Camtasia Studio review, uses, features, advantages and disadvantages

Camtasia Studio is two products in one, The screen recorder and Video maker and editor, It is capable of creating powerful, interactive and professional videos that can be used for a wide range of projects such as making of YouTube videos, Camtasia offers new call-out options, improved sharing tools and a completely updated user interface.

Camtasia Studio

Camtasia (formerly Camtasia Studio) is a software suite. It is created and published by TechSmith. It is used for creating video tutorials & presentations directly via the screen-cast or via the direct recording plug-in to Microsoft PowerPoint, It is available to all Windows and Mac users, and it is a premium product.

You can choose the screen area to be recorded freely, and audio or other multimedia recordings may be recorded at the same time or added separately from any other source and integrated with the Camtasia component of the product.

Camtasia consists of two main components which are Camtasia Recorder and Camtasia editor, Camtasia Recorder is a separate tool for capturing screen audio and video, Camtasia editor is the component for which the entire product is named, that is a multimedia authoring tool with the industry standard “timeline” interface for managing multiple clips in a stacked track form plus many enhancements.

Camtasia is used by anyone that plans on recording videos and needs a product that is capable of recording the computer screen, It can be used in making YouTube videos, educational presentations, marketing projects, and sales presentations, The software supports a wide range of file formats for importing and exporting videos and other projects.

Camtasia advantages

Camtasia looks professional, It offers Picture in Picture (PiP), It can export in many different file types, It is more customizable, It has bells and whistles, It presents multiple audio tracks, It has many features in the interface that makes creating screen videos and processing them, You can choose to record your entire screen or only a portion of it that you preset before recording begins.

You can utilize various tools included in the program to complete your video, These include multiple Transition Options, Voice Narration, a Zoom and Pan effect, Cursor Effects, Captions, Quizzing, and more. You can use built-in tools to enhance and improve the audio quality of your voice recording.

Camtasia offers a higher level of flexibility in the number of media types that are available when producing a presentation, The developers using Camtasia can save the presentations as Adobe Flash, Windows Media streaming video, Quicktime movie, DVD-ready AVI video, iPod/iTunes video, RealMedia streaming media, MP3 audio and animated GIF formats.

You will be able to edit anything with Camtasia Studio, From editing visual effects to adding animations, Camtasia software can add interactivity functions to your videos & it can add things like adding quizzes, Quizzes and surveys restrict the media types when saving a presentation, The projects containing a quiz or survey can only be saved in the Flash format.

There is no limits on video length, This is one area that sets Camtasia apart from most other competitors out there, especially the free products that are available for download, Camtasia software does not have a limitation on the length of videos or any other project created using the software, This is a main benefit of Camtasia as certain projects such as sales presentations can be lengthy.

Camtasia is capable of recording anything. It is very versatile and has very few limitations on what you can record. It is capable of recording computer screens, PowerPoint presentations, Computer cameras or webcams, Voice narration, and any other audio.

If you record your computer screen or PowerPoint presentations, you can turn on your computer camera and be featured in the videos, you can set the software to show a live recording of the presenter in the actual video, The presenter will be in the bottom right corner of the video for your viewers to see.

Camtasia software is capable of editing videos, If you recorded the video using Camtasia or any other video recording software, you will be able to convert the file format and edit the recording using the drag and drop editor.

It can import and export, It supports .camproj, camrec and .avi file formats when importing and exporting the projects, All projects can be shared and transferred to multiple computers and locations. The screen recordings can be transferred from a PC to a Mac or vice versa.

You can publish and share to YouTube. Completed projects can be published and uploaded to YouTube, Google Docs, MyPlaces, and Screen-cast right from the Camtasia dashboard, This is very convenient and much easier than the sharing options found on other software.

The biggest advantages of using Camtasia are the ability to create unlimited videos, publish videos to YouTube directly from the user dashboard, and powerful integration with Microsoft PowerPoint and other third-party services, You can try Camtasia free for 30 days without any commitments.

