Online tutorial methods

[Doug Nelson]

We've all seen static tutorials such as we use here on RP (screenshot, text, screenshot, text, etc.). A lot of us have probably also seen online movie tutorials. But there are lots of other choices out there.

My questions for you are:

What is the most interesting/useful style of online tutorial for you?
Have you seen any innovative tutorial technology used?
What is the least useful style of tutorial for you?

Examples?

Remember, we're talking about delivery method, not content.

[d_kendal]

My favorite type of tutorials are PDF or Flash, since they're both easy to archive on your hard drive. I like flash tutorials, since they can be very interactive. the one downside to both of those types is that the images in them usually aren't good quality so they can be harder to work with when you're trying out the tutorial technique on the included photo(s). HTML tuts can be annoying since they're a harder to save, but the upside to them is that the image quality can be much better then PDF or Flash.

- David

[Doug Nelson]

Have you seen any good flash Photoshop tutorials?

[Roger Roberts]

David,I recently found out that I could save a whole tutorial page to a folder to access later by going to File>save as>save as type>select> web archive,single file (*.mht) and save. This may be old hat to most but new to me .

[Mike Needham]

I tend to come from the "monkey see, monkey do" school of learning so am fond of Quicktime. Other than that I read a bit.

[Ed_L]

I've saved a lot of tutorials like Roger mentioned. But, like Mike, I like the quick time movies best. They seem to be easier for me to understand the first time around. I also have several of these saved on my hard drive.

Ed

[Doug Nelson]

I'd also like to know if people prefer reading text, or having a narrator.

Also, aren't QT movies kind of big? I remember putting up one of my own tests a year ago and no one could access it because it was almost 2meg!!!!!

[d_kendal]

Originally posted by Doug Nelson
Have you seen any good flash Photoshop tutorials?

not that I can recall, but I've seen tuts for other programs made with flash and really liked them.

- David

[d_kendal]

Originally posted by Doug Nelson
I'd also like to know if people prefer reading text, or having a narrator.

Also, aren't QT movies kind of big? I remember putting up one of my own tests a year ago and no one could access it because it was almost 2meg!!!!!

I prefer text, not really sure why, I just find it easier to understand an explanation in text, especially if it's complicated.
Now that I have DSL file size isn't a problem, but when I had dial up i usually didn't want to wait for the download to be able to watch a video tutorial.

- David

[Ed_L]

I think I have 20 quick time movies downloaded. They range from a very short 580KB to a rather long 8,826 KB. I'm still using a dial-up account, but they're worth the wait to me. If the narrator is good on a quick time movie, I prefer that over text. But either way would work just fine for me.

Ed

[Mike Needham]

Just like Flash, Quicktime streams information, so huge filesizes appear less of a problem, obviously donwloading them is another matter although having broadband makes it painless.

[Vikki]

I like Quicktime with an option to download in PDF format as well.