Table of Contents for Technology Tutorials

To make it easier to locate posts for individual tutorial topics, I have created the following table of contents. Left click on a tutorial name to view it in the current browser tab and use the browser's back button to return to this post. Right click on the tutorial name to open the post in a new browser window or tab.

To view a larger version of screenshot or picture contained in one of these posts, left click on it. A full-sized image will appear in the current browser tab. Use the browser's back button to return to the post when you are done viewing the image.


Table of Contents for Technology Tutorials

Creating a Basic, Multimedia Presentation with Impress

Using GIMP for Quick and Dirty Image Editing

Using Audacity to Record Your Voice

Adding a Video to an Impress Presentation

Taking a Screenshot

Making a Screencast with CamStudio

Convert a Video Format with Any Video Converter

Using Any Video Converter to Convert a Video

Copying Audio Files from a Computer to an MP3 Player

Downloading a Podcast Directly from a Web Site

Scenarios for Using Audacity and MP3 Players to Supplement Tutoring Sessions

Downloading and Installing Windows Version of Audacity

Downloading and Installing a Program with Firefox

"Unzipping" a ZIP File with ZipCentral

Additional Impress Tutorials

WordPress Blogs (Tutorials)

Links to User Guides & Third-Party Tutorials

Skype User Guide

Making a Screencast with CamStudio

In the previous post, Taking a Screenshot , I showed how to take a still picture of your computer screen using a free screen capture tool called Gadwin PrintScreen. Sometimes, however, it is more effective to make a movie of what is happening on your screen, so the person viewing it can see the actual process. This kind of movie is called a screencast.

To illustrate this point, here is a screencast I made with a free product called CamStudio (http://camstudio.org), showing how to insert a video into an Impress slide:

(Note: To play the screencast, left click on the little arrow at the lower left corner of the video box.)


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(Left click here to play screencast.)

(Note: Dragging and dropping a video within an Impress slide is normally very smooth. It's jerky in this example because I was running both Impress and CamStudio at the same time, which overwhelmed my computer and slowed it down.)

The process for creating a screencast with CamStudio is very simple. This tutorial shows how to do this on a computer running Windows Vista.

(1) When you launch CamStudio in Windows, the following screen will appear:





















(2) CamStudio offers three options for making a screencast of your computer screen:

(a) the entire desktop,

(b) user-selected portion of the screen or

(c) a single window.

I prefer option b, so I can control the size of the area I'm recording.

To set the screen capture size to option b:

(a) left click on "Region" at the top of the CamStudio menu and

(b) if it's not already checked, left click on "Region" in the menu that appears.






















(3) Now, to keep the CamStudio window out of the screencast, minimize it as you would any other window, by left clicking on "Minimize" "(-)."





















(4) To begin recording the screencast,

(a) right click on the CamStudio icon at the bottom right of the desktop and

(b) left click on "Record."




















(5) Left click on a corner of the area of your screen you wish to record and, while holding down the left mouse button, drag the box that appears to select your recording area.























(6) When you release the left mouse button, a green bracket will appear at each corner of the portion of the screen being recorded and recording will begin.


















At this point, begin the process you wish to record.


(7) To stop recording, right click on the CamStudio icon at the bottom right of the desktop and left click on "Stop" in the menu.




















(8) Navigate to where you wish to save the file.

The file will be saved in AVI format. To name the file, replace the "*" in "*.avi" with the name of your file.






















(9) Left click on "Save" to save your file.























The AVI format is suitable for inclusion in an Impress presentation. If you wish to upload the screencast to a blog or website, you will need to convert it to the smaller, Flash Video Format (FLV). Refer to the post Convert a Video Format with Any Video Converter for instructions on how to do this.

Convert a Video Format with Any Video Converter

I use an inexpensive Flip Video Camcorder to record my videos. The default format is AVI, which results in a very large file size. While this is fine when inserting a video in an Impress presentation, it takes forever to upload to a website or a blog. To decrease the size of the a video file, I use a free, Windows-only tool called Any Video Converter (http://www.any-video-converter.com/products/for_video_free) to convert the file to Flash Video Format (FLV), which is much smaller and supported by blogs and websites.


