Taking Adobe Captivate to the Next Level. Joseph Ganci, Dazzle Technologies Corp. Produced by Selecting, Combining, and Using Authoring Tools

Transcription

1 302 Taking Adobe Captivate to the Next Level Joseph Ganci, Dazzle Produced by Selecting, Combining, and Using Authoring Tools

2 Taking Adobe Captivate to the Next Level Joseph Ganci Dazzle Objectives In this session, you will learn: How to record narration correctly How to easily deliver in multiple languages How to use slidelets for increased productivity and elegance How to add accessibility with no pain How to use the gallery folder to full effect Development techniques for increased maintainability How to use the branching view to full effect Page 1

3 Record Narration Correctly The Basics Narration can be recorded during the recording of a simulation. Record Narration Correctly The Basics Captivate contains a basic audio editor when you need to make changes. Page 2

4 Record Narration Correctly The Basics You can import and export audio recordings, so that, for instance you can replace amateur narration with professional narration. Record Narration Correctly The Basics You can edit how the audio is timed between slides when importing audio. Page 3

5 Record Narration Correctly The Advanced When you are narrating audio while capturing a simulation, you will find that the narration may end being split between two slides in the middle of a word or sentence. Why is this a problem? If you wish to edit the timing of any slide later, your narration will be ruined. Record Narration Correctly The Advanced Let s see why... Page 4

6 Record Narration Correctly The Advanced The trick is to use an approach where you speak, then click, speak, then click. Tell them what you re going to do, then do it. That way you can edit your slides with no problem! How to Easily Deliver in Multiple Languages The Basics There are five areas where language comes into play: Spoken Narration Text Captions Closed Captions Slide Accessibility Text Embedded in Images Page 5

7 How to Easily Deliver in Multiple Languages SPOKEN NARRATION - The Basics Remember Captivate contains an Advanced Audio feature. Through it, you can export and update audio. How to Easily Deliver in Multiple Languages TEXT CAPTIONS - The Basics There are four ways to deal with language in text captions 1) When recording simulations, you can choose from several built-in languages. Page 6

8 How to Easily Deliver in Multiple Languages TEXT CAPTIONS - The Basics There are four ways to deal with language in text captions 2) You can change captions one by one. How to Easily Deliver in Multiple Languages TEXT CAPTIONS - The Basics There are four ways to deal with language in text captions 3) You can export a Captions word document and change the captions all in one place. Original Text Caption Data Select the Menu Bar menu Select the Word Count... menu item The Word Count dialog opens Select the Include footnotes and endnotes check box Select the Close button Updated Text Caption Data Seleziona il menu Menu Bar Seleziona l opzione Word Count... Il dialogo Word Count apre Seleziona Include footnotes and endnotes Seleziona il pulsante Close Page 7

9 How to Easily Deliver in Multiple Languages TEXT CAPTIONS - The Basics There are four ways to deal with language in text captions 4) You can create your own language using RDL files in the Captivate folder. How to Easily Deliver in Multiple Languages CLOSED CAPTIONS - The Basics Closed captions are changed in the Advanced Audio feature. Page 8

10 How to Easily Deliver in Multiple Languages EMBEDDED IN IMAGES - The Basics Simply put: don t ever do this! How to Easily Deliver in Multiple Languages Now The Advanced Let s say you need to deliver the same exact lesson in English, Italian and Urdu (strange combination!). We ll make this a software simulation example and call our demonstration footnotes.cp. 1) Create your simulation in English, using narration and automatic text captions. Save your file. 2) When done, copy footnotes.cp to two other files, footnotes_it.cp and footnotes_ur.cp. 3) In your English version, export the text captions to a Word document. It will be called footnotes Captions.doc. Page 9

11 How to Easily Deliver in Multiple Languages Now The Advanced Let s say you need to deliver the same exact lesson in English, Italian and Urdu (strange combination!). We ll make this a software simulation example and call our demonstration footnotes.cp. 4) Copy footnotes Captions.doc to two other files, footnotes_it.doc and footnotes_ur.doc. 5) Open each of the new Word documents and change the languages appropriately. 6) Return to the English Captivate file and open the Advanced Audio options. How to Easily Deliver in Multiple Languages Now The Advanced Let s say you need to deliver the same exact lesson in English, Italian and Urdu (strange combination!). We ll make this a software simulation example and call our demonstration footnotes.cp. 7) Select all the rows in the Advanced Audio dialog and choose Export. 8) Export all the audio narrations to.wav files in a folder called footnotes audio Italian. 9) Copy the whole footnotes audio Italian folder and call it footnotes audio Urdu. Page 10

