dhark.com: Smaller/Faster Adobe Captivate Output

Adobe Captivate was built with low bandwidth in mind. A typical project with sound (some narration) and a modest screen size of 512 x 384 streams at approximately 2–3 kilobytes per second. Your viewers can play this project using a 56 Kbps (or slower) dial-up modem without waiting more than a few seconds for the project to start. Additionally, there are no pauses during playback.

Note: File size depends on several factors. Larger files contain elements such as photos, images, sound tracks, large screen sizes, rapid screen transitions, and higher quality video and audio settings.

There are a number of ways to improve the file size of Adobe Captivate output:

•One important factor is the kilobytes per second ratio. See: View bandwidth utilization Check the bandwidth analysis to find this factor.[View demo] Don't despair if your project is large; it is possible for a large project to stream well over the Internet. For example, a 400 KB file might seem large, but if it plays for 5 minutes, it streams easily over a 28.8 Kbps modem. The first slide in a project always has a longer kilobytes per second ratio, because it is the first slide to load and additional project information must load with it.

View bandwidth utilization

Use the Bandwidth Analyzer to view the bandwidth required by the project and its object. You can see how much bandwidth each slide or object requires and how well the slides stream over various connections. With this knowledge, you can make the required changes to your project.

You can reduce the impact on the project by extending the timing for high-bandwidth frames or the preceding frames. Apply this fix only if bandwidth is limited and you notice distracting pauses during playback over the Internet.

In an open project, select Project > Bandwidth Analyzer. The Bandwidth Analyzer dialog box appears. This dialog box contains three tabs: Slide Summary, Graph, and Project Summary.
Navigate through the tabs for the required information.
(Optional) Click Print to print information in all the tabs.

The Bandwidth Analyzer dialog box contains the following tabs:

Slide Summary tab

Provides information about the speed and size of the slide.

Slide: Displays the slide number.
KB Per Sec: (Kilobytes per second) As a rule, any frame that requires less than 3 KB per second streams well over a modem Internet connection. Larger frames can, depending upon several factors, cause playback to pause. If previous frames require lower bandwidth, the higher-bandwidth frame can download at an acceptable speed. The first frame in a project always has a higher KB-per-second value, because additional project information must load with it.
Seconds: The frame duration, in seconds.
Video (KB): The size of any included video.
Audio (KB): The size of any included audio.

Graph

Shows how the project streams across time for different modem and broadband speeds. You can view high-bandwidth frames and note how they appear on common connection types.

Project Summary

Displays project summary information. Both the size and KB-per-second value are listed for each project item. Size is much less significant than KB-per-second value. For example, a 500-KB project running for 60 seconds streams at 8.3 KB per second. This project requires a broadband connection. By contrast, a 2000-KB project running for 10 minutes streams at 3.3 KB per second. This project streams well even over a low-speed modem connection.

Slide Info

Displays information about slides and their objects. Objects are listed under the slides to which they belong. Objects aren’t listed if they represent less than 10% of the size of the slide.

Object: Name of the slide or object. The word “reused” next to the name of an object indicates a copy of the object. The word “linked” next to the name of an object indicates that it was not published in the final SWF file.
Type: The nature of the object. The object can be a video, graphic, animation, widget, drawing, or a standard Adobe Captivate object.
Size (Kb): The size of the slide or object, in kilobits.
128k Speed (Sec): Time required, in seconds, to download the object at a network speed of 128 Kbps.
56k Speed (Sec): Time required, in seconds, to download the object at a network speed of 56 Kbps.
33k Speed (Sec): Time required, in seconds, to download the object at a network speed of 33 Kbps.

•Consider your color settings and the images included in your project. Two quick tips for reducing file size are to avoid color gradients and to avoid photo images.
•If you are not going to upload your SWF files to Adobe® Connect™ Enterprise, you can turn off the Include Adobe Connect Metadata option in the project preferences. This option is on by default, and it adds data to your project that allows for better integration with Adobe Acrobat Connect Professional. If you do not use Acrobat Connect Professional, turn this option off to reduce project size.

get the file size you want ...

From Adobe Forums: Reducing Size of Captivate project:

I am not a fan of reduced resolution JPG files. They seem to be too grainy and pictures will get blothcy. Instead, set the First slide to NORMAL and then click the option on the slide editing scren (lower left) to replicate the changes to ALL other slides. This should set all to Normal and it will make the SWF smaller.

Change project size and quality Edit > Preferences > Project SWF Size and Quality

Antialias Transparent Captions: Anti-aliasing smoothens out the text edges in the published file. Selecting this option affects the size of the SWF file when the project is published. The transparent caption text in the published file is anti-aliased.
Compress Full Motion Recording SWF File: This option compresses the full motion recording SWF file to a smaller size. Choosing this option can increase the time taken to preview or publish the project.
Settings: You can select the quality of the SWF file that is published by moving the slider bar to the corresponding option: High, Medium, Low, or Custom. When you choose High, Medium, or Low, Adobe Captivate uses its internal settings to set the quality of the file. Files of a higher quality are compressed to a lesser extent, and therefore might be of a greater file size. You can customize the options for quality when you move the slider to the Custom level.
Retain Slide Quality Settings: Select this option to use the slide quality settings defined in the Slide Properties dialog box for the slide.
BMP Image Quality: The screenshots generated during recording are in the bitmap format. Reducing the image quality reduces the file size but can affect the quality of the color in the images. Any bitmap files that you have inserted in the project are also affected.
JPEG Image Quality: JPEG files that you have inserted in the project are affected when you choose this option. Reducing the image quality reduces the file size but can affect the quality of the color in the images. JPEG images are detailed and contain many colors, so greatly lowering their quality is not advised.
Audio Quality: Audio files are converted to mp3 format before they are published. A file with higher quality does not affect the file size drastically but significantly improves the audio quality.
Advanced Project Compression: During publishing, Adobe Captivate takes into account only the difference between two slides instead of publishing both the slides. The compression reduces the size of the published project. Choosing this option can increase the time taken to preview or publish the project. Compressed projects sometimes do not play as intended in Flash Player.
Compress SWF File: Compresses the published SWF file. Compressed SWF files can be played only with Flash Player 6 or later. Choosing this option can increase the time taken to preview or publish the project.

Smaller/Faster Adobe Captivate Output