Home > Mathcasts - Pencasts > Pencasts vs Traditional Mathcasts
Pencasts vs. Traditional Mathcasts --- By Graeme MacNeil (The Math Maker)
Advantages and Disadvantages
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Traditional Mathcast
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Pencast
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Cost |
Free - $10 (Jing, Screencast.com, free annotation software, $10 microphone) to $50-$100 (graphics tablet, Jing, ...) to more (Camtasia Studio, document camera, JingPro, etc) |
$150 - 1 GB LiveScribe Pulse SmartPen (holds 100 hours of audio + thousands of pages of notes), $200 - 2 GB version , Notebooks $4 - $13 each (most come in sets) |
Portability
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For true portability, requires a tablet PC with built in microphone or equivalent.
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Very portable, the pen fits in your pocket but you must have the special paper.
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Embedding
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Easy to embed into a webpage with Jing or Camtasia Studio (or other recording software).
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Requires you to either a) obtain the embed code from the LiveScribe website or b) create your own embed code (for different sized pencasts)
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Transferring to other sites
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Very simple since you have a copy on your computer generated by the software.
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Cannot be done due to the propriety method of uploading the files from the LiveScribe desktop.
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Error correction
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Simple to do.
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Impossible unless you wish to record the error and make correction on the page.
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Diagrams
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Can be added easily.
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You must draw the diagram on the page.
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Color
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Easily changed with the annotation software.
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Cannot be done unless you change refills. Also there are a limited number of colors.
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Emphasis/Highlighting
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Simple when using the highlighting tool. Text tools allow for emphasis.
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Not possible unless just drawing boxes around key results.
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Different formats
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Depending on the software you may have a number of formats. E.g. swf, mp4, avi, flv
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One format on their site.
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Time to produce
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For complex problem can be time consuming from start to finish.
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As long as it takes to write the problem and solution.
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Quality
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Quality of the mathcasts can be changed to suit different devices.
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Sound quality can be changed by using the supplied headset.
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Using other software
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Other software applications can be introduced and used in the mathcast.
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Not possible.
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When producing a traditional mathcasts, you will need annotation software, a writing tablet, microphone or headset
and software to produce the video whereas with the pen, you will only require the pen and appropriate paper.
However, as shown above there are a number of key advantages to producing the traditional mathcasts over those
produced using the pen.
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