Screencasting

Screencasting is the real-time recording of screen activity. It is used largely as a means to create how to tutorial videos for software. I use screencasting to produce tutorials for students, but it is also nice to have the students themselves create videos themselves. Camstudio is a popular option, however one of its main drawbacks is that the files are created are rather large and need to be compressed afterwards. Jing on the otherhand produces videos that are uploaded to the jing project website. Both these programs are free, however if you are more serious about producing screen tutorials then Camtasia may be your program of choice. Unfortunately, this comes with a price tag.

Update 27th September 2010

Thank's to Chris Smith I'm now a convert to Screenr. The main advantage is the high resolution and direct storage on the Web. If only more tutorial videos were produced at better resolutions like those made with Screenr.