Recording Your Screen

You can record your Mac's screen using only the QuickTime Player app that comes with OS X. It is easy to record and then you get to preview the result before saving.

You can also watch this video at YouTube (but with ads).

Video Transcript: Hi, this is Gary with MacMost.com. On today's episode let's look at using QuickTime Player to record your screen.
So I'm often asked how do I record the screen when I'm making the MacMost video podcast. For instance do I use something like ScreenFlow or Camtasia, both of which are excellent screen recording software apps. As a matter of fact I'm using ScreenFlow right now to record the screen because I'm going to demonstrate the way I make most of my videos which is not to use those apps but instead simply to use QuickTime Player. Some people don't realize that you can record the screen with QuickTime Player.
I'm going to run it right now. This is the standard QuickTime Player that comes with your Mac and it is something that every Mac has and every version of Mac OS 10 has added features to. In the last couple of versions of Mac OS 10 we've got the ability to go File and New Screen Recording.
When you do that you get a little box like this and it shows the microphones being picked up. You can actually click here and select the microphone that you want and also whether or not you want to show mouse clicks while recording, which I do. A lot of people notice that there are little circles that appear over the mouse clicks.
So let's go ahead and I'm going to hit Record and now I have the option to record the full screen or I can drag for part of the screen.
So let's start by recording the full screen. I'm going to click here and let's say I want to do something where I'm just showing how I can drag files and folders around there. You can see I've got this little circle with a box inside of it. I can click on that and it stops the recording. It instantly opens up what I've recorded inside of QuickTime Player.
Now I can actually play it back and I can scrub through it and I can even go and do some standard QuickTime stuff. Like, for instance, I can trim it there so I can get some stuff off the beginning and the end. I'm not going to do that with this particular one. 
Then I can either Export it or simply just Save it and now I can save it out as a QuickTime movie. It saves it as a pretty compact QuickTime movie.
I like this method of doing it because instead of saving it as a file and if I don't want to keep it now I have to go and find that file and delete it. Instead now I can actually just see what it is and not save it if I don't want to keep it. That's actually how I make a lot of these podcast episodes is I will record a small segment and if I don't like what I've said or how I've said it or something that was shown on the screen was unexpected I simply don't save it and I start again.
So when I'm saving it I'm only saving clips that I'm going to use and then I edit them together either in iMovie or FinalCut and that's how I make the videos.
You'll notice here that I've got, right there, that little black circle I talked about. A lot of people ask how do I get that. Well QuickTime just does that as long as you select that option there that I showed for showing mouse clicks. So you can see I've got the trackpad button held down and you can see it puts the circle there to indicate that on the video.
So it is a pretty straight forward easy way to do it. I'm going to close this without saving. I'm going to show you just one more time how it's done but this time I'm going to click and drag a boxed area.
So not only do you get to select an area but you get to adjust it. See the Start Recording button in there but I can drag the edges. So if I want to capture just a small area I can certainly do that and I can do it in an unusual size even to create an unusual movie. You can see now I can do things in here. I can hit the Stop button and I get a QuickTime movie that is that size right there.
It is really easy to do, really easy to make quick little clips to demonstrate something to somebody and it's all there in QuickTime Player which you've got on your Mac right now.

Comments: 19 Responses to “Recording Your Screen”

Emmanuel Scerri

9 years ago

Hello Gary, thanks for an interesting video. How can I record video as you illustrated, and sound being played through the speakers as opposed to sound as it's being picked up through the microphone? Here and thinking of uses with video being played on the screen. Thanks for your help, Emmanuel in Switzerland

Gary Rosenzweig

Emmanuel: Just get an app like ScreenFlow. That will do it.

torch_55

Gary, have you tried Voila or their newer Capto for video recording? I have had good luck with Voila and now want to ry Capto.

John

Thanks Gary that was a great podcast ,very helpful

torch_55: Never used them or heard of them, sorry.

JoeAllen

Very helpful. I sometimes watch an 8 minute video on YouTube, but only like, say, the last 3 minute of the video. I can now copy the 3 minutes that I like, and ignore the 5 minutes that I do NOT like.

PS: Are there an "legal risks" associated with copying 3 minutes of an 8 minute YouTube video?

JoeAllen: If you want to know the legal risks, you'll need to ask a lawyer. But I do know that copying someone's video without permission is a copyright violation, so the answer is probably yes.

Rich Randall

Doesn't work as video described. Doesn't work at all in fact.

Rich: obviously I t does work, since this is how I record most MacMost videos. Can you describe what you are doing exactly and what is happening that does not match the tutorial?

STAVROS KARAKOZIS

Dear Gary,

I played my video on the screen of my Macbook Pro with DVD player. I did everything you said in your macMost video to record my playing video. it does not work. The only thing I get is a recorded white screen. Why is that happening?

Stavros: This technique is for recording the screen for tutorials or to demonstrate some computing technique. It will not help you circumvent copyright protection on DVDs.

Joost

I cant record the sound, only the screen, and no animation of the mouse. Is my quicktime player outdated? Macbook Air OS X 11.4

Joost: El Capitan (10.11.4) is indeed the latest version of OS X. Make sure you have Show Mouse Clicks In Recording turned on (same place as where I show you you can choose a microphone). Only sound from your microphone is recorded. If you want more, you'll need to get a screen recording app.

I found it - thanx.

Tony

I only seem to have QuickTime Player version 7 which does not have screen recording facility. Running El Capitan V 10.11.4. Help :-)

Tony: You most likely have both. If you have had your Mac for a while, or have migrated, you have the old QuickTime (version 7) and then the new version "QuickTime Player." Look in your Applications folder.

Sue

Gary, thanks so much for this; I've been looking for software to do this for several weeks. I didn't realize I had it on my mac all this time! Doh!
Thanks again, Sue.

BRUCE STASIUK

I must have done something wrong. i got it going but now the new screen video is grayed out. how can i get it going again?

Bruce: Try closing all of the open QuickTime Player windows. Maybe quit it and restart it again.

Comments Closed.

Recording Your Screen

Comments: 19 Responses to “Recording Your Screen”

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