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Creating Presentations

The guide to creating and recording presentations.

Exporting Your Slides as Images

Instead of recording your presentation, you can import your slides as images. Any transitions or animations you create in the presentation will be lost with this method. However, you can create transitions and animations in the video editor.

PowerPoint (obnoxiously simple)

  • File → Export → Choose file type JPEG or PNG → Choose Every Slide to download a folder with all slides.

OR

  • If you're going to use Camtasia to edit your video, you can upload your pptx file directly into Camtasia. Visit the Camtasia Import PowerPoint Slides page for complete details.
    • This will also work with Google Slides if you save your presentation as pptx but you must also have PowerPoint installed on your computer.

Google Slides (more complicated)

  • Easy mode: If you have PowerPoint installed on your computer, you can save your presentation as a pptx file: File → Download → Microsoft PowerPoint (.pptx).
  • If you don't have PowerPoint on your computer, you have two options:
    • Fewest steps: Download as PDF and export files as images in Adobe Acrobat - File → Download As PDF Document (.pdf)
      • In Adobe Acrobat: File → Save As  → Choose file type PNG or JPEG
    • Most steps: Download each slide separately - File → Download As (JPEG or PNG)
      • Note that if you download the slides in order they will be named in order with a parenthetical at the end of the file name.

Importing Your Slides Into Camtasia

The instructions below are for importing your slides into Camtasia, a video editor that is free to all Cal Poly Humboldt students, faculty and staff. Camtasia is available on all campus computers, including library laptops. To access Camtasia off-campus, use VLab or Remote Access. The free trial version of Camtasia comes with a watermark that cannot be removed, so we recommend against using it.

However, you can use almost any video editor to convert your presentation slides into a video. For a list of free options, as well as instructions on using VLab and Remote Access, check out our Creating Videos Software page.

Importing Your Slides

Camtasia's guide on how to Import PowerPoint Slides includes video and text descriptions.

Choose the Import Media option either from the main menu in the Media Bin or by clicking on File → Import → Media and select your video or image file(s). For in-depth instructions, visit the Camtasia Import Media help page.

Screenshot of import media option in Camtasia.

Setting The Timings

When you import images into Camtasia, they will automatically appear on screen for a set amount of time. The default is 5 seconds. You can change this before your drag your slides into your project by opening preferences (Ctrl+,) and selecting the Timing tab.

Screenshot of timing preferences in Camtasia

Note that you can also set your transition timings here.

Video Editing Basics

This short video (24s) demonstrates how to add slides as images and then edit them using Camtasia. Screenshots and written descriptions are below if you don't want to watch the video.

Adding Your Slides

To add media to your video, drag the slide image from the Media Bin onto the timeline. Simply click on the slide image in the Media Bin and drag it down into the timeline at the bottom of the screen.

Camtasia Screenshot of Media Bin- control click to select multiple slides at once.

Camtasia Screenshot - click and drag to move them around on the timeline.

Setting Slide Duration

The slide will appear on the screen for the default amount of time set in the preferences (see above). If you want to change that, simply hover your mouse over the edge of the slide segment in your timeline and drag. Next to your mouse cursor, a little bubble with the duration of the slide will appear to help you. You can also click and drag the slider to the point where the slide should stop and then hover over the edge of the segment and drag it to the slider (it will snap into place).

Camtasia Screenshot - click and drag the edge of the slide to change its duration in the timeline.

Adding Transitions

From the Transitions option in the left-hand menu, you can click on and drag the transition onto your slide.

Camtasia Screenshot - click and drag transitions onto a slide in the timeline.

Learn More

There are many useful resources for learning more about Camtasia: