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By now you've probably heard about Captivate (formerly RoboDemo), Macromedia's tool for creating engaging software simulations, demonstrations, and tutorials. You've decided to take the plunge and create your first "captivating" demonstration, but how do you get started? This article will walk you through the basics of producing your very first Captivate project. If you don't own Captivate, you can download the 30-day trial from Macromedia's Web site. Captivate is currently Windows only.

Before you start, it's a good idea to plan ahead. That starts with asking some very basic questions:

• What are your objectives?
• Who will your audience be?
• How will you distribute your work?

If you know the answers to these questions beforehand, it will be much easier to develop your project. Captivate calls projects movies; like a movie, they'll have a beginning, a plot in the middle, and a conclusion. Even for small movies, it's a good idea to sketch out a storyboard. It doesn't have to be fancy (doodles on napkins are pretty commonplace), but it should help you determine the flow of your content.

Having planned your project, you next need to identify what you will need to capture. This means you have to make sure that you have everything you need before you begin ­ additional graphics, audio files, scripts ­ anything you may want to include in your movie. You can add elements later, but the more prepared you are before you begin, the easier it will be to complete your work.

If you're not sure about what types of elements you might want to include, try to find some samples of a project similar to yours. Take notes about the elements that are used, and how others use them successfully. For some projects, an audio soundtrack might be too distracting, but for others it may enhance the visuals. Try to get feedback from potential end users during development to make sure you don't go too far with any added elements.

Tip: If your project covers several objectives or describes a lengthy process, you should break up or Ochunk' your work into smaller segments. This helps the viewer understand the information, and also helps keep your file sizes smaller. If you try to cram too much action into one movie, you may end up choking systems with older graphic cards. Instead, create a menu for each segment and create separate movies accordingly. This can be done using the MenuBuilder application that is a part of Captivate.

Once you have a good idea of what your movie will need and how it should flow, you can begin. You may need to do several "takes" to get some elements of your project exactly how you want them, but most actions that you record will be easy to adjust and edit after you have finished recording.

Starting a New Project
When you first open Captivate, you are presented with a dialog screen. This screen shows you what you can do within Captivate ­ open an existing movie, create a new movie, etc. Since this is your first Captivate project, you'll select the "Record or create a new movie" option (see Figure 1).

Once you've chosen to start a new movie, Captivate still needs more information from you ­ it needs to know whether you'll be recording an application, the full screen, or a custom portion of your screen. If you're recording an application, you can snap it into a Captivate window to make it smaller. This enables you to fit your demo onto another interface (such as a Web page), and it reduces the overall size of your file. If you're making a movie that will be distributed on a disc or presented full-screen (such as a kiosk), then you can choose to capture the entire screen, or even select a custom portion, such as if you wanted to eliminate certain areas (e.g., the task bar). We'll do our first movie from an application (see Figure 2).

Now you'll need to navigate to the application that you want to record. Captivate will give you a series of options for recording a specific size or a preset size. If you select the drop-down menu that says "Optionally, select a window you'd like to record", the application that you choose will resize to your specified dimensions (see Figure 3).

Before we dive into our recording, we may want to adjust some of the recording options by choosing the Options button from the Recording dialog. You can select the language that you want to use, choose a style for your screen prompts and dialogs, and choose what kind of recording to make. Since we're just getting started, we'll create a demonstration, which is a movie that shows the viewer the steps needed to perform a function or task. For now, we won't be recording any narration or changing any of the settings in the other tabs. The options to hear keystroke and camera sounds are for your assistance only; these sounds will not appear in your final project (see Figure 4).

Lights, Camera, Action!
Now that your settings have been completed, press OK in the Recording Options dialog, and then the Record button to begin recording. Place the content so that the viewer can follow along with you comfortably. It is possible to capture narration while recording, but you will get much better results if you concentrate on recording the screen actions separately from the audio. You may want to read along with a script when you are recording so that your actions are in sync with any narration that will be added. You can adjust the timing of your actions later if needed.

Tip: You'll want to make a static page (or pages) to place at the beginning of your project to introduce your objective(s) and tell the audience what the project is about, what level of experience and knowledge they should have, and what they should be able to accomplish once they have viewed it.

When recording, any object that you select on the screen will trigger a screen capture ­ for example, if you press a Submit button, Captivate will take a snapshot of that action and record it. For more dynamic actions, such as typing a file name in a Save As...dialog, Captivate will automatically record the full process as a video segment.

When you have finished capturing your actions, you will need to press the End key to stop recording. Captivate will then assemble your work and open your movie in Storyboard view, which shows you your project in slides (see Figure 5).

You can now preview your project by selecting Preview from the top of the screen. To play the entire project from start to finish, select Movie from this menu, or press F4.

If your project is absolutely perfect, great! You can skip ahead to the section on Publishing next month. Chances are, though, that you'll need to make a few tweaks and adjustments to your work.

Editing Your Work
Once you've finished the recording process, there are two primary types of edits you may need to make: changing what you recorded (moving elements, deleting screens, adjusting timing, and so forth) and adding elements to what you recorded (sound, external files, additional Captivate recordings, etc.).

If you don't like the location of a slide or section of your project, you can make adjustments easily by selecting the desired slides and then dragging and dropping them where you want them. If you're familiar with other slide-based applications, like PowerPoint, this is a familiar process. When you drop the slide where you want it, the slides will renumber for you. You can also remove a slide(s) by right-clicking on it and selecting Delete Slide. A dialog will ask if you really want to delete the slide. Click OK to delete it. If you need to make adjustments to a single slide, you can double-click on it to go into Edit mode for that slide.

Modifying Captions
Captivate automatically inserts text into each slide to describe the actions that were recorded. These are called captions. If you need to modify a caption, double-click on the slide you want to edit, then double-click on the caption itself. The Text Caption dialog will appear. From here, you can change the caption's style, font, font size, font color, and even the text itself. Keep in mind that you will want to select only fonts that will be installed on a user's system, just like you would for a Web page. Press Apply to preview your modifications (see Figure 7).

If you select "Apply properties to all Ocaptions' in the movie," a global style will be created. All captions (existing or new) will take on that style within your movie. When you are finished making changes, press OK.

If you need to adjust the caption's size, drag one of the caption's selection handles to expand or contract the caption. Be careful not to obscure any text when resizing. To move the caption, click once inside it, and then drag it into place. For more precise placement, use the arrow keys on your keyboard.

Adjusting Timing
One of the greatest features in Captivate is its timeline. The timeline allows you to adjust when individual elements occur, as well as their duration. Elements can be any of the audio, text, or visual pieces that make up your slide.

This is especially useful for when you want to lengthen or shorten a segment after recording, or if you need to change the order in which elements appear. If you click on an element in the timeline to select it, you can drag it left (to place it earlier) or right (to have it come in later). If you need to lengthen or shorten an element's duration, select it on the right-hand side, where it ends, then move the double arrow cursor left to shorten it or right to lengthen it. You'll see the selection expand or shrink accordingly. You can preview just the slide you're editing by pressing F3.

Summary
Part Two of this article will go into detail on adding narration and audio to your project, importing other assets into your project, and adding a few dynamic elements to give it some life. Then we'll actually publish your masterpiece to share it with the rest of the world. See you then!

Additional Resources:

Captivate Demo Download: www.macromedia.com/cfusion/tdrc/index.cfm?product=captivate

Captivate Developer Center: www.macromedia.com/devnet/captivate/.

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