12 How to Easily Deliver in Multiple Languages Now The Advanced Let s say you need to deliver the same exact lesson in English, Italian and Urdu (strange combination!). We ll make this a software simulation example and call our demonstration footnotes.cp. 10) Using your own audio editor, rerecord and copy over each of the audio files in each audio language folder. 11) Close the English Captivate file and open the Italian Captivate file. 12) Import the captions you saved in footnotes_it.doc. How to Easily Deliver in Multiple Languages Now The Advanced Let s say you need to deliver the same exact lesson in English, Italian and Urdu (strange combination!). We ll make this a software simulation example and call our demonstration footnotes.cp. 13) Open the Advanced Audio editor and update each of the audio files to the ones in the Italian folder. 14) Repeat the process for the Urdu version. 15) You re done! Page 11

13 How to Easily Deliver in Multiple Languages The Advanced How to Use Slidelets for Increased Productivity and Elegance The Basics Captivate slidelets allow you to place a mini-slide on the current slide. This lets you cut way down on the need to navigate to other slides. The output is more elegant and productive as a result. Page 12

14 How to Use Slidelets for Increased Productivity and Elegance The Basics Take a look at this screen. By rolling over the coworker This image and text caption will appear and audio will play. How to Use Slidelets for Increased Productivity and Elegance The Basics Each slidelet has its own separate timeline! Slidelets can contain any objects except for: The three interaction types Text entry box Click box Button Another slidelet (because it can navigate) Mouse movements Page 13

15 How to Use Slidelets for Increased Productivity and Elegance The Basics When you create a slidelet, the rollover area appears rectangular, just as you see with a rollover text caption or a rollover image. Ah, but there is a way to make the rollover shape anything you wish with slidelets! Let s take a look. How to Use Slidelets for Increased Productivity and Elegance Advanced Insert a new slidelet by choosing Insert Rollover Slidelet. The area on the left is where you will place the slidelet objects. The area on the right is what will trigger the slidelet to appear when the user rolls over it. Notice the often-overlooked prompt to press Ctrl-Alt-W. You can also right-click and choose Redraw Shape or choose Edit Redraw Shape. Page 14

16 How to Use Slidelets for Increased Productivity and Elegance Advanced Now you can create any shape you like. Click once to create each new segment. Double-click to finish your rollover area. Note that the light blue polygon represents the area that will trigger the slidelet to appear. How to Use Slidelets for Increased Productivity and Elegance Advanced For instance, on a map, you can create a rollover area the same size and shape of region of Calabria, Italy. When someone rolls over this area, you can show information of the region, play music and show images. Page 15

17 How to Use Slidelets for Increased Productivity and Elegance The Advanced How to Use Slidelets for Increased Productivity and Elegance Advanced Another useful item the Stick Slidelet option. Normally, when the user rolls off the rollover area, the slidelet will disappear. Using the Stick Slidelet option, the slidelet will stay up until its timeline runs out. Page 16

18 How to Use Slidelets for Increased Productivity and Elegance The Advanced How to Add Accessibility with No Pain The Basics Accessibility allows people with disabilities access to your learning. There are three main places that you can use to add accessiblity: 508 compliance Closed captioning Accessibility text There are other tips for adding accessibility. Check Help in Captivate for more information. Page 17

19 How to Add Accessibility with No Pain How It s Done Compliance Choose Edit Preferences and then Project. Make sure the 508 compliance option is checked. This opens several areas of Captivate open to screen readers. How to Add Accessibility with No Pain How It s Done - Closed Captioning Choose Project Skin and ensure the Closed Captioning option is checked. This will place the CC button on the playbar and allow learners to pop up closed captioning text. You can use the Settings button to change the look and feel of the captions. Page 18

20 How to Add Accessibility with No Pain How It s Done - Closed Captioning To add the closed captions for each slide, choose Audio Advanced Audio Choose a slide that has sound on it and then click the button. How to Add Accessibility with No Pain How It s Done - Closed Captioning At this point, you can add closed captioning text and synchronize it with the audio. Page 19

