These days, interactive lessons that can be viewed over the Internet or from a CD are all the rage.
There are many programs that can be used to capture a computer’s screen, mouse action and audio. Unfortunately, the resulting movies can be huge--a five minute lesson could easily gobble up nearly 100mb of storage space on a hard drive. Downloading a file that large will take a lot of time, even if a user has a fast Internet connection. Large file sizes are just part of the problem. The movies may not be cross-platform (they may not work on both Macs and PCs). Interactivity is a feature most of the "mouse capture" applications do not support. And there are few of these programs that allow images to be imported.
In short, the technology for creating interactive lessons WAS bad. But not anymore. RoboDemo 4 (from the folks at eHelp Software) is here. Using RoboDemo, you can capture screen shots on your computer and quickly turn them into interactive lessons (movies). The movies you create can be interactive--you can add images, captions, rollovers, clickable areas, typing areas and sound effects. Note: There are two different versions of RoboDemo 4: RoboDemo eLearning Edition and RoboDemo 4. The eLearning Edition has tools for eLearning not found in RoboDemo 4. This book was written specifically for RoboDemo eLearning Edition. You can use this book if you own RoboDemo 4--but you will be instructed to skip lessons that utilize RoboDemo eLearning Edition features.
Book Contents:
Module 1: RoboDemo Basics
Download Data Files for the Web | Explore a Completed Project | Create a New Movie Manually | Use Frame Auto Recording | Set Movie Preferences | Insert and Delete Blank Frames | Insert an Image | Set Image Properties | Set Object Transitions | Work with Image Stacks | Create a Backup Project
Module 2: Interactivity Basics
Restore a Movie | Insert a Caption | Change Caption Properties | Control Caption Appearance Order | Check Spelling | Change the Pointer Path | Add Click Boxes | Adjust Frame Timing | Insert and Format a Highlight Box | Create a New Movie with Automatically Generated Captions
Module 3: Advanced Interactivity
Restore a Movie | Insert Rollover Captions | Insert Rollover Image | Record a Voice-over | Import an Audio File | Attach Objects | Add Text Entry Boxes | Create a Text Animation Frame | Insert a Quiz Frame | Edit a Quiz Frame | Link a Movie to a Web Site | Link to Other Movies
Module 4: Finishing Touches
Import a PowerPoint Presentation | Import Frames from One RoboDemo Project into Another | Analyze Movie Bandwidth | Set Movie Properties | Set Movie Controls | Export as a Word Document | Export a Movie as a Flash Movie | FTP a Movie to a Web Server (demo only)
