-made screencasts as an popularity-indicator of a product as well as an indicator of the quality of support I could expect from the product’s community.

What useful sites have you found that teach screencasting?

showmedo.com has all that you need.

And at this point Horst decided to write his own questions and answers to express further thoughts, mostly about ShowMeDo (note – I’m a co-founder) that he felt needed airing

What don’t you like about ShowMeDo?

….(long pause)…this is a very difficult question! Well, the ShowMeDo wiki is not very popular, that’s sad because I like Wiki. Also I don’t see the sense of anonymous comments. I want to answer everyone who writes me a comment. If you really need anonymous feedback, a simple rating or flag system is enough.

What do you like about showmedo.com?

• The founders, Ian and Kyran, these are great guys
• The focus, about open-source
• The policy: the videos are free, and authors are encourage to license under a creative-commons license. Lot of video sites look for the quick dollar; be it with banner-ads, be it with pay-per-view models etc. Most videos on showmedo are free from the start, and I think the subscription model is very fair.

What was your worst moment with showmedo?

Working 2 weekends and visiting my own elemtary school twice to produce a single video with elementary school kids…just to realize the video is crappy because of my visual concept. I haven’t published the video yet.  Poor kids, they put much work into it

On a German OpenOffice forum I got criticised for a series of German open-office video tutorials. I do not mind the critique (some of the videos were bad) nor the style (produce nothing, criticise  others) but i don’t like to get criticised  for the idea of showing the speaker’s face using a webcam. I had seen this concept on ShowMeDo first (on a video about Django) and have never created a screencast without a webcam since.

What was your best moment with showmedo?

• Getting good feedback right from the start for my first (crappy) video
• Getting good feedback still feels good every time
• Doing something for free education
• Winning a price at the ars-electronica competition because I made a ShowMeDo screencast with kids – this felt very good
• Seeing my name published in the Python Papers because of Ian’s work
• Too many ‘best moments’ to select one and they still are coming
• Producing a video with students in Chinese and Russian language  even though I speak no word of each language
• Reading comments below a video about Python in Russian language:

“Thank God I understand Python.” – gasto

“Clear and simple even if I don’t understand either Russian nor German.” – richard1956

“Very nice introduction to Python! I enjoyed the video very much! I was surprised to find how anyone can easily follow along no matter what language you speak! I feel stupid now, I guess that’s why Python is called a programming language : )” – anonymous

Where do you want to see ShowMeDo.com in the future?

In a world where bad news and pessimistic prognoses are produced by the hour I make an optimistic forecast: ShowMeDo will be there in the future, it will be somewhat bigger and
still great.

Along with the One-Laptop-per-Child project, I think that the best way to improve this planet and it’s residents is to spread access to knowledge and education. ShowMeDo can be a part of it; providing the tools, the knowledge and the community for everyone to share his bit of wisdom and giving access to this wisdom to everyone.

I also think that video-platforms like ShowMeDo will inherit the role that currently big publisher houses hold for the book market: Providing for the audience the service of filtering only the most interesting of all the those possible authors and providing for the authors the service of helping to reach the audience.

I feel  that those companies that provide the best all around (learning) service  will rise while those that hold on to the concept of physical learning products will fail.

In ShowMeDo’s financial humble beginnings, Ian and Kyran have already proved  to always put the user’s needs before their own needs. This attitude makes me certain to see a bright future for ShowMeDo in the long run.

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Ian is a professional screencaster (ProCasts, twitter) and blogger (IanOzsvald.com).

Gabriel Hasbun (gasto) is another long-time screencaster at ShowMeDo.com where he has created over 20 tutorial screencasts.

What sort of screencasts do you make?

Educational screencasts for programming (C and Python) and software usage (GIMP, and in the future Blender).

How long does it take you to make each screencast?

It depends. There are 2 types of screencast (if one wants to show discrimination) :

1. Straight forward screencasting. One simply records one’s voice and screen while showing the educational material on-screen. A 20 minutes screencast takes about 1 hour, and 4 if I went through a rehearsal script before. So it will depend also on the familiarity of the subject to me.
2. Edited screencasting. These are the most time consuming. Only recommended if what one wants is to emphasize on concepts rather than sole “clicking here creates X” screencasts. One needs video editing software. A 20 minutes screencast might take 3 days (if I really want it polished)

What software do you use to screencast?

• CamStudio for screencasting
• VirtualDub and the GIMP/GAP for video editing
• Audacity and Cubase LE for sound/music editing

What hardware do you use?

An old Pentium Celeron 2.6 Ghz, 2 GB RAM, 255 MB GeForce 6200 AGP graphics card, with a Lexicon Labmda mini audio studio, a Dexun Pro-58 microphone, a Casio music keyboard, SoldSound headphones and a lot of patience.

What does a new screencaster need to get started?

• Patience, like everything worth one’s time.
• A lot of knowledge and a lot of research.
• The will to help people.
• Love of computers
• Didactics knowledge
• Creativity
• A computer with minimum performance (to 2009 mainstream standards), unless one wants advanced video editing, in which case I would recommend a fast processor and a mid-profile graphics card. Integrated audio is OK unless one is interested in composing music, in which case I’d recommend a cheap audio interface from Lexicon (Alpha is OK).
• Articulated speech

What useful sites have you found that teach screencasting?

