Video Presentation: Recording Yourself & Your Screen

If you need to record your presentation, this article will give you some quick tips for recording video and uploading it to the ECSS Congress platform.
To make the most of this article, we recommend downloading Office 365 – it’s free as part of your University enrolment.

Recording Your Screen

To record a presentation, or record content on your screen, there are a few different options. It’s important you find one that works well for you and is easy to use on your device.
MP4 is the recommended file format for uploading a video to the ECSS Congress platform.

PowerPoint

PowerPoint has an in-built recorder to let you record your presentation with narration, your presentation with narration and a camera input (Office 365), or just your screen. You have access to Office 365 for free with your university enrolment.

What you’ll need:

• Microsoft Office (PowerPoint)
• A Microphone (your webcam may have one built-in)
• A Webcam (optional)

If you want to record a presentation with slides, you can do this in PowerPoint.

This Microsoft Office support article covers the method for Office 365, earlier versions of Windows, Mac OS, and PowerPoint online. This option can be found on the ‘Slide Show’ tab under ‘Record Slide Show’. PowerPoint presentations cut audio whilst changing slides, so take a brief pause before moving to the next slide.

Be aware that there is no in-built editor for cutting out sections, but you can re-record individual slides if you need to.

Both of these methods can be exported as videos, as well as saved as PowerPoint presentations. Our recommended format for uploading to the ECSS Congress platform is mp4.

Screencast-o-matic and Screencast.com

If you prefer not to use Office products, you can always try out these free tools; Screencast-o-matic and Screencast.com. These tools will output to mp4 and can be easily shared online and on Blackboard.

Always exercise caution when installing third-party software.

What you’ll need:

• A Webcam
• A Microphone (your webcam may have one built-in)
• The appropriate software (TechSmith Capture, Launcher, etc)

Screencast-o-matic allows you to record your screen with a browser-based recorder, which requires you to download and install a ‘Launcher’ on your device.

What can it do:

• The recorder offers you options to record Screen, Webcam, or both at the same time. You can also choose whether or not to record audio.
• Once your recording is complete, you’ll have the option to save as a local video file, upload to screencast-o-matic.com, or upload to YouTube.

Screencast.com includes a Recorder application (called TechSmith Capture), a basic video recorder, which allows you to record your screen and webcam, along with audio input. You’ll need to create an account to use Screencast.com and the recorder.

What can it do:

• The recorder offers you options to record Screen, Webcam, or both at the same time. You can also choose whether or not to record audio.
• Once recorded, the video will upload to Screencast.com. You can then download it from there. Note: The free version has limited storage and playback (2GB storage and 2GB bandwidth per month.)

Our recommended format for uploading to the ECSS Congress platform is mp4.

Source:  University of Reading, “Blackboard Help for Students” and Microsoft Office Support