Outside the Box with Autodesk Inventor Publisher and Techsmith Camtasia Studio ~ Inventor Tales

Thursday, October 11, 2012

Outside the Box with Autodesk Inventor Publisher and Techsmith Camtasia Studio

“Hindsight explains the injury that foresight would have prevented”
~Unknown

For the second time, I've taken a video exported from Autodesk Inventor Publisher, and created a set of narrative instructions by editing the video in Camtasia Studio by Techsmith.

In this case, I created it as a sample for KETIV's Autodesk Manufacturing Academy in Oregon, which was yesterday, October 10th, 2012, and California, coming up on October 25th, 2012.

Just like before, I started with an assembly. This was a Dual Throttle Assembly provided by Datum3 Studios.

The Dual Throttle Assembly created by Datum3

But just like any "2.0" version, this one is improved. Sure, I had better tools in the sense that I had more current versions of both softwares (Inventor Publisher 2013 & Camtasia Studio 8.0), but I also have gotten better at creating them as well.

But putting aside the "fun and excitement" portion of the task, I realized there was a "real world" lesson hidden in my fun and games.

First, think outside the box. I know I can be guilty of thinking about using my set of CAD tools to solve all my engineering and design problems. Sometimes I fail to ;ook beyond what I can do with a little bit of creativity.

In this example, I wanted to use a voice-over. Perhaps text or video instructions alone just won't cut it. Perhaps this is going to be a file for use overseas. With the help of a translator, a voice over could be created in several different languages for several different locales.

Not to mention the fact that I got to edit the video exported out of Inventor Publisher, edit it, and throw some cool transitions and effects.

That's where I took the video file from Inventor Publisher, imported it into Camtasia Studio, and started the editing process. I threw in transitions, intro and outro slides, as well as watermarks, and credits!

And as part of that "credit where credit is due" process, I can't thank Datum3 Studios for the use of their Dual Throttle Assembly.. This project would have been a lot tougher without their help!

Check the Dual Throttle assembly, and some of their other cool work, on their projects gallery here!

So here's the result of a some spit and polish, and a few virtual blood, sweat, and tears. I hope you enjoy, and maybe get a little inspired by a project I had a lot of fun creating.