• ShowMeDo.com
• Screencast Patterns

Do you recommend screencasts as a good technique to teach new users about software?

Yes. Multimedia in general will always be better than plain boring text. It enhances the learning experience:

• Provides immediate confidence with software/programming because of the I-am-at-your-side-teaching feeling the screencaster gives with the voice
• The visual feedback inherent in screencasts of what needs to be done on screen with the input device replaces the need of a distracting textual explanation
• Text is boring. Writing 5000 characters to explain how one’s software/library/website works is a good way of scaring away your potential users
• Watching a screencast is fun, easy-going, and easy to the eyes;
• Following a screencast and mimicking is straightforward, no need for translations of text to action

In my opinion all computer documentation should use screencasting and leave text for medieval transcripts.

You see, in my previous paragraph, it is not clear whether I am referring to a computer booklet which explains the motherboard specifications, or documentation written digitally. I could’ve used more refined terms or add extra lines for the clarification. In screencasting, that is not necessary at all. Language issues are resolved visually immediately.

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Ian is a professional screencaster (ProCasts, twitter) and blogger (IanOzsvald.com).

Lucas Holland is an open-source user, screencaster and a long-time author of 49 tutorial screencasts at ShowMeDo.  I asked him some questions about how and why he screencasts.  Lucas and his friend Marius Meinert use the unusual technique of co-screencasting from two locations to make some of their productions.

What sort of screencasts do you make?

I make screencasts covering programming, mostly. So far I have covered Python and Ruby.

What got you started with screencasting?

I always thought that learning a new skill (such as programming) should be as fun as possible and at the same time available to everyone, regardless of their income or social status.

Screencasts (if well done) are a lot more fun than boring books (most of the time) and providing them for free makes knowledge available freely. So in a way screencasting combines those 2 things. I had seen screencasts and wanted to share my knowledge.

I know that you’ve collaborated with another developer to make two-person screencasts – can you tell us why and how you did that?

I have collaborated with a friend of mine and fellow developer, Marius on many of my screencasts. Marius and I have a history of working on tech projects together. So when we came across screencasts we just decided to work together on them.

When we first got started we would sit down together and record our screencasts on one of our computers. We still do that and I feel that it’s the best way to co-host screencasts.

Unfortunately, we don’t live in the same place geographically so we had to find some way of collaborating over the internet. So nowadays we use a combination of Skype and VNC to record our screencasts. We’ll record the Skype call audio (which includes both our voices) and capture the screen on one of our boxes.

Do you think screencasts work for everyone?

I know that there are different types of learners, some more visual than others. It’s my contention that screencasts work for many people but I’m sure there are some people out there who prefer to learn from books etc. Consequently, a combination of screencasts and text/images provides the ideal learning environment.

What software do you use to screencast?

That depends on the OS I’m on. On OS X I use Screenflow and iShowU. On Windows boxes I use Camtasia studio. I don’t really screencast on Linux since I haven’t found a software solution that works well for me.

What hardware do you use?

I use a macbook laptop and a cheap USB headset for screencasting. Sometimes I’ll also use my Windows box which I custom built.

What resources can you recommend for new screencasters?

ShowMeDo is definitely a good resource. Watch as many other screencasts as you can. Steal the good things about them and make sure you don’t make the same mistakes. Also, books provide some insight as to the order in which to teach things etc.

Which screencast have you seen most recently that taught you something new?

Apple provides a number of ‘how to’ screencasts on using GarageBand (a music recording/editing tool). I play the guitar in my free time and being able to record oneself is definitely very useful for the learning process. Some of you musicians out there probably know this. I definitely picked up a few tricks while watching those screencasts.

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Ian is a professional screencaster (ProCasts, twitter) and blogger (IanOzsvald.com).

Learning from the experience of others is invaluable.  Here I’ll pull together screencasting interviews by the experienced practitioners in our field.

Ian Ozsvald (founder of ProCasts):

• The Art and Science of Screencasting (mp3 podcast interview for Startup Success, detail here)
• Screencasting: an Expert Reveals the Dark Art (reprinted here as Jolt has closed)
• Interview with Ian Ozsvald – Screencasting made professional!

Interviews with open-source screencasters:

• Lucas Holland of ShowMeDo (Mac)
• Gasto of ShowMeDo (Windows)
• Horst Jens of ShowMeDo (Linux)
• Remy Sharp of jQueryForDesigners (Mac)
• Interview – Michael Pick : Man behind WordPress Screencasts!

Interviews with people who make screencasting tools:

• ScreenToaster’s Rudy Viard on why they’re building an on-line screencasting service

Good screencasting articles:

• Let’s Make a Screencast! Part One
• Let’s Make a Screencast – the Final Cut
• How do you produce Product Demo videos?
• What software do you use to make screencasts for your product?

Would you like a free eBook that covers all of this information (and more)? Our Little Book of Screencasting is in the works, to receive a notification when we release it send an email to: ebook_notify@procasts.co.uk

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Ian is a professional screencaster (ProCasts, twitter) and blogger (IanOzsvald.com).