Video Tutorials > Camtasia Tips

Recording PowerPoint Presentations

Required: Camtasia 4.0 or higher (when installing, check the option to enable the PowerPoint add-in)

See also Techsmith’s video: Record a PowerPoint Presentation

Create a PowerPoint presentation on your topic and save it to your computer.

Is it recording at too large a size???
PowerPoint automatically expands to fullscreen when you go to the Slideshow mode to record - this can be REALLY big if you have a large monitor! To record at a smaller size, in PowerPoint go to Slide Show > Set Up Show and change "Show type" to "Browsed by an individual (window)" and uncheck "Show scrollbar". Go back to your slides, click on your Camtasia "Record" button and you can then resize the window to whatever size suits you.

Option 1: Open PowerPoint

1. See the Camtasia toolbar - six buttons, including a red dot icon to record and a microphone icon for audio
2. Open the PowerPoint presentation you want to record
3. To setup your recording options, click the 5th button on the Camtasia toolbar – looks like a hand over a screen. You can choose several options here, including audio options and setting up hotkeys to start and stop recording
4. In audio options, make sure to test your microphone settings first!
5. When you’re ready to record the presentation, click both the microphone icon to enable voice recording and the red dot icon to begin presentation recording (or use the hotkey F9 if you chose that in the setup)
6. Notice the large red word ‘REC’.  This indicates that you are now recording, but will not show up on your final video.
7. Go through your PowerPoint presentation, speaking naturally into the microphone to record your voice as you move through the presentation
8. Camtasia will record your mouse movements (if you chose that option in the setup) and your voice automatically. It will also record moving from PowerPoint to an embedded link (e.g. a link within your PowerPoint presentation) outside of PowerPoint. For example, you can link to a database like Barton and Camtasia will record that in the same file as your presentation. To move back to PowerPoint after leaving it, choose it in your task list and choose ‘Resume Presentation’. However, this can be a bit slow and you may have to edit it later to make the video move along quicker.
9. When you reach the end of your presentation, Camtasia gives you the option to either Stop Recording or Continue Recording.
   - Stop Recording if you are completely finished with your presentation.
   - Continue Recording if you want to record beyond your PowerPoint presentation (e.g. to demonstrate a database).
10. Choose to either Edit or Produce your recording.
    Produce your recording as a Flash file, according to the MIT Libraries guidelines.
    You can always go back and edit your recording, including voice narration.

Option 2. Open Camtasia

1. Under the Task List, choose ‘Record PowerPoint’.
2. PowerPoint will launch; open the presentation you want to record.
3. Then follow the process above.

Page last modified: August 20, 2008