How To Record a Screen Cast of Your Final Project?
As discussed in this best-of final projects page you may wish to make your impressive Final Project more easily acccessible for your prospective employer to view, by making a screen recording of the app.
Questions to Consider
- What screen recording software?
- Should i do multiple takes?
- How long should the recording be?
- What level of detail?
- Where should I post? Youtube, vimeo, or ...
- Should I edit for perfection?
What screen recording software?
There are so many great options! From screencast-o-matic on the easy end to OBS if you have a hundred hours to learn advanced open source recording software. Or Camtasia if you want a paid version.
There are others that are OS specific or otherwise not known to me.
If you're not sure, use screencast-o-matic in the free version.
Should I do multiple takes?
Recording a few different times and picking the best one may not take as long as you think, and you might be surprised, with that one that you got best.
How long should the recording be?
From your own experience as a consumer, you probably already know that brevity always beats everything else. Your interviewer may be willing to watch a screencast but sometimes only if it is short.
If you can show everything in a couple minutes, that might or might not be optimal - depending on the viewer.
Moe did his in 7 minutes and it felt great.
What level of detail?
If you go into a great level of detail you may bore the very people that you were instead hoping to impress.
One possible defense is to record a 2 minute version for general consumption, and if you feel you didn't get to tell the whole story, a second more detailed version only for those who really care about all that detail.
Always be ready and well rehearsed, to go over these details in person should the interviewer wish to to that. This is where you get to really shine, and show off what you can do.
Where should I post?
Either youtube or vimeo should be adequate - but youtube might be better if the interviewer is more likely to already be logged into youtube.
Should I edit for perfection?
If you even ask this question, for realsies, then you are an obsessive person. Get some help. :)
If this would keep you from completing your app screencast then DO NOT EDIT! Get that video out there for the world to see your skills! That is what you want. Perfection is the enemy of good, in this instance.
I do edit my own screen recordings because I am obsessive but also because sometimes I get both repetitious and also stick in a lot of long pauses and restarts. So for me it's self defense to edit that junk back out.
Only if you have a youtube already out there, and you now want to replace it with a shorter more refined version later - that is great. But editing is very time consuming, and only for those who are right on the edge of too obsessive for their own good.