Edition

Educator Resources

This month, I was looking around online because I wanted to show you some educational blogs that were talking about the new SnagIt 9. Only ...I could not seem to find any. There are quite a bit of reviews out there on SnagIt 9 and quite a few blogs dedicated to education, I just could not seem to find one quite yet that talked about both.

This got me thinking...As a writer, I read a few blogs that talk about writing so my money says that many of you read education blogs. I would love to know what blogs you find useful...or maybe you have one of your own? Let me know your favorite education-related blog or where I can read yours.

So, all this means that you will have to deal with SnagIt 9 reviews that are more general and not posted by someone with an education perspective...let me know if you find any so that we can share how the new features in SnagIt 9 might help this group. In the meantime, you can read these general reviews in the community section this month.

Enjoy!
Katie Birmingham
Newsletter Editor
 

This month, we have not just 1, but 2, product releases to tell you about.

SnagIt 9 is here! With tons of new features and an all new user interface, version 9 promises to be the best yet. Here are some of the new features that you might be interested in:

• multi-capture capability: now you can take more than one capture at a time and combine images.
• media library: all of your captures are automatically saved and readily available when you want them.
• new editing user-interface: easily find and the features you use most and discover the ones you've never used.

Check out all the new features in SnagIt 9 by visiting our What's New page. Not a SnagIt user yet? Give it a try for free for 30 days.
 

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Kevin Boutelle has the daunting task of providing technology training opportunities for more than 2500 educators and support staff for the Oswego County BOCES and 9 supported school districts. Kevin was doing print newsletters from the IT department and recently switched over to producing them as videos. His videos address questions that are commonly asked of the IT department like how to burn a CD or how to access and use webmail.

While this interview might be more directed toward our subscribers with an IT focus, I think the idea of video newsletters is an interesting one and could be done to give parents updates or as a class project for students.

Here is a short interview with Kevin that will give you more details on what he does and how he does it...

What is your process for making one of your video newsletters?

In general, the process is decide on topic, script actions, do dry run, change script, modify settings where needed, another dry run, record, edit, produce in two forms (flash for web and .m4v for ipod), upload and then send notification to all staff.

Have you seen increased "readership" since changing from a print to video newsletter?

Without question. The site that I use to host the flash files and the podcast allows me to see how many views each resource has received. I can then take these reports and graph these page views for my team leaders. They love showing the detail off to other administrators in the organization.

I noticed that you have RSS and iTunes feeds available, can you tell me about setting that up...was it difficult, how did you do it?

I use Feedburner to provide me with the various feeds but I write my own XML for the RSS feed that I provide to feedburner. This way I can guarantee that everything is exactly as I want it. Learning the tags for the XML wasn't incredibly difficult but testing was a bit tedious.

Editor's Note: I can't resist doing a plug for Screencast.com here...if Kevin were hosting his videos on Screencast.com, it would automatically generate the RSS and iTunes feeds. Easy!

Where are you hosting your videos?

I use 2 Moodle sites that I maintain my training materials on. One is mostly org based and the other is specifically designed to provide access to anyone, anywhere. The newsletter is focused on our organization and the tasks that face our staff and faculty. I've provided it to anyone that cares to see it but I'm not sure the value is there for those outside our organization. The one thing that serving it in this manner has provided me however is the chance to work with others that are curious about how and why I produce these materials the way I do.


Have a look at Kevin's videos, they do take a minute to load but are worth the wait. Click the link below, the videos are on the left side of the page, under the IT Video News heading. Enjoy!

Looks like people are enjoying the new features....

"What most impressed me about this upgrade was how simpler it makes the process of capturing and creating illustrations. " -Ed Bott, edbott.com

"...a familiar, intuitive, and much more varnished capture utility whose image editor has finally come of age." –Jessica Dolcourt, C|NET Download.com

"It is difficult for me to imagine that there have been significant enhancements to SnagIt. I thought it had pretty much reached its zenith, but SnagIt 9 manages to improve an already superb product..."-Tim Hillibrand, mobilitysite.com


I'd love to hear what you think of SnagIt 9. Try it, tell me what you love and what you hate and how you would use SnagIt in education. If I get enough feedback, I can include the comments in next month's community section.
 

Have you ever moved to a new house in the same town...and then found yourself mindlessly driving to the old house one day after work? Getting adjusted to a new version of familiar software can be like that. It takes a little while to retrain your muscle memory. That's why we created a video introducing SnagIt 9 to existing users...to help you develop a mental map of where things are in the new version and, hopefully, ease your transition to version 9.

Intro to SnagIt 9 for existing users

(If you're new to SnagIt, you may want to watch the Intro for New Users instead...)

New to Screencast.com? Find everything you will need to know to get going. We'll show you how to:

• setup your account
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Visit the Screencast.com help section for everything from the basics to in-depth tutorials on what you can do with Screencast.com and how to do it.