The process for converting a video file is very easy:

(1) When you launch Any Video Converter, the following screen will appear:


















(2) Left click on "Add Video."
















(3) Navigate to where you saved the file you wish to convert and left click on "Open."















Note that the AVI file for the short (23 second) video being used in this example is quite large: 45.1 megabytes.


(4) Note that file size of the same video will be only 1.48 megabytes after it has been converted into Flash Video Format (FLV).



















(5) The file you selected will now appear in the Any Video Converter screen.


















(6) The current format of the video file will be displayed in the "Profile:" at the top right of the Any Video Converter screen.

To chose the new format:

(a) Left click on the little down arrow next to the current format.

(b) Choose the new format from the drop down menu that appears.
















(7) My Flip Video Camcorder records audio as well. I like to remove this audio during the conversion process and add it separately later on.

To remove the audio from the converted video:

(a) Select "Disable Audio."

(b) Left click on the down arrow next to the status, which is to the right of "Disable Audio."

(c) Left click on "Yes."

















(8) The audio will now be removed from the FLV version of the video file.



















(9) Now, left click on "CONVERT" to begin the conversion process.



















This will create a second copy of the video file in the selected format. Your original version will not be changed.

(10) The progress of the conversion will be displayed under "Status."



















(11) Unless you specify otherwise, Any Video Converter will create a folder called "Any Video Converter" in your "Documents" folder, and store the converted video in a subfolder it creates specifically for files in that format. In this example, the converted video file will be stored in "Documents\Any Video Converter\FLV\[filename]."


















Notes:

Adding a Video to an Impress Presentation

Sometimes, a short video demonstrating how to do something is much more meaningful than a series of pictures. Adding a video to an Impress slide is almost exactly the same as the process for adding a picture described in the post: Creating a Basic, Multimedia Presentation with Impress. This post will show you how to do this.

In one of my presentations, I use a brief presentation called "Making a Doctor's Appointment" to show how an Impress presentation can be used to emulate a role-playing session between a learner and a tutor. In one of the slides, I use the following video I made of myself dialing the mock phone number of the doctor's office:

(Note: left click on the little arrow at the bottom left of the image to play the video.)





I will now show you how to insert this video in an Impress slide, so it will begin playing automatically when the slide appears on a computer screen.

(1) First. left click on "Insert" in the toolbar in the main Impress window , then left click on "Movie and Sound" in the menu that appears.



















(2) Navigate to the folder on your computer that contains the video you wish to insert, select the video by left clicking on it and left click on "Open."






















Note that the video format is AVI in this example.

(3) There are many video formats, but Impress will work with only a few. If you click on the down arrow at the bottom right of the menu, you will see a list of the supported formats.


























In a subsequent post, I will show how to use another free tool called Any Video Converter to convert video files from one format to another.


(4) An image of the first frame of the video will now appear in the center of the workspace.


















(5) The video image is a little too large. To make it smaller,

(a) right click anywhere within the image and

(b) left click on "Position and Size . . . ."





















(6) Next, verify that "Keep Ratio" is checked before you reduce the width and height of the image.






















(7) Reduce either the width or the height. (Because "Keep Ratio" is checked, the size of the other will change proportionally.) Then left click on "OK."





















(8) The video image is now smaller in size.





















(9) Now, drag and drop the video image to where you would like it to appear on the slide.





















(10) There is now room for explanatory text to the left of it.






















(11) Add text, as described in the post Creating a Basic, Multimedia Presentation with Impress.





















You can also use Audacity to record audio that will play simultaneously with the video when the slide is displayed on a computer. Insert the audio as described in the post Creating a Basic, Multimedia Presentation with Impress.

12. Finally, preview the slide, to see how it will appear to the learner.


















Notes:

(1) Impress presentations containing combination of photos, audio and video would be useful for creating workplace materials that combine on-the-job-training with ESL instruction. A work process could be broken down into its component parts and packaged in an instructional, multimedia presentation. The vocabulary and sentences used in the explanatory text and audio would be the same as used on the job.