A
screencast is a digital recording of
computer screen output, also known as a
video screen capture, often containing audio
narration. Although the term
screencast dates from 2004, products such as
Lotus ScreenCam were used as early as 1994. Early products produced large files and had limited editing features. More recent products support more compact file formats such as
Adobe Flash and have more sophisticated editing features allowing changes in sequence, mouse movement, and audio.
Just as a
screenshot is a picture of a user's screen, a screencast is essentially a movie of the changes over time that a user sees on his monitor.
Uses
Screencasts are useful for demonstrating and teaching software features. Creating a screencast helps software developers show off their work. Screencasts are a useful tool for ordinary software users as well, to help report bugs (the movie takes the place of potentially unclear written explanations) or to show others how a given task is accomplished in a specific software environment. Screencasts are excellent tools for learning how to use computers, and several
podcasts have started to teach computer users how to use software through screencasts.
Considering the high cost of instructor / faculty led training and the relative ineffectiveness of typical
computer based training (CBT) systems, screencasting is likely to become a very popular technique for imparting high-quality knowledge at a low cost.
For example, organizers of computer related seminars may choose to routinely record complete seminars and make them available on
DVDs to all attendees for future reference and/or sell these recordings to people who cannot afford the fee of the live seminar or don't have time to attend it. This will generate an additional revenue stream for organizers of seminars and make the knowledge available to a broader audience, so generating a win-win situation for everybody.
This strategy of recording seminars is already widely used in fields where using a simple video camera or audio recorder is sufficient to make a useful recording of a seminar. Computer-related seminars need high quality and easily readable recordings of screen contents which is usually not achievable by using a video camera to film the desktop which is usually projected onto the wall by a projector.
A drawback of most commercial screencasting programs for
Microsoft Windows is their inability to make videos of
OpenGL applications, though Demo Builder,
Fraps, and
Growler Guncam can cope with this.
More recently, the popularity of inexpensive desktop screencasting software has created a cottage industry among internet marketers claiming that their screencasting techniques will increase sales for online businesses like eBay and monetized blogging.
Educators are now using screencasts as another means of integrating technology into the curriculum. Students can record video and audio as they demonstrate the proper procedure to solve a problem on an interactive whiteboard.
Origin of the term
In 2004, columnist
Jon Udell invited readers of his blog to propose names for the emerging genre. Udell selected the term
screencast, which was proposed by both Joseph McDonald and
Deeje Cooley. His is a well-known example - which explains how
Wikipedia works - illustrating the history of the
Heavy metal umlaut Wikipedia article.
Since 2004, the term
screencast has gained widespread use and has been adopted as part of Internet and Computing vernacular.
Hardware
An alternative solution for capturing a screencast is the use of a hardware
RGB or
DVI frame grabber card. This approach does not have the
OpenGL limitations mentioned above, and places the burden of the recording and compression process on a machine separate from the one generating the visual material being
captured.
Software
Several screencasting software applications with varying capabilities are on the market.
For Windows Users
For Mac
For Mac and Windows
- Jing, free and Pro versions
For GNU/Linux and Windows
For GNU/Linux
Notable screencasters
As the genre has become more popular, individuals have become specialist screencasters creating screencasts for specific areas of technology. These include:
See also
