Hi There,

I'm looking to develop an avatar of sorts that I can use to narrate an eLearning course in Adobe Captivate. I've searched and searched but I don't understand whether or not I can get a talking cartoon from CrazyTalk to do this. The problem is that I can't get a transparent background. I downloaded the free trial of popVideo converter and I can see where that would give me the transparent background that I'm looking for and the widget output is perfect - exactly what I want - but Captivate only accepts swf or avi files and I can't figure out how to convert a widget to a swf or avi file. Is there a program out there that will do this for me? (I've also tried the png idea mentioned in another post but that won't work either.) Any help is appreciated! Thank you!

Hi..

popVideo Converter is intended for use with Reallusion software such as iClone, CrazyTalk Animator etc using .popVideo or .iWidget formats. It doesn't output to any other video formats apart from allowing export of an Alpha video in AVI format.

So you basically have a couple of options with CrazyTalk Animator. That is to use a sequence image format like PNG which will have a transparent background or output with a green screen background and use a video editor to remove the background.

Both ways will require that you then use the video editor to output to a video format that Adobe Captivate can import. As I'm personally not familiar with Captivate I can't help further on what would be the best format to use.

Alternatively you could save yourself a lot of work by setting the correct background in CrazyTalk Animator and output this as a straight AVI file which could then easily be imported in Captivate. Of course if it is essential you have a transparent background then this method won't be suitable.

Perhaps someone who is familiar with Adobe Captivate can offer further advice.  

                                                                

Peter
Forum Administrator

www.reallusion.com

I use captivate a lot... am on the beta team for CP6, in fact. This is a glaring issue that needs to be resolved for users of pretty much any e-learning system. Mediasemantics has an interesting solution for us, and although it isn't as robust as iclone, you can very easily export video with alpha transparency that looks pretty good. I'm sticking with iclone, but we (at the very least) need a solid FLV with alpha option.

Also, Also, Wik... I'd like to be on Reallusion's beta team as well.

Has there been any update to this? I am testing iClone5 and have used a green background and then went to test PopVideo to get a transparent background. It seems like your older tool Widgetcast may have been able to provide that Widget for a website or potentially SWF conversion, but it is no longer available.

Is there an alternative? Basically, I want to use iClone5 and create my character with a plain background and add in my dialogue. Then import into Adobe Captivate or Articulate Storyline to be part of an e-learning module. I was hopeful popVideo could do the trick, but I just get a black background with the AVI converted to FLV and I only get the mask of my image not the actual video of my image. (odd)


Thanks
Rodney

As I mentioned in my previous reply in this thread, popVideo Converter is designed for use with iClone5 and CrazyTalk Animator and uses the .popVideo file format that both these products can read.

The only other format it exports is an alpha video which is the black and white video you mention. You then need to take this alpha video and the original source video and open them both up in your video editor. This will then allow you an alternative method to remove the background.

                                                                

Peter
Forum Administrator

www.reallusion.com

I have used the color key in Adobe Prmiere Pro to import an AVI transparent Animator ll cartoon file to Captivate 8.  The key was not the best.   I am having problems importing mpeg  4 white background carton file.  Would like to see more posts on this issue.

I too am struggling with this issue of getting a transparent CT animation into captivate. it was the whole reason I bought CT in the first place, to make elearning with transparency.
esther