There are a lot of great screen capture & screencasting tools out there. There’s one that has a permanent place in my toolbox though. It’s Jing.
Jing makes it simple to capture and share both screen capture images and screen casting videos. It’s not meant to replace a more full featured application like ScreenFlow because it’s limited to only 5 minutes of recording time and there isn’t a way to edit your video. I consider Jing to be one of those quick down & dirty tools that just gets the job done.
What makes Jing so useful is it’s tight integration with Screencast.com for hosting. This combination makes it easy to share images and movies without having to know a thing about FTP settings. And from a workflow standpoint, when uploading to Screencast.com, Jing will automatically copy the URL to your clipboard so it’s easy to share in an email, text message, or on Twitter.
Jing is free, but for $15 a year you can upgrade to the Pro version that includes the ability to record MP4 videos in addition to the standard Flash video. And, you can post to YouTube.
A basic Screencast.com account is free too and maybe more than sufficient for casual users. If you’re providing a lot of screencasts, a paid account offers much more storage and bandwidth. It’s only $10/mo. and offers 25Gb of storage and 200Gb of transfer. And it doesn’t limit commercial videos like the terms of service of some other hosting platforms.
This video introduces you to Jing. In the movie, I do the following:
- Share 5 real world Jing examples.
- Show you how to create screen captures & screencasts.
- Share 5 tips for you to get the most out of Jing.
Jing and Screencast.com are from TechSmith. They’re the developers of SnagIt and Camtasia. They’re a solid company and have great support too. Jing works on both Mac’s & PC’s too.
I encourage you to take a look at Jing. Let me know if it’s earned a place in your toolbox too.
[Update: By the way, the video on this page inserted using HTML5. In modern browsers it should play just fine. In Firefox and a few others, it should drop down to a Flash player version. If you have problems, please let me know. Thanks.]
Great work, Scott. Very organized and presented.
Thanks Michael. I had fun doing this video and I really do like the Jing/Screencast.com solution. It’s perfect for light weight screencasts.
Hi
I noticed in the screencast in the section #4 resize.
How did you get in Firefox the WEB DEVELOPER in the Tools section on the toolbar?
Angus,
You can add plug-ins to Firefox. Here’s the URL for the Web Developer plugin.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-us/firefox/addon/web-developer/
Hope this helps.
Thanks you are a legend !!
I am impressed with the lightning fast reply.
It works just as you have shown it – that is a real beauty of the screencast – you can see it, rewind it and pause it on the exact spot you want!!!
Your screencasts are informative and helpful – I will return for more. Cheers
Scott,
I really like your stuff, can you maybe provide some insite on using Camtasia with other video players. I think you use the Jw video player, I just think this would be very useful.
Tony,
Thanks for stopping by and leaving a comment. Camtasia, like many of the other screencasting applications, allows us to produce video files. I produce all my videos as H.264 video files. This gives me flexibility to upload them to YouTube, Blip, or Vimeo. They also play on iPhones and iPads whereas Flash output doesn’t. I’ve used the JW Player before but I prefer to use Easy Video Player [aff].
I like Easy Video Player because it integrates with my Amazon S3 hosting, has various player styles, and provides lots of advanced video player features like overlays, calls to action, and page creation. It’s a great choice for video marketing and I offer this to a lot of my small business clients.
You can also use the regular player that’s built into Jing or Camtasia. Most people will find these adequate. But if you want more flexibility and a different look, the JW Player or Easy Video Player is the way to go. I’ll do a future post on Easy Video Player and show all the capabilities so you get a better understanding of it.