Poor Camtasia video quality on Youtube - how to fix?

Amtmann

Hi folks,

I'm using Camtasia Studio 7 to do a bit of screencasting. I'm producing the files as .avi or .wmv to try to get good quality, but when the videos go live on Youtube, they're quite fuzzy. I've even produced a few of them in HD and they're still fuzzy. How do I get a crisp, sharp image?

Tips would be hugely appreciated

ED E

Dump the raw avi from the cap straight to file, then edit and compress with a h264 codec into a reasonable size for YT upload(mpeg 4).

Amtmann

Hey there,

Thanks for that. A little unsure as to what you mean in places though. Is this the codec you're referring to?

So basically, you're advising me not to produce the camtasia capture at all, just to work with the capture file itself?

Mister Man

When I record for camtasia 7 I record the file as normal, then edit it using Camtasia studio, and render it out as quicktime (.MOV) 1300x720 and I get perfect clear results on YouTube.

Amtmann

Going to try that now.

Amtmann

Hmm... that didn't do much for the picture quality, and it badly reduced the quality of the sound. Bugger.

Mister Man

Tremelo wrote: »

Hmm... that didn't do much for the picture quality, and it badly reduced the quality of the sound. Bugger.

What I actually done was, Selected "HD" as the render setting, then went to edit it, and here are the settings I have it at


Maybe that might help you out a bit? If not, can you send me a link to the video on youtube as an example of the quality?

Amtmann

Mister Man wrote: »

What I actually done was, Selected "HD" as the render setting, then went to edit it, and here are the settings I have it at


Maybe that might help you out a bit? If not, can you send me a link to the video on youtube as an example of the quality?

I'll give that a go now. Will get back to you on this thread. Thanks a mill for your advice so far!

Amtmann

Just to confirm, you:

1) select add/edit presets on the production wizard
2) select HD on the Manage Production Presets box
3) Close the Manage Production Presets box
4) select "Custom production settings" on the production wizard
5) Proceed through the wizard setting .mov as the format and inputting those dimensions.

Do I have you right?

Mister Man

**Note - you need Quicktime installed on your PC for this to work
1.Open camtasia studio
2.Do whatever editing etc needs to be done
3.Go to file>Produce and share
4.From the drop down menu, select HD. The drop down menu should close, re-open it, and go to the bottom where it says "Add/Edit Presets
5.A new box will pop up, this time select "Edit" from the top of the box (Note - the drop down menu should be on HD)
6.Name it whatever, I left mine as HD. Select .MOV - Quicktime Moive from the list of formats. Click "Next"
7.On the next page, select "Quicktime options"
8.I Should have options for both "Video" & "Audio" Select "Settings" on the "Video" part of the box
9. Compression Type: (H.264) - Motion: Frame Rate (Current) fps Key Frames: (Automatic) Frame Reordering (Ticked)

Compressor = Quality: (High) Encoding: (Fast encode (Single Pass)

Data Rate = Data Rate: (Automatic) Optimized for: Download
Hit "OK"
10. Play around with Audio, depends on what your rendering what the best settings are for it IMO
11. Prepare for internet streaming (Thicked) Drop down menu set to (Fast Start) Hit "Next"
12.Select "Custom Size" and make it Width-1300 Height-720 Background colour (Black) Under "File Size Select "Use Instant Zoom-n-Pan speed to reduce file size (Thicked) & Hit "Next"
13.I Don't have any settings for this page, so just hit "Next" again.
14.Should have your settings on the screen now, if so hit "Close" and render the project out.

If you need anymore help, PM me, and I can share my screen via Skype so you can see everything.