One of the things I love about my job is working with people in a variety of industries. I'm always amazed at who is using our software. And, this week was no different. I have to admit, I was surprised when I heard from Robin Heppell from Funeral Futurist about who he was creating screencasts for - funeral professionals! Robin is a funeral director and consultant! But, he's not your ordinary funeral consultant - he's utilizing technology like no one else in his industry!

I picked Robin's videos for the Screencast of the Week because he's bringing screencasts to a non-traditional industry and bridging the technical divide. Even if you're not in the funeral industry, you can learn from Rob about how he is utilizing technology. Check out some of Robin's screencasts here:

Also, check out the quick Q&A that I (BW) did with Robin (RH). Enjoy!

BW: How have videos, images and screenshots changed your own communication for the better?

RH: The funeral industry, like many industries, is a relationship-based industry. Relationships are how funeral directors have created their own businesses, so I can build and strengthen my relationships with my clients (the funeral directors) with videos as they get more familiar with my expertise and personality.

BW: Are your videos, images and screenshots used internally or externally? What is the viewer response to them?

RH: I create a lot of free training or tips for external use as my main form of marketing. If I am recording a demonstration with a client, it usually contains sensitive information so that video is used internally for them. But since I have taken some notes and have an outline for demonstration, I will immediately record a similar, generic video and upload it to be another externally marketing / training piece.

BW: What do you use Camtasia Studio for primarily?

RH: Recording training courses for funeral directors with PowerPoint & Camtasia.

BW: What do you use SnagIt for primarily?

RH: Screen captures of Google results displaying how to dominate those results with online video (many of those videos are produced by Camtasia - kinda full circle eh?)

BW: What are the last three captures in your Open Captures Tray?

RH: Google Results for "Funeral Consulting" , Home page of a funeral home website I created with WordPress, Order form from my online shopping cart.

BW: What was the last video project you worked on about?

RH: "Price Shopper Secrets" training course that teaches funeral directors how to be more effective when talking with price shoppers on the phone.

BW: Is there one feature of Camtasia Studio v6 that has flat-out delighted you? Tell me about it...

RH: YouTube preset. It was the only change that I needed to see to want to upgrade to Version 6!

Any nominations for next week's Screencast of the Week?

Whenever I make a mistake narrating my audio, I will often either tap the microphone or pause for a minute. That way when editing, I can quickly locate either spikes in the audio or dead time which signals to me where I need to edit my audio. It makes it a lot faster for me to locate the problem areas to edit.

Hope this helps you! See the screenshot below showing where I tapped the microphone to indicate to myself where I needed to start editing. The spikes in volume stand out on the audio track.

Do you have any quick tips to share about audio?

As a kid, I was constantly drawing. As a student, often my notes from class were supplemented with sketches and doodles. And, now as an adult, I often sketch out ideas and concepts for work projects. I like drawing out diagrams, mindmaps and flow charts. I find it can be easier and more effective to plan, share information and concepts with visuals. A picture is worth a thousand words as they say...

I'm out in Banff this week at CanUX. I know, I know. I will try to suffer through it. :-) One of the speakers is Dave Gray from XPLANE (That's him on my right at Lake Louise, Alberta on Sunday). I've had the honor of seeing him speak at the VizThink conferences and he is always interesting and inspiring.

And, it just so happens that Dave uses Camtasia Studio. Check out his video about the basic principles of visual language - Forms, fields and flows.

You can see additional videos and content from Dave here.

And, if you're interested in what's going on at CanUX, Kaleem Khan will be live tweeting the event. Follow his Twitter stream here to see what's going on.

And, in interest of transparency, TechSmith is a sponsor of CanUX.

Any nominations for next week's Screencast of the Week?

After attending the Microsoft Professional Developers Conference (PDC) recently, I have to say that I'm excited to see some of the technology they demoed at the conference. Attendees walked away with "the goods" so that they could install and start playing with Windows 7 which is the next version of Windows. I was happy to run into blogger Long Zheng (that's him pictured on the right) at the conference.

