Proper Project Size

[tmichellemoore]

Hello,
I am new to this forum and first of all would like to say hello out there.
I am new to Captivate. I have taken a tutorial at Lynda.com on Captivate and understand a whole lot more now about the product. I am also reading the user's manual.

Here is my question...
I am ready to record a project, but am having trouble deciding on the size for the project. Is there a chart somewhere that can give me recommendations on this? I think that I should stay in the 640 x 480 to 800 x 600 range. I don't understand how this is affected when I am recording on an 800 x 600 computer and displaying on a 1024 x 768 monitor, etc. There are recommendations and I read that you should base this on your client computers. They are of varying resolutions (I am in a school system) so I would say 800 x 600 is the lowest. and will always be shown in a browser . I am working on the project at home on a 1920 x 1200 monitor (this also clouds my judgement).

I am somewhat computer savvy, but this one is over my head for the moment. Just wait until I get to situational assessments. :-)
Thanks for any guidance you can give me.
Michelle

[Captiv8r]

Hi Michelle and welcome to our community

Part of this will depend on exactly what you intend to record. For example, let's say you intend to show your audience how to type text into Windows Notepad. Now you could just open up Notepad and begin recording, but it is probably sized way too large and you are wasting space. So you decide to size it much smaller. After changing the size to be much smaller, you might record a way cool really small project that will stream well. But what if you need to also show your user how to save the file? If it's too small, the File menu may extend beyond the recording area. Then what happens when you click the Save option? See that substantially larger dialog that results? Well, that size is what will probably be your determining factor there.

Personally, my own "sweet spot" is 640 x 480. But your mileage and needs will probably vary. Unfortunately, there is no "one size fits all" for Captivate projects. In some cases you simply cannot avoid recording at a large size. For example, if what you are recording requires a full screen.

The general guideliine is that the smaller you might make the recording area, the better off you will be.

Cheers... Rick

[tmichellemoore]

Thank you, Rick.

In this particular demonstration the Start button and the desktop have to be seen about 4 times. Everything else other than a those few screen shots can be captured using the windowed view. Can I mix them?

Michelle

[SeanHV]

There is another option to consider also. Recording at one size and then resizing to a smaller one. My normal situation is needing to show quite a bit of screen real estate but I don't want to do full screen.

I usally record at 960x720, then resize the movie to 800x600.

[Guest]

Does anyone know how to shrink a software simulation recording screen? I record on a large screen. Consequently, when I save and export, the resulting swf can't fit into the browser neatly.