Imagine being able to send a link to clients containing a narrated tour of a website under construction.  Or a simple narrated screen cast explaining the newest Facebook features.  The creativity to be unleashed is virtually limitless.

I’ve been playing around with Jing as a screen capture tool and am just blown away by the screencasting / video capabilities.  Videos in the free version are limited to 5 minutes in length.  That doesn’t seem to be a shortcoming, afterall, there is no editing capability.  That makes 5 minutes a rather long time to be narrating.

I used to use Snagit.  Video sound was always problematic for me, even after purchasing a USB microphone.  The sound in Jing’s video function is quite good.

Here is a piece comparing 27 different screen capture tools.

And a humourous look at what one company is doing with Jing.

@swrightboucher 

I’m with @rich-brooks 

ScreenFlow is the best screen capture software I’ve come across. I’m locked in there until further notice lol

@dakotalocal Jon, your comments are appreciated.  CamStudio is really interesting.

Re Camtasia – How much of a learning curve is involved with that program?

Thx,

Susan

@swrightboucher  thanks for the link to the review of 27 screen capture tools.  I will be looking to decide what to use

Susan, thanks for this new list. Mine was getting quite dated and though I love Jing, I was on the lookout for new Mac tools. So glad to see a plethora of Mac goodies on there, many of them free. I just love me some freebies. The ones that will capture a whole webpage without a lot of trouble seem like they’d be great for sending clips to clients. Jing wasn’t doing that for me, if I remember correctly.

I really like Snagit. Can do a lopt of editting after capure as well.

@swrightboucher

Last summer I went on a tour trying to find the best free software and like many here found CamStudio. I don’t like what it does to my computer sometimes.

So, I went looking again and discovered Jing. I’m playing with it and at this point I really like its features and functionality.

I’m going to check out your other list. Have tried any of the other ones?

Don

@swrightboucher

Thanks Susan. I do have a couple of video editors, so I can personally edit them them with Photoshop Premier Pro CS5. I realize not everyone can do that though.

My Son just bought a cool program (he’s 16) and is making us some animated videos for our website that ought to be a lot of fun and really cool.

@donpurdum we’ll have to see your son’s videos, Don

@deairby

It will be fun and interesting. I’m looking forward to it as well. Thanks!

On my Mac — just to capture a screen or any portion of it — I use and like “Grab,” available in Mac’s AppStore.