This is what I see:
All of the documentation and support videos (thanks Paul Wilson!) say that I should see a trim button and two “guides” or “shapes” indicating start and stop. I don’t see these in my instance of Captivate 2017. I have clicked and right-clicked every possible place but no hope.
How do I force Captivate into displaying the trim features so I can use them?
Thank you.
David
Maybe you have to look for other resources? Trim button in the timeline is to be found in the Timeline of a Video Demo project (cpvc), not in the Timeline of a cptx project which is visible in your screenshot. Have a look at:
https://elearning.adobe.com/2017/08/secrets-of-timelines-in-captivate-intro/
https://elearning.adobe.com/2017/02/secrets-of-video-demo-timeline-cpvc-project/
Can you tell what you mean by ‘trim’ in this situation? I guess that you captured a software simulation in Demo mode, not a Video demo. Such a simulation in slide based: each step is on a separate slide. I see a mouse object which will be moving on this slide, then a highlight box and a text container appears telling what is going to happen. When the playhead reaches the end of the slide, it will automatically proceed to the next slide. In that next slide a similar set of objects will appear, if the mouse object is there it will seamlessly continue where it stopped in the previous slide.
Hi,
Thanks for your comment. I am facing a similar issue. Does it mean that I cannot trim a video imported/inserted into a slide.
That would be bad news considering that very basic products like Techsmith’s Camtasia can do this. Currently, I am editing (trimming) my externally shot videos in Camtasia and then importing it into Adobe Captivate, which is such a shame.
Request to advise if I am missing out on something or have got it totally wrong on my understanding of Captivate 2019.
Regards….Muralidhar
I will try to explain my answer by using a metaphor. As an engineer I try to use the most appropriate tool for each task. Will not use an example with complicated excavating machines but compare a professional screwdriver with a fully featured Makita drilling tool. You cannot compare those tools, correct? But that is exactly what you are doing at this moment:
- Camtasia, a screencapture tool, is meant to create ‘passive video’ and excels for that goal. Just like I will not use the Makita tool with the just plugin to quickly screw something which has loosened? That screwdriver may have some small add-ins (like detecting if there is electricity…) but its main goal is just screwing. That is Camtasia.
- Captivate is an eLearning authoring tool. It is meant to create highly engaging interactive courses. That is its main goal. Because you’ll need graphics (bitmap, vector), audio and video, animations…. as assets to create interactivity it has some basic editing functionality for those assets. You can trim a video imported as slide video by shortening the duration of its timeline after importing. If you use Video Demo, which is a less-featured clone of Camtasia but with a quite good editor you can do a lot more. But if you create the video in another application, you should use that application to prepare the video completely. Some basic editing is possible in Captivate for audio (volume,normalizing), for bitmap images (cropping, hue, alpha, switching to grayscale…), for SVG (fill colors)…. but for professional editing I will use Audition, Photoshop, Illustrator, Premiere Pro, After Effects. Just like you can do a lot more with dedicated tools than you can with the different add-ons to a Makita drilling machine.
Hope this explains better what I meant in my first answer. You can trim video, you can add CC to video, you can convert video into real interactive video (better than Camtasia). Maybe this explains also the difference in cost between Camtasia (or Snagit, not to forget that useful tool) and Captivate or any other eLearning authoring tool.
I see where you’re coming from Lieve, but editing an MP4 is basic and should be a default feature like the basic audio edit that’s been included in Captivate. This is something, I believe, that Adobe has missed, and actually shouldn’t have.
Some misunderstanding here. Look at the screenshot of the original question: the word ‘video’ is used wrongly for a slide within a cptx-project.
There are limited video editing possibilities under Video, Edit timing. You can trim a mp4, distribute it over multiple slides as long as it is inserted as slide video. Same as Audio possibilities those are limited. I prefer to do it in a dedicated tool as I wrote in my previous comment.
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