There are 3 steps to creating a video and putting it into your Canvas course:

Creating and uploading video can be a lot of fun, or it can turn into a very time consuming project. There are 3 basic steps to make sure that working with video is simple!

Get a video on your computer.
Upload that video to a video hosting platform e.g. YouTube, 3cMediaSolutions, or Canvas Studio.
Share that video via your Canvas course.

1. Get a video on your computer.

There are many ways to get a video on your computer.

You can take a video on your camera or smartphone and transfer that file to your computer.
You can download an existing video from a website, if allowed by copyright.
You can also make a video on your computer. We'll concentrate on that last option. (If the video is already on the web, say on YouTube, just add it to your course like you'd add any External URL.)

The Online Ed Department has a Recording Station in LTC 110, all set up with recording software (Screencast-o-matic and Camtasia), a good webcam, microphones, a document camera, professional lighting, instructions and help. You can reserve it through the Library Circulation desk. That works wonderfully.

Screencast-o-matic.com will let allow you to create screen-recording type videos. The professional version will let you record your computer screen, upload, edit, export (download), caption, and host video. (Contact the Online Ed help desk for the special password to get the Professional version!)

Downloading and installing Screencast-o-matic onto your computer is probably the best long term option if you plan to use SOM semi-regularly. SOM can be used directly from the website, but there can be some odd behavior when Mac users attempt to run SOM from the website. Either way, installing SOM is generally a good idea if you want to make video.

To fully use any screen recording software, you need a headset with a microphone and a webcam. The Online Ed Department also has these for long-term loan in LTC 317 (and some at the Library Circulation desk), but for now, just record something on the screen.

Then download it to your computer. That's step 1.

2) Post that video to a video repository

You may post your video to any repository such as YouTube or Vimeo. The CCC Chancellor's Office is supporting 3C Media Solutions. We recommend registering for an account here: 3cmediasolutions.org. 3cMediaSolutions has the benefit of being strictly used by CCC staff and faculty. What this means is linking to a 3cMediaSolutions video does not open "Pandora's box" of distractions that a student might encounter on YouTube.

Instructions for uploading a video can be found on the 3cMediaSolutions.org site.

Go to http://www.3cmediasolutions.org/, login. Click My Account | Media to get to your videos. You'll find the "Add/Upload Media" button there.

Follow the steps to upload the video. Once it's uploaded, it takes time, usually 15 minutes, but perhaps an hour or 2, for 3CMediaSolutions to receive and process the file. When it's ready, the Options column will have options, like this:

Click the video name, scroll down, and copy the Share Link.

That's step 2.

3) Share that video via your Canvas course.

Now that you have the share link for a video, go back to your Canvas course. Add this link to a module like you'd add any other link. (That is, Go to the module where the link should be, click the "+" to the right of the module name, select External URL, etc....)

You can also put this link in a Canvas Content Page. Just add a Content Page to your module. Edit the page. Type some words that explain the video. Then type something like "Watch the Volcano Video". Select those words, click the link icon in the page editor header, and paste in the Share Link for 3cMediaSolutions.

Voila! Your beautiful video is ready for its debut.

(If you'd rather embed the video into a Canvas Content Page, copy the 3cMediaSolutions Embed Code. Edit the Canvas Page where you'd like the video embedded, click the embed icon symbol (it looks like a cloud), paste the embed code. To avoid having scroll bars, change the 2nd "width" to 680, and the 2nd "height" to 390, like this: