Lecture Capture: Lessons from Week 1

Expected behaviour: When you record a session using the YuJa software client and you have specified a module channel to publish to, you expect to be able to press ‘Post Now’ on the recording confirmation window that pops-up.

Issue: Some staff have found that this does not work. They press ‘Post Now’ but find that the video has not been published when they go to the module’s video channel later, or when students start asking where it is.

Resolution: This issue has been reported to YuJa and we are working to resolve it. In the mean time, you should always check that your video was published correctly, publishing it manually if it hasn’t. This is covered in the extended lecture capture guides or you can view the YuJa specific guide here.

We will let the community know when we have found the underlying cause of this issue and resolved it properly.

Some people have found that they’ve recorded the camera feed with an odd angle or direction. This issue has a different resolution depending on whether you are in a Standard or Enhanced room.

Standard Room Camera: Standard rooms (labelled STD in timetabling) have a simple webcam on a flexible arm for giving your recording a video feed. Adjustment of this is completely manual so you should make sure it’s pointing in a sensible direction, such as where you are likely to be standing for your session. It’s easy just to to check you have a sensible view using the YuJa recording preview.

Enhanced Room Cameras: Enhanced rooms have automatic cameras with pre-set views and a ‘follow’ capability. There are two modes that control the camera angle, ‘Presentation’ and ‘Discussion’, both controlled on the touch-screen panels on the desk:

• Presentation Mode sets the camera to latch-on to the person standing beside the panel and follow them automatically. Note that this latch can sometimes go wrong when the area is busy, so you can reset the tracking by pressing the ‘Presentation’ button again. If you still have trouble with this, you can switch to Discussion mode.
• Discussion Mode is designed for tracking whole-class conversations in Hybrid situations. However, it can also give you a simple alternative in lecture capture as it simply zooms out to the widest angle and takes in the whole room.

We don’t recommend you record video media that you play in the room in most cases. First of all, there are copyright issues that come into play as there are different rules for playing to a room vs re-recording to publish online. There are also technical issues that can arise as you end up recording both the audio on the computer and the sound in the room – often with chaotic results. We suggest the following:

• When you come to play a video in your session, pause the YuJa recording using the on-screen utility window. Don’t forget to un-pause when you’re done!
• You can release/link to the original video, if you’re sure of the copyright issues in your My Dundee module later, along side the lecture recording.
• If you must record the in-room video, then be sure to mute the microphones in the room using either the control panel (enhanced rooms) or the YuJa software (see how to open the YuJa panel while recording, below)

Whatever you do, make sure you’re on the right side of copyright law with content.

Although we cover the use of YuJa in the Lecture Capture workflow, it is only the basics. To learn more, we have some resources on our own knowledge-base and YuJa has an extensive reference website:

• CTIL resources for YuJa
• YuJa Help Website

A small number of users have reported finding ‘sources’ missing in the final upload of the recording. This is a pain and can occur for several reasons including user error, hardware fault or a YuJa error. If this does happen to you, please report it to Help4u, including the module, time/date and link to the YuJa video you had the issue with. This way we can try to figure out what went wrong and report it to YuJa or the AV team as required.

PowerPoint can be set to display slides on any screen and sometimes it gets it wrong. If you start your slide show and the slides appear in the wrong place, or the presenter view gets in the way, you can go back to the settings and make sure it’s set up right:

1. Stop the slideshow and go back to the PowerPoint window.
2. Click on the ‘Slide Show’ tab and locate the ‘Monitors’ section.
3. Change the Monitor from ‘Automatic’ to ‘Primary Display’. This will ensure the slides are sent to the correct monitor and projector.
4. You can also choose to switch off ‘Use Presenter View’ if you don’t need it.

Read more about PowerPoint presentation settings on the Microsoft website.

Yes you can!

When you start recording, the YuJa window where the source settings, previews and other setting were configured disappears by default, leaving only the discrete recording control window. To re-open this without ending the recording, click on the YuJa icon from the control bar.

Note that opening this window can get in the way of any presentation on the main display, so of you are in an enhanced room, drag the window over to the secondary monitor. If you only have a single monitor in the room, be sure and close the window when you’re done.

Don’t worry – this only deletes a link, not your module channel or any content you’ve added to ti. To create a new YuJa channel link in your module, read our guide on creating a YuJa channel here!

The first thing to do is the most frustrating, which is to be patient as at it can take time for processing to complete. However, if it’s been more than a day, then something has probably gone wrong and you’ll need to log a call with Help4U. Please be sure to include the time date the video was recorded and the title of the video so that we can identify the specific video.