Camtasia’s process of creating a presentation is much like creating a movie, The components of its interface are similar to those found in video applications such as Windows Movie Maker and Adobe Premiere, Full-motion screen recordings are captured from a selected region of the screen, a specific window, the entire screen or a PowerPoint presentation.

Camtasia Studio interface options including Recording Options (left), Clip Bin (center), Preview Window (right) and Timeline (bottom), The screen recordings, video from a web camera, audio from a microphone and imported media are stored in an unedited form in a clip bin, To add media to a project, the developer drags the content from the clip bin into the timeline, Different forms of media are separated into tracks in the timeline.

Camtasia’s timeline offers the tracks for multiple video and audio recordings and the other content such as quizzes and captions, The developers use a preview window for viewing the media stored in the timeline and individual clips stored in the clip bin, The storyboard helps the developers to quickly locate screen recordings, transitions, title slides and the other content of the file. 

As with Camtasia, the audio and video can be recorded separately. In addition to the default auto-recording procedure, developers can choose to record screenshots manually by pressing the Print Screen button to create a new slide. This can further assist the developer in capturing only the desired screenshots for the Captivate project.

Camtasia offers an option for recording directly from Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2003 or PowerPoint 2007. In both recording types, all actions, such as mouse movements in the selected window and audio through a microphone, are saved in a Camtasia recording file at the end of the screen capture.

The Camtasia recording file can be inserted into the timeline by selecting and dragging it from the clip bin. Camtasia’s real-time recording method is most advantageous to the developers needing detailed screen captures who do not mind editing video content in the timeline.

Camtasia Studio helps you import many types of multimedia video and audio files, including MP4, MP3, WMV, WMA, AVI, WAV, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, Adobe Flash, and many other formats into the Camtasia proprietary CAMREC format, which is readable only by Camtasia.

Camtasia is the best software on the market, No other software comes close to the quality and versatility of Camtasia, If you need a product that is capable of recording your computer screen, creating and editing videos, Camtasia is a superb program for creating the instructional or the other videos using screen capture, The interface is accessible to all users at all levels.

Camtasia disadvantages

Camtasia’s procedure of creating a presentation through an individual movie works best for the developers who are familiar with video applications. Developers unfamiliar with the procedure may have increased difficulty with the editing procedure in Camtasia because screen captures occur in real time.

Frame synchronization of video resulting from modification or deletion of errors, including audio misspeaking or incorrect mouse movements, can be tedious in Camtasia. The script outlining the elements of the screen capture can help alleviate errors during recordings.

Camtasia is not free, You could get lost working on a project. It is more complex and not web-based/requires installation. It can be intimidating to look at on first glance, and you can get yourself into trouble if you don’t quite know what you are doing.

Camtasia is not perfect and it has a few minor flaws, It requires software, To record videos and capture your computer screen, you have to download Camtasia software which requires specific system requirements for Windows and Mac operating system, As of right now, they do not offer a web based version of the software.

You are only allowed to update your software to a new version of your current version. if you have Camtasia Studio 9 and version 9.2 comes out, you will be able to update for free. However, if version 10 is released, you will have to pay to upgrade to the new version.

The main disadvantage is the difficulty in editing the content in the video and deleting errors that occurred during the recording, When deleting one or more frames in the video and audio tracks, It is difficult to match up frames so that the video and audio flow smoothly, The production of a project as a Word document is not found in Camtasia, which is useful for the printouts.

Camtasia lacks any video-clip manipulation or integration with other packages that have such capabilities, Audio handling has minimal capabilities and no integration with the other packages compared to some competitors in this price range.

The rotation of objects is applied via a dialog rather than interactively, though many lower-priced video editors do provide interactive rotation and manipulation of objects such as text and video frames, Recording live from a DV camera is not supported, Camtasia can crash, But you can remedy these situations by closing the app and opening it again to start fresh.