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What began as a freeware project to easily share basic screen captures and screen recordings has grown into a solid application and capture distribution system with a premium component. Jing's attractive application takes a sound, simple approach to capturing; begin by dragging the crosshairs to define your capture field and then take a still or start a recording. When you're done, save it to your computer or upload it to Screencast.com (operated by Jing's publisher), an FTP site, Flickr, or YouTube (for a premium). If you've got Snagit or Camtasia Studio, TechSmith's premium programs for capturing and editing stills and videos, respectively, you can click a button on the post-capture toolbar to send the capture along for deeper editing than Jing's basics can supply.
Apart from sharing ease, Jing has some other clever features that don't diminish its conscious simplicity. The yellow "sun" icon that can be moved around the edges of your screen is what you hover over to get started, though in the brief preferences menu you can hide the sun and call up the crosshairs with a hot key. Two other hot keys now help Jing's capture crosshairs snap to common aspect ratios. Press Ctrl to maintain a 4:3 aspect ratio and Shift for 16:9 wide-screen proportions. While locked into a ratio, dragging out the crosshair shows you boundaries for common screen measurements within that ratio that you can easily snap to, like 320x240 or 640x480. This is a nice addition in keeping with Jing's visual, low-text-density design.
In the latest release, subscribers to the $15-a-year Jing Pro gain the ability to record from their Webcam. You can toggle between Webcam and screen recording during a screen capture.
Less convenient is the requirement of the Microsoft .NET Framework, which can take several minutes to install if it's absent. Once that's out of the way, though, you've got on your hands a well-featured screen capture app that's visual enough for nontechies to use and has enough features for sharehounds to easily distribute recordings and images that require limited post-capture modifications.
Jing 2.1 (Windows):Publisher's Description
From TechSmith:
Jing - Visual Conversation
The always-ready program that instantly captures and shares images and video... from your computer to anywhere.
The Jing sun sits nicely on your desktop, ready to capture at a moments notice. Select an area on your screen, capture it as an image or record as video. Make it your own by adding text, arrows, and other effects. Share instantly over the web, IM, and email.
Make all your online conversations crystal clear by adding quick and simple visual elements using Jing.
What's new in this version: Version 2.1 gives premium users the ability to record from their Web cam. All users get use of hotkeys to snap the crosshairs to common aspect ratios, and export abilities to Snagit and Camtasia.
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All versions:
2.9 starsout of 79 votes
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Current version:
3.3 starsout of 12 votes
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My rating:
Write review
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"captured screen but could not get sound to work."
Version: Jing 2.1
Pros
easy to record video without sound
Cons
only records for five minutes
Summary
used it to record a webinar,but it was useless without sound.Five minutes or recording time is too short.
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"Required Registration ?"
Version: Jing 2.1
Pros
Didn't find any since it required registration
Cons
Requested registration, not good..
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"Was not what I was looking for."
Version: Jing 2.1
Pros
I do not know as I did not use it.
Cons
None that I know of.
Summary
Ok I guess.
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"Nice Little Application"
Version: Jing 2.1
Pros
Easy to load and use. It is free.
Cons
Only 5 minutes per recording.
Summary
When it is free and it works it is hard to complain.
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"Great resolution, but NO sound in the free version"
Version: Jing 2.1
Pros
I'e tested quite a few free video screen capture tools, and this one so far is hands down the best quality video resolution I've seen.
Cons
Jing said "Microphone is on" when I started recording. My mic is properly hooked up. I have a professional recording project studio, so I know what I'm doing. There is nothing wrong whatsoever with my set up. The SWF files saved contain no sound.
Summary
I do have a trouble ticket filed with their help site, and am awaiting word. I use Pro Tools, Cakewalk, Audacity, and several other recording softwares and DAWs. I have no idea why Jing isn't capturing sound even though it says it is.
Well, I think it's rather ridiculous that we can't change the star rating when updating a review, because this one deserves to be changed to a five.
Hopefully they can help find the answers, and I can come back and increase the rating here, but there is obviously some kind of conflict going on here.
Every Google search I've done about this problem has turned up with posts saying if the software says the mic is on, and there is no sound in the video, something is wrong with my system.
In this particular instance, that is simply NOT the case. There is NOTHING wrong with my system or my configuration. Jing is the ONLY software that is not capturing my mic.
Updated on Jul 8, 2009
I've discovered that the problem lay not in the software, but in a routing setting in one or more softwares on my computer. It took quite a while to get it working, and I'm not entirely sure yet which setting change made the difference. It is odd that Jing, for whatever reason can't pick up the firewire signal coming from my Projectmix I/O when every other program I have recieves it with the same settings, but nevertheless, I DID get Jing to finally capture the signal in the final files.
Sound quality isn't great (I have a Shure SM-57, studio quality mic), and it should come across far better than it does, but this IS a free software, so it does deserve five stars as far as I'm concerned.
Updated on Jul 9, 2009Still think this deserves a five as a free software, however I wanted to use for online tutorial delivery, and the sound quality simply didn't cut it. Support says it's because it's set up for online, but I have many far more high quality files on my sites that deliver just fine. No need for the quality to be that poor. I ended up buying a far better one that allowed for 44.1 khz delivery, which is the recording industry standard. The videos deliver perfectly well over the web. My advice:
If your just going to create stuff for your friends, Jing is fine. If you want to create anything remotely professional, don't bother with ANY free software (not yet anyway, check the date of this review, you never know what will be out there in a few months or years!). I went with iShowU HD for only thirty bucks, and it's well worth it. -
"Where's the sound?"
Version: Jing 2.1
Pros
East install, loved the "sun" gui, intuitive and relative easy to use
Cons
I couldn't get the sound to record.
Summary
I uninstalled the program.
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"Good modern job done here"
Version: Jing 2.1
Pros
Its easy to work with-has functions I have not tried out Yet
Its free..Cons
Just wonder why my normal AVI player cant play the files it make.
For me no sweat though DivX can-- but still strangeSummary
I think the Graphic is super in this program- nice when all things do not look the same
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"Simple. Even my seven-year old granddaughter use it."
Version: Jing 2.1
Pros
Quick and simple to use
Cons
No cons that I can think.
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"been using sidebar feature, but this one is better"
Version: Jing 2.1
Pros
Much easier to use than the Sidebar capture feature, and has more options.
Cons
Haven't found any yet.
Summary
Easy and fun to use.
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"Excellent - very quick and precise. Love this program."
Version: Jing 2.1
Pros
very quick
Cons
do not have any cons at this time.
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