Often the nature of consulting requires showing clients “how”. Creating a tutorial video, whether explaining software or showing off a new dashboard, can be a quick and easy task with the right tools. In this blog, I’ll go over the free (Windows) software I use to achieve this.
ScreenToGif
ScreenToGif, as the name suggests, turns your screen into a gif (..or video). Download, hit record, resize the window over your recording area and you’re done. What follows is feature-rich editing of your recording where you can edit out long pauses, copy frames when you need long pauses and even add text and shapes to multiple frames explaining what you’re doing.
After recording, you can export a gif or video. From experience, the gif option is less useful, especially for longer clips, as it frustrates anyone watching it because you can’t control the playback. Exporting as a video is often far more useful. Typically, I set it to 10 frames per second as this keeps a good pace. Unfortunately, the file is always huge, which brings me to the next tool..
HandBrake
HandBrake, as the name does not suggest, compresses video files. Drag in the massive .avi file created with ScreenToGif, select a preset, hit “Start Encode” and you have a filesize friendly video ready to share with the world (or your client).
TL;DR
- Record with ScreenToGif
- Edit and make annotations
- Export as video
- Compress with HandBrake
- Share
All the software is 100% free and open-source, so there are no ads or those pesky “please purchase me” messages.
ScreenToGif: https://www.screentogif.com
HandBrake: https://handbrake.fr
As always, thanks for taking the time to read my blog! If you have any comments, suggestions or want to chat, free to connect with me on my LinkedIn!
~ Ryan Edwards