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by joeybeninghove 5364 days ago
Haha, I know. I have an ugly mug for sure. :) That's always been kind of my style for screencasting in general. I think it gives it a nice personal feel. But would you rather have the option of just seeing the code without the live video?
1 comments
jcapote 5364 days ago
Not that it's ugly, its just distracting from the code, also it takes up screen real estate. Just my 2 cents, if that's your style, go with it.
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joeybeninghove 5364 days ago
Thanks man. That's great feedback. Perhaps I could play around with the sizing of the video a bit. I try to keep it out of the way of the code so that it doesn't overlap too bad.
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petercooper 5364 days ago
My straw polls (or "market research" if I ever needed to big it up ;-)) showed a general dislike (though not strongly) for live video throughout a screencast but including portions was OK. That said, everything Gregg Pollack does seems to have him in it the whole time, and he's doing OK ;-)

I avoid it mostly because it adds overhead to the file size. You can crunch down a screen / presentation only screencast to pretty incredible sizes with H264 but as soon as you mix in live video, you either need to sacrifice its quality severely or put up with large files.

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topfunky 5364 days ago
I've found the same thing. Solid colors of a screen capture can easily compress to under 200 MB for 60 minutes of video, but live action (even with only small movements) can double or triple that in size.
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joeybeninghove 5364 days ago
Yep, I've known about the file size issue when including live video, but it's something that I'm willing to continue experimenting with. One of my main reasons for including live video in my own screencasts is because I myself enjoy watching ones that have it. So, I guess you could say I'm doing it because it's something I enjoy. I'm hoping others will like it as well. :)
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randall 5363 days ago
What about making an actual screencasting site where someone can turn the live video on and off in JS?
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shn 5364 days ago
Agree, KhanAcademy style is less distracting. A voice that addresses to one person is enough for a personal touch for the listener.
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