Very similar to the software for video capture, the screenshot software for PC are functioning within the recording of the cursor’s movements on the screen of your PC, reason why they are extremely useful when it comes to record the presentations online of software and tutorials, because these special programs are recording each move you’re making- operations of click and drag, menu openings, window openings, and is also facilitating the online chats on the subject of the capacities that a product is or is not offering.
These programs are generally very easy to use, and have editing options that are very efficient: live capture for menus, colors, and the modification in real time of the fonts, of the text and of the mouse’s movements, all of them allowing the transfer of the video file by the e-mail. The screenshot software can automatically save the registration as images (BMB, JPG, GIF), or as video files.
The editing option is extremely important because it allows inserting commentaries as text, according to the registered moves in order to explain all the processes that are taking pace and their chronological order. Also, the author has the possibility of increasing the movie file’s dimension and to cut the parts he considers unimportant. The online communication is a great component of the modern world nowadays, reason why the software for screenshots is especially created, so they can be easily used for the illustration and the communication of the ideas and information.
The term of “screen casting” was invented in 2004, and is specially used for defining the way of capturing the sequences on the PC’s screenshot. One of the latest approaches involves the capturing of different sequences, rather than taking separate images that later on, you have to connect, and over which you will add the video part, recorded with the microphone.
Between the most used and famous software for PC screenshots we mention:
- Windows Media TM– software launched by the company Microsoft in 2000, which is using the most advanced technology for capturing the moves the screen of your computer does, with a high level of quality for the captured images. This new technology brought by Microsoft Digital Media Division is offering the possibility of recording the tutorials through internet, with the perfect reproducing of the video images and sound, at a resolution of 800×600.
- CamStudio software of screenshots is capable of registering all the activity of your monitor and all the sounds and video files, AVI type, which can be transformed in SWF. With the help of this program you can create video tutorials, record the special characteristics of the new installed software, you can make detailed descriptions of the products which you have just installed, and then sell them, etc. CamStudio has the capacity of adding to your recordings a great quality, all being anti-aliased, and you can even personalize the movies you made by adding a video with you in front of the monitor. The file’s dimension is very little, and the soft has incorporated the special codec Lossless.
- Easy Screen Capture, is a software of PC screenshots which allows the text introduction for the taped images and with which you can register tutorials, games, demos, at a superior quality, and after you can easily burn them on a CD/DVD. With the help of this soft, you have the possibility of also registering your voice or you can register music for the background video file. The soft won many awards in time.
- Adobe Captivate 5.5 is the upgraded version of software for PC screenshots that offers many other video editing options. The program offers the possibility of recording everything that’s happening on your monitor, at a very good resolution. The recording can be multimodal and can generate with its help, within a single recording session, the proof of a procedure, the stimulation of the necessary steps and all other stages you wish to explain. Unlike the other software, Adobe Captivate 5.5 gives you the opportunity of also clicking right, left and double clicks without affecting the program. You can easily add text messages in order to completely describe the concepts and actions you are recording, or you can let the soft do that for you, while you are capturing them. The software is very easy to customize, you can change its dimensions, position, orientation, aspect and the display of your comments.
The programs above are just the one representative for the category, and at a simple Google search, you will surely find even more free downloadable programs, from the most complex to the very simple to use and install, all according to your necessities.