The typical use of video content used on websites is to provide a demonstration or showcase a product and provide advice in the form of a how to guide. In previous years having video on your website was not an option due to the limitation of bandwidth. Now with the availability and wide spread use of faster internet speeds for consumers the use of video, produced correctly is now a good option to enrich your website visitor experience.

As placing video on your website is becoming increasingly popular, there has been an increase of software available to help you easily create, edit and publish your videos online.

A popular term derived from the evolution of Podcasting is Screencasting. As the name implies, screencasting is the process of creating a video by recording what is displayed on your screen. Screencasting in context can be effective for creating how to video content and instructional guides. Screencasting video content, which most probably makes up around 80% of YouTube content is very easy to create. Software for screencasting tools is available for a range of budgets. Screencasting tools range from Free, opensource to around $700.

Free Screencasting Software:

AviScreen: At the time of writing this article AviScreen is free to download and use. AviScreen is a Windows based software tool which should work on Windows 32bit versions, we have not tested the software on Win64bit platforms. As the name would suggest AviScreen captures and records the video into AVI files only. The program does also offer saving screen captures into BMP format.

CamStudio: Another free software, CamStudio is open source software for capturing on-screen content and audio for production of AVI files. CamStudio is only at time of writing compatible with Windows based software. We have not tested this software on Windows 64bit platform.

Commercial Software:

Adobe Captivate: Prices at time of writing this article started at around $700. Adobe is most probably the largest company for graphic and multimedia creation tools, used by consumers and businesses all over the world. Adobe Captivate is a relatively new product in the Adobe software range which has slowly built credibility as one of the best commercial screen capturing programs. Unlike the free screencasting tools Captivate provides numerous options and publication formats including the popular and de jure standard for video creation .flv flies.

Currently the benefits of commercial tools for screencasting provides the best features when deciding what tool to use when screencasting. As time goes by and as video based websites become more popular open source projects and free software will no doubt start to bridge the gap between the amounts of features offered in the commercial software. If you are thinking of creating professional screencasts, purchasing software should be consideration.