21 How to Add Accessibility with No Pain How It s Done Accessibility Text Choose a slide and then Slide Properties. Click the Accessibility button on the Properties dialog box. How to Add Accessibility with No Pain How It s Done Accessibility Text You can then add screen-readable text here. You can also copy text from text captions on the slide, from closed captions or from slide notes. Page 20

22 How to Add Accessibility with No Pain How to Use the Gallery Folder to Full Effect The Way It Works The Gallery is a feature of Captivate that is often overlooked because it is not directly accessible from inside the product. The Gallery is a series of folders found where you have installed Captivate, all found under the folder called Gallery. You can add to each of these folders to extend Captivate s offerings. Page 21

23 How to Use the Gallery Folder to Full Effect The Way It Works You can add more buttons to use for button images by putting three image files for each button in the Buttons folder, one for the up state, one for down, and one for over. That button will then be available to you in Captivate. How to Use the Gallery Folder to Full Effect The Way It Works In the same way, you can add new captions by placing the correct images in the Captions folder. For the Hotspots folder, use any SWF file to show when you use a Hotspot question and you wish an image or animation to show where the user clicks. The Mouse folder lets you add mouse click sounds and visual indicators of mouse clicks. Page 22

24 How to Use the Gallery Folder to Full Effect The Way It Works PlaybackControls let you set up your own slider bars and related items for your published files. You can add Preloaders with more SWF animations to show when the published file is loading. The PrintOutPut folder contains templates for when you publish to the three types of Word documents: Lesson, Step by Step and Storyboard. You can create your own. How to Use the Gallery Folder to Full Effect The Way It Works The Sound folder contains those audio files you may want to use in many places. Keyboard tap sounds and such are stored separately in the SoundEffects folder. In the SWF Animation folder you have general purpose animations for arrows, bullets, highlights and more. Page 23

25 How to Use the Gallery Folder to Full Effect The Way It Works TextAnimations lets you include your own text animations, which you create in Flash. The textures found in the Textures folder are primarily used for creating borders for your published files. Finally, the Themes folder contains initialization files, each of which represents the settings for the skin and menu to be used for the current file when published. How to Use the Gallery Folder to Full Effect Page 24

26 Development Techniques for Increased Maintainability Some Tips - Libraries Use your library to full effect. Right-clicking an item in the library gives you options learn and use them Be sure to check out the item s properites. You ll see useful options here. Delete unused items from the library. This will keep your file size smaller. Development Techniques for Increased Maintainability Some Tips - Narration Record amateur narration first to determine pacing, verbiage and other factors. After final wordsmithing of the audio scripts, then record final audio using a professional narrator. Page 25

27 Development Techniques for Increased Maintainability Some Tips External Files Keep track of all of the resources you use in your file, including all images and sound files. This makes it much easier to edit and reimport them when needed. It s amaizng how easily these files get misplaced after they have been imported. If worse comes to worst, you can export images and audio from within your Captivate files, but that s extra work. Development Techniques for Increased Maintainability Some Tips Locking Slides and Objects To remind yourself or other team members that a timeline object is considered final, lock it. Page 26

28 Development Techniques for Increased Maintainability Some Tips Locking Slides and Objects You can do the same thing with slides. This is a good idea and helps maintain your files by preventing accidental changes. These are not passwordprotected. They are visual reminders and can be unlocked easily. Development Techniques for Increased Maintainability Some Tips Name Your Slides Naming your slides will make it easy to see at a glance what the purpose of slides are. Page 27

29 Development Techniques for Increased Maintainability Some Tips Group Your Slides Group your slides according to their purpose. This will make it much easier to work with the files. Be sure to title your groups as well. Development Techniques for Increased Maintainability Some Tips Add Notes to Your Slides Notes are a good way of keeping yourself and others informed of the history and any issues related to the slide. Page 28

30 Development Techniques for Increased Maintainability How to Use the Branching View to Full Effect Branching The Branching View is like a snapshot of your whole file. Page 29

31 How to Use the Branching View to Full Effect Branching You can see how the slides relate and navigate to each other. You can even change the navigation destination and reporting options for slides here. You can ungroup slides that are grouped. You can zoom in and out of parts of your file. How to Use the Branching View to Full Effect Page 30

32 Questions and Answers Thank You! If you would like to contact Joe Ganci: For more tips and tricks, write to Joe. To discuss working with Joe, call him at x303. Page 31