After PDC, Long made a quick screencast showing off a new feature in Windows 7. It runs 15 seconds (no audio). You can see the video here. I like this video because its a perfect use of a screencast - it is a quick way to show a new feature in action. It is nice to have full blown longer demos, but small and sweet is nice sometimes too! And, even though Windows 7 won't be available for retail for another few years, we can still see Windows 7 in use with screencasts. Expect more screencasts of Windows 7!

Any nominations for next week's Screencast of the Week?

Earlier this summer, a longtime friend, Shaan Hurley from Autodesk, stopped by TechSmith for a visit! That's a pic of us on the left in our Shipping Department along with Tony Dunckel, the SnagIt Product Manager. Shaan's been a long time user of SnagIt and Camtasia Studio.

Shaan travels the world showing users how to use Autodesk products. I was reading his blog the other day and noticed this recent post. He had a great screencast in the post which you can see below which is this week's Screencast of the Week.

I picked this as the Screencast of the Week for a couple reasons. First, I liked that it was short and succinct. I love quick tips and tricks. I also liked it because Shaan was sharing his answers to users questions from around the world. What better way to answer a user question than with a video showing exactly where to find the feature in question? And, location no longer matters - Shaan can be anywhere in the world (and usually is) and answer questions with a quick screencast. Perfect use of technology!

TechSmith will be at Autodesk University in December. If you're attending the show or are in Las Vegas, stop by and see us.

And, that reminds me. If you'd like to come visit TechSmith like Shaan did this summer, our doors are open! We love having visitors! Email or call me (+1.517.410.0030) and I'll give you a tour, you can meet the product teams to give them your feedback directly, and I'll even treat you to lunch. Come on in!

Ever dream of being chased up a tower of padded mats closely followed by a muscleman who is trying to throw you over the edge of the mountain toward your impending doom?! Well, Tiffany Florentine was up for the challenge! That's Tiffaney pictured to the left (pic from the NBC American Gladiators website). She recently tried out to be a contestant on American Gladiators.... and made it to the competition with some help from Camtasia Studio! Blog readers, you're in for a treat with the week's Screencast of the Week!

I heard from Robin Moore, one of Tiffaney's co-workers at Deloitte Consulting, about Tiffaney's plight to make the competition of American Gladiator.

Tiffaney had made it through the second and third level trials, but needed to submit a 10 minute video that "sold her story" to the team of judges to make the next level. The kicker? She only had a 48 hour notice to shoot and submit the completed video. Lucky for Tiffaney, Robin had experience with video.

Tiffaney and a friend went out that night to film her. They got some footage of Tiffaney running around Michigan's state capitol in Lansing wearing only her signature spandex in 18 inches of snow! Now that is dedication! It's hard to look tough when you're freezing!

Early the next day, Tiffaney brought Robin the footage on a flash drive to start making the video. There was only about 9 hours left to work on it before it had to be in the overnight mail. To Robin's surprise, she had raw video files straight out of the camera. Not the converted files. After Robin downloaded the files, it took her a while to even find the right codec so she could view the videos. And, Robin wasted another hour looking online for anything that could convert the video into a readable format.

Robin had used Camtasia Studio countless times for software capture (Robin used it extensively. We worked together on Morae training videos several years ago), but never tried it for full-motion video. She decided to give it a shot. And, the good news was that Camtasia Studio was able to import and manipulate all the video files Robin needed. And, they were back on track! Robin and Tiffaney spent the next 6 hours glued to Robin's monitor splicing about 40 video clips together and mixing in some photos, transitions and fun music to complete a 10 minute video. They produced the video, burned it on to a CD and drove, I'm told recklessly, to the latest overnight pickup location they could find. Tiffaney almost tackled the delivery guy who was on his way out of the parking lot. They had made the deadline!

With Camtasia Studio's help, Tiffaney was able to win her contestant role!

Check out Tiffaney's Camtasia video here.

And you can read Tiffaney's bio on NBC's American Gladiator website here.

And, Tiffaney writes of her own experience on the show here.

I think Robin and Tiffaney make quite the team, don't you? If you disagree, Tiffaney may chase you down and tackle you! :-) Thanks Robin and Tiffaney for sharing your fantastic journey and Camtasia Studio video!