In this article:
- Challenge: Uploads Take a Long Time
- Tip: Make Shorter Recordings
- Tip: Reduce Recording Resolution in Kaltura Capture
Challenge: Uploads Taking a Long Time
Media (video and audio recordings) can use a lot of storage space, and this is true for media created with Kaltura Capture. Uploading media from your computer to Kaltura's systems can take several minutes or longer.
Upload time depends on several factors, including:
- Your internet connection speed
- Whether you use ethernet or WiFi
- How many other people/devices are using your connection at the same time
- The length and quality of your recording
Use the following tips to reduce the amount of time it takes to upload a media recording created with Kaltura Capture.
Tip: Make shorter Recordings
Record in 10-minute chunks or less. Lengthy recordings (such as a 50-minute or longer lecture) take longer to upload and are challenging for students to navigate.
Creating Effective Short Recordings
- Decide ahead of time how you will break up what you are presenting. Consider outlining subtopics. If you use a slide deck, insert a slide to introduce a subtopic. Insert another slide that ends a subtopic and serves as a visual reminder to stop recording.
- Take the opportunity to summarize important points when ending a subtopic, and introduce the next subtopic when you restart.
Using Playlists to Group Topic Recordings Together
After making short topic recordings, you can group them together using playlists in Kaltura.
For example, given a lecture with five topics:
- In Kaltura Capture, record and upload ~10-minute recordings for each topic.
- If you use another tool to make recordings, upload the file to My Media in Canvas or Kaltura MediaSpace.
- In the Media Gallery of your Canvas course, create a playlist; give the playlist a descriptive name such as Week 2 - Lecture 2, then add each of the topic recordings to the playlist.
- Viewers will then be able to view that group of recordings together in the Media Gallery, or you can post the playlist to a page in Canvas using the Rich Content Editor > Embed Media from Kaltura.
Tip: Reduce Recording Resolution in Kaltura Capture
Kaltura Capture can record your screen and/or camera at relatively high resolution. Lowering the screen recording quality by one level generally results in a 40-50% reduction in file size, which will be faster to upload to Kaltura.
To lower the resolution when recording in Kaltura Capture:
- Open Kaltura Capture
- Select Manage
- Select the Settings (gear icon) on the left side of the screen
- To the right of Screen recording quality, select the radio button for 720p
- Select Save. A notification appears in the upper right if the settings saved successfully
- Proceed to make a new recording with the new settings
Notes:
- Lowering resolution makes small text harder to see in the recording. Make a test recording to see if important text remains readable and adjust as needed
- Kaltura Capture's default is for the screen to be recorded at 1920p (1920x1080 pixels), and the webcam to be recorded at 720p (1280x720 pixels)