The Logical Blog

When importing audio files into Captivate, the files can be in WAV or MP3 format.

The WAV format was developed jointly by Microsoft and IBM as the standard format for sound on PCs. WAV sound files end with a .wav extension and can be played by nearly any computer that supports sound. Since WAV files are not compressed, they can get huge.

MP3 (MPEG Layer 3) is a compressed audio format that allows for high quality sound that is significantly smaller than its WAV cousin.

If you add a WAV file to a project, Captivate converts the WAV file to MP3 format when you publish. And while imported audio files generally perform well in Captivate, consider the following true story:

A few audio clips were giving us fits in a recent Captivate project. The project contained several audio clips that had each been imported onto the slides. The clips played as expected if previewed via the Play button on the Audio toolbar. However, when previewed or published, the same audio clips dropped the last few syllables. We spent several maddening hours deleting and re-importing the troublesome clips, all to no avail.

Here’s how we solved this pesky problem:

1. Choose Audio > Advanced Audio to display the Advanced Audio Management dialog box
2. Select the audio clip that is causing all of the drama
3. Ensure Include WAVE files in export is selected from the options at the bottom of the dialog box
4. Click the Export button and then click OK (While the export destination does not really matter, you should make a note of where you send the file to make the next step easier)
5. Delete the troublesome audio file
6. Import the WAV file you exported

   That should solve the problem of the "dropsies."

Using Adobe Captivate 2, you can create computer- based simulations from anything you can access from your computer. The simulations you create can be interactive—you can add captions, rollovers, clickable areas, typing areas and sound effects. During these lessons you will learn the skills essential to mastering Captivate.

Lessons include:

The Captivate Interface | Insert Text Captions | Edit Text Captions | Modify Text Captions and Add Highlight Boxes | Align Objects | Control Caption Timing | Insert and Manipulate Images | Image Stacks | Insert Click Boxes and Set Caption Options | Adding Buttons | Duplicate Slides and Hide the Mouse | Change Slide Timing | Insert Text Entry Boxes | Change the Pointer Path | Text Animation | Frames Rates and Animation | Export and Import Movie Captions | Add Background Music | Resize a Movie | Import PowerPoint Slides | Link to Other Movies | Link a Movie to a Web Site | Checking | Bandwidth and Publishing Movies | Publish to Word | Set Reporting | Options and the Manifest File | Insert a Question Slide | Edit a Question Slide | Set Question Slide Options | Create a Menu Builder Project | Edit and Export a Menu Builder Project | Publish SCOs | Upload Course Content into an LMS.

Click here to register.

Click here to test-drive some of the lessons for free.

Question of the Week:

"I was told never to record a Captivate movie higher than 800 x 600. I don’t recall the reasoning behind this. What are the advantages to recording at this height and width? Will the resolution make the output file bigger?"

Answer:

Determining the resolution and capture area settings for your Captivate movies is one of the most important first steps before recording any movies.

The issue of resolution is really one of usability. If your screen resolution is 1024×768 and you capture the whole screen (1024×768), users will have to scroll to keep up with your demonstration. (Even if the user’s resolution is 1024×768 since the browser’s scroll bars and menu’s will take up a chuck of that space.)

If the user’s screen resolution is 800×600, their experience is not typically a good one. The settings I recommend are a screen resolution of 1024×768 and a capture area not to exceed 800×600. Using these settings you get the best of both worlds. If 800×600 is not possible due to target software limitations, use the smallest capture area that does work.

As for file size, certainly the larger the capture area, the more pixels you capture and the larger your movies will be. However, the primary culprit behind “project bloat” is animation and, to a greater extent, audio.

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Shortcut of the Week:

Kudos to Gregg J Wanciak who stumbled upon this Captivate shortcut:

"I haven’t seen this documented anywhere yet," said Gregg. "In Edit view (not Storyboard or Branching), as long as your focus is not in the Slide Notes pane, typing the letter D on your keyboard will bring up the Slide Properties."

Interesting. D for Properties. Makes perfect sense to me! How did you discover that one Gregg? You weren’t kidding about the whole "stumbled" thing, were you? It works, though. Thanks for the tip.

If you’re a long-time Captivate user, you’ve certainly come to appreciate Captivate’s ability to Preview your project without the need to Publish . Just in case you’re new to the Captivate family, you can click the Preview tool on Captivate’s Main toolbar and select from Play this Slide, Project, From this slide, Next 5 slides, and In Web Browser.

Of course, all of the previews offer something to the Captivate developer. But one stands head-and- shoulders above the rest. Read on and I’ll explain.

Play this Slide: Not bad. It’ll play the current slide, just like its name implies. However, it’s flawed in that it will not play slide animation. I only find it useful to show how slide objects such as captions and highlight boxes appear on the slide in relationship to each other. No thanks.

Project: Again, not bad. This preview will generate and play the entire project as it will appear should you Publish a standalone project. Of course, if the project is large, you’ll waste a lot of time waiting for the preview to be generated. On the plus side, you’ll have playbars at the top and side of the preview you can use to navigate the preview. And if you find a problem on a slide, you can click the Edit button to jump right to that slide. Nice, but I still have to say next.

In Web Browser: This preview will generate and play the entire project as it will appear should you Publish a SWF. But as with the Project preview, you’ll waste a lot of time waiting for the preview to be generated. Unlike the Project preview, you don’t get the handy playbars, nor do you have the Edit button that will jump you right to a problem slide. Sorry, but next.

Where does that leave us. Oh yeah, Preview Next 5 slides. If you press [F10] on your keyboard, you’ll get to see your project in groups of 5 slides. In my opinion, this is the most helpful way to preview the project slides. Unlike the last two previews, Next 5 slides does not generate the project (it only generates 5 slides at a time). And unlike the Play this Slide preview, you will see the animation as it will Publish, which I find very helpful. My only complaint is that you can only preview 5 slides at a time. Wouldn’t it be nice if you could preview as many slides as you want? Maybe Captivate 3?

Wait. Roll that back! Captivate 3? How about now? Once again I find myself admitting to “finding” a feature I hadn’t been aware existed. Bethany Senarith from Wells Fargo, a student in a recent class, was able to preview 7 slides at a time. Huh? I thought I was seeing things when I saw her Preview tool say “Next 7 slides.”

Here’s how she did it:

1. Choose Project > Preferences
2. Select the Defaults tab (if you’re like me, I bet you’re wondering how long that tab has been there—go ahead and admit it)
3. Change the Preview Next count to whatever slide count floats your boat
4. Click OK

Last week it was Ms. Nolan with her little zoom trick. Now it’s Ms. Senarith. Anyone else care to show me just how much I don’t know? Hurry, because I’m going back and looking at every dialog box—twice. Soon I’ll know it all, just like I think I do.

Want to learn more about Captivate? Click here.