Cross posted from The Visual Lounge

"I feel the need... the need for speed!" Ah, one of my favorite quotes from the movie, Top Gun. Remember that scene?

Last weekend was the Indianapolis 500. I was watching the news and found out that those cars hit speeds of 220 mph or more!? That got me thinking about speed... which led me to thinking about Top Gun and then got me thinking about one of my favorite topics, screencapture and screencasting (yes, that's how my brain works)! ;-) It occurred to me that Jing is like the racecar of screencaptures and screencasting! It's all about speed, baby!

And, I've been thinking lately about how much fun it was to do the Camtasia Studio 24 videos in 24 hours. And, wondering if we should pull another all nighter to make 24 videos for Jing? But, since a big benefit of Jing is how quickly you can create and share content, I thought a speed test would be a better idea instead! Besides, I'm not sure if I've caught up on sleep after our last all nighter screencasting. :-)

So, for our speed test, we'll create 6 Jing screencasts in 60 minutes next Tuesday, June 2, 2009 at 3:00 pm EDT (GMT-4)!

A variety of TechSmithies will be joining me on the screencasts from Jing developers, to Graphic Artists, to Trainers and Information Developers to Product Marketing Managers. We'll post the Jingcasts here on The Visual Lounge Blog as well as on the Jing Blog as they are available (hopefully every 10 minutes). If you'd like to tune in live, we'll be streaming from Ustream.TV here. There will be a chat room on Ustream.TV so feel free to ask us questions there. I will also post updates on Twitter (TechSmith and BetsyWeber).

We'll show you some new tips and tricks and reveal some new surprises as well. So, tune in!

Any topics you'd like us to cover?

Hey Jing users! We have an update on the Screencast 4 Cash Contest that MindBites has going on. The deadline is quickly approaching, and there are a lot of great entries to vote on. We'd love to see a Jing user win this contest so get your entry submitted by 11:59 PM CST on Monday June 1 and you could win $1000!

Entering the contest is easy. Simply register at MindBites and then create and upload an original screencast tutorial. The screencasts must be instructional in nature, at least three minutes long, and focused on tech (e.g. software, development, or gaming). You can find the rules here. Not sure what to teach in your screencast? It doesn't have to be rocket science, and it doesn't have to be something that no one other than yourself knows how to do. Make a screencast about tips to get more out of software or online apps you use every day, or maybe sneaky tricks for online games you play... If you do it on a computer, it's pretty much fair game.

The Grand Prize winner will receive $1000 plus a copy of Camtasia Studio and Snagit. There is also a People's Choice Award winner who will walk away with $500 and a copy of Snagit!

So get out there and Screencast!

If you're still not sold on the idea of making a screencast for the contest (probably because you just have no use for $1000, right?), there's no acceptable excuse for opting not to vote. For every vote cast, $0.10 will be donated to the Youth for Technology Foundation. YTF obviously can't buy too much technology for a dime, so we need everyone to mobilize to make sure they walk away with enough money to really make a difference for some deserving kids in some underserved communities. Voting begins Tuesday June 2nd and will end on June 8th. The Grand Prize and People's Choice Winners will be announced on June 9th.

In the interest of transparency, I have to let you know that TechSmith is a sponsor. Our Chief Evangelist, Betsy Weber will be a judge for the grand prize winner portion of the contest.

Happy Screencasting!

Katie Lewis
Product Marketing Manager

We got an email the other day asking if there was a way to delete everything in the History. Well, this post will show you a "behind-the-scenes" way to do it for power users. In addition it might free up some memory if you're a Mac user. Disclaimer: Messing around with files and folders could screw up your History or lead to unintended consequences, so do so at your own risk!

Now, on to the video, but first a couple of tips:

• Don't be alarmed by the face close-up at the start of the video. It lasts less than 10 seconds. If you need to, just look away until you hear the audio change.
• You can watch the video in full screen mode. (You may want to wait to go full screen until the "face scene" passes.)

Hi! Have you ever visited the Visual Lounge run by TechSmith's Evangelist Extraordinaire Betsy Weber? She's always got a ton of great screencasting examples and you never know what else.

Right now she's wrapping up at the 360|Flex conference and has some entertaining interviews with interesting people. Check 'em out especially if you like bacon-flavored lollipops. Seriously.

But the main reason I'm writing is to highlight a recent post she made highlighting Heather James' Jing guide she made for colleagues. Heather lives in Ireland and is a fan of Jing and Camtasia Studio. Thanks for going to the effort of making this PDF and sharing Heather!!

Recently, we asked you to share your Tips and Tricks for using Jing. Respondents said:

• Remove sensitive information using the Frame tool.
• Use Jing as a quick visual reference for comparison without even saving the image, especially in programs where you have to leave the needed info to apply it elsewhere.
• Use Jing as a measuring stick to get the number of pixels between two elements.
• Use Jing to get the exact dimensions of a screen element.
• Draw arrows before creating the text box. it looks better!
• The Save button can be configured to save to a specific location and you can create multiple Save buttons.

Congratulations to Joshua, Trevor, René, and Sanjeev who won the T-Shirts! A big pat on the back to Joshua who used Jing to show what you can do to Jing. Great visual communication?!? Besides the ego boost, he also gets a special Jing T-Shirt signed by the entire Jing Team. How is that for bragging rights?

The shirts are on their way, and we hope others may have learned a thing or two from these tips!

Call me happy... Call me surprised... Call me lucky... Whatever the case, I was so excited and humbled the other day when I noticed the Jing user base had grown over a 1/2 million users. Look at two of your friends or colleagues -- hopefully at least one of them is a fellow Jingmate of yours.

Its not the number per se that gets me all choked up, but more so the idea that this many people in the world are now speaking visually and hopefully adding valuable content to their online conversations. The real game changer for all of us is an environment where we not only consume rich forms of communication (images, video, audio), but also have an easy and accessible way to contribute to the conversation.

Whatever your reason for using Jing, the entire team and I want to sincerely thank you and hope you will keep that voice of reason coming our way. Its what has made Jing what it is today.

Humbly Yours,
Tony Dunckel
Jing Product Manager

We've extended the deadline for our Share your Tips & Tricks for Jing - Win a T-Shirt contest until Monday, May 11th 2009 11:59pm EST.
We've already gotten some great submissions, but would like to get a few more.

If you have any tips for working with Jing, please share them in the comments.
Recording tips, editing tips, setup tips... they are all great!

5 T-Shirts will be raffled off among all entries, and the most helpful and/or creative comment will get a T-Shirt, signed by the entire Jing Team.

Note: As you probably have noticed, the Jing blog is loading reeaaallly slow these days. It can therefore take a minute for the comment fields to load. We are working on resolving these issues, so please hang in there.