3 (Easier) Ways to Combine Your Camera and Slides
Our previous article on how to combine your slides and webcam to engage students was a hit because…
Only trouble was, it was a little complicated to get this technique working. Fortunately, new tools have come along, and now…
It’s much easier to integrate your webcam in your slides!
Easiest Solution if you Use Zoom
In Zoom, your presentation can now be your virtual background!
This setup puts you directly on top of your slides, so you can interact with your slides as you’re leading your students through them.
What It Looks Like
How to Do It
For the step-by-step instructions, read this article from Zoom.
Caveats
While this is a wonderfully simple solution, there are some things to keep in mind:
- It’s beta functionality, meaning Zoom is actively working on it. There might be rough edges to the experience for a few more months.
- For the best effect, your computer needs to be able to support Zoom’s virtual backgrounds
- It doesn’t support animations in your slides. If you have animations you want to keep, there’s a tool called PPspliT that may help you split each of your animations into separate static slides.
Easiest Solution if You Use a Mac
If Zoom’s slide virtual backgrounds won’t do the trick for you and you’re on a Mac, the next easiest option is to use the new mmhmm app.
Similar to the solution for Zoom users outlined above, mmhmm allows you to show content “over your shoulder” and dive into an immersive full-screen presentation. Like the Zoom setup above, this experience engages your students in an interactive experience.
Mmhmm integrates with Zoom, Teams, and Google Meet, and a few others.
Recent updates now allow for full compatibility with any video app that allows screen sharing!
Setting Up mmhmm
Step 1: Open the app
Step 2: If you use a green screen, click the Camera button in the top right corner, and click the I have a green screen box. If you don’t have a green screen, use the Presenter sidebar and experiment with the Silhouette, Round and Portrait mask tools to frame yourself. With mmhmm, you can use the resizer to shrink and grow yourself and your images to direct your viewers’ attention exactly where you want it to be.
Step 3: Click the Rooms sidebar to choose your background image. You can choose from the always-growing variety included, or you can upload your own image or video to use as a background.
Step 4: Add your slides in the Slide Tray at the bottom of the mmhmm screen.
Step 5: Once you have your slides and camera set up, share your screen in your respective platform (Zoom, Google Meet, etc.) and choose the mmhmm tab to present your interactive, engaging presentation. With new features shipping all the time, mmhmm continues to offer ways to WOW! your students. For instance, they recently released the Copilot feature, so now two people can work together on the same presentation.
As with the Zoom solution outlined earlier, mmhmm is not a perfect solution. This app is currently in beta functionality, meaning mmhmm is actively working on it so there might be bugs and some rough edges to the experience.
Additionally, this app is only for Mac users – while they promise a Windows version is on the way soon, it does not currently exist.
Easiest Universal Solution
While a little more involved, Open Broadcaster Software (OBS) is the original and most powerful way to combine your slides and webcam.
OBS works on Windows and Mac, and with virtually all web conference software tools.
Fortunately, the process of using OBS to achieve this effect has been greatly simplified.
Click here for our easier instructions for using OBS to create engaging presentations.
See It In Action
We hope you give this technique a shot – it helps students stay engaged and it’s a more fun way to lecture.
To see a recorded online session that uses these techniques to combine webcam and slides, add your email:
Missed Our Recent Articles?
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- Slido: Our Favorite Tool for Online Engagement. Zoom fatigue is ruining student engagement in online classes. Use Slido to inject energy and interaction into your online classes.
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- Gamify Your Online Class. Don’t lecture at your students. Invite them into a game to learn the material. If you gamify your online class sessions, your students engage and perform!
- Online Entrepreneurship Syllabus. This online entrepreneurship syllabus is an innovative online experience that is asynchronous with multiple touchpoints, skills-based, and experiential.
Want More Engaged Students?
Check out the Experiential Entrepreneurship Curriculum.
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We’ve taken the guesswork out of creating an engaging approach that works both online or in-person. ExEC has a comprehensive entrepreneurship syllabus template complete with 15 weeks of award-winning lesson plans that can be easily adapted to your needs.
