Intro

Captivate 2019 (version 11) was released on the 22nd of August. I had agreed to coach a personalised training 27-28 of August, which was planned for CP2017. I got an urgent call: would it be possible to switch to CP2019? Since I like challenges, I accepted.  In this post I will talk about this experience, my view as trainer on this new version. Beware: do not consider this to be a full Review, that will be posted later. I didn’t coach about all the new features as you’ll read.

Personalised training?

Why do I label this training as ‘personalized’?  The client had asked for very specific topics, not for a standardised basic training, because the trainees would start with a very specific project. They needed to learn about quizzes, responsive projects with fluid boxes, branching, themes. I explained that is was also necessary before any other topic to understand the functionality of Captivate’s timeline because that is the real foundation of all functionality. I agreed to add 360 images with hotspots workflow. Due to the limited duration of the training (two days) I would demo interactive video, but not train about its workflow.

It was a small group of trainees, but with very different background. First example: one trainee had been working as freelance developer with Captivate 2017, but had never a real training and only created non-responsive projects.  Another trainee never used Captivate, but had an IT degree, well versed in programming languages and user of Premiere Pro. Another challenge: all trainees needed to be engaged in the training! From their end feedback (orally) this has been a success. I don’t remember everything, but was particularly impressed by one sentence ‘I learned so much in so little time.M oreover you really empowered me. I arrived, believing that Captivate was a simple application to create small videos but it is so much more !’

Captivate 2019 features

Fluid Boxes

It is much easier for a trainer to explain the idea of fluid boxes in this new version. The hierarchy is made very clear, in the properties panel (once a FB has been selected) and by the indicators in the top left corner of each fluid box/object.

Those indicators also show visually the flow of the fluid box, whether it is the selected one (center fluid box in the screenshot) or hovering over a fluid box (green indicator for bottom fluid box).

We did explore the fluid boxes in the default quizzing master slides. Since themes were a requested topic, we created a couple of content master slides. I showed not only the use of the new Position properties for sizing the fluid boxes, but also my (still favourite) workflow for using guides. It is a personal choice. One of the content master slides was used for a Drag&Drop question.

Due to lack of time, I didn’t use the CSV import, but the older GIFT import for the creation of the quiz slides. GIFT has the advantage of allowing to enter partial scoring, couldn’t find it in the CSV import (may have missed it?).

360 Slide

We created a 360 image, and added hotspots, trying out all the possible assets: text, image, audio and question slide. The workflow is so easy that the trainees didn’t really need training. I love it when trainees ask: can we find out ourselves, for any feature!  Here a static screenshot showing a hotspot with a question:

I explained how it is possible to edit the image in Photoshop CC, maybe to correct some exposure flaws.

Interactive video

As explained before I didn’t train, only showed an example of interactive video. Beware: this is really my favourite new feature, be sure you’ll see interactive videos posted here in a near future. It just didn’t fit in this training of two days.