If you don’t have the budget for a professional voice-over person or you just prefer to do-it-yourself, these tips may help you to create more professional screen recordings using a product like Camtasia (which I use) or another screen recording tool on the market.

1. Storyboard your presentation and script it out making sure to note where slides change or where a point should be emphasized with voice inflection or a pause.
2. Record your visuals first, without audio, but for practice talk through the audio so that you get the right timing for slide changes. Personally, I’ve found the audio quality is much better when the visual and audio tracks are recorded separately.
3. It’s a good idea to start and finish your recording all on the same day as your voice changes pitch quite noticeably. It’s weird but I find it really hard to make my voice sound the same on a different day.
4. Record the whole thing in one take if you can, it doesn’t have to be a perfect one track wonder. If you mess up a line, make a loud noise to cause a spike on the audio track, pause a moment and then begin again. The spike on the audio track indicates where you need to come back to for editing.
5. Take a big drink of water before you begin and if you need to have some during the recording, just go ahead. Again, make a loud noise to indicate it’s an area of the track that needs editing, pause and then continue with the script.
6. Avoid coffee and sugary drinks before recording as it does something weird to your saliva production and can make for some interesting mouth noises.
7. Stand up to speak if you can. At the very least sit up straight on the edge of your chair and drop your knees to open up your chest for maximum voice projection and nice deep breaths.
8. I use a headset with a mic which works pretty well as you can position the mic a short distance from your face, and out to the side to minimize breathing and mouth noises.
9. Make sure to do your recording when traffic noise and background noises will be at a minimum. I always record on the weekend as my mic picks up every little noise. You can remove background noise afterward, but it’s not always perfect.
10. Finally, it may sound random but having apple slices handy while you are recording is a good idea because the pectin in apples helps to reduce mouth noises.

I’d love to hear of any more helpful techniques that you’ve come up with in the comments section below.

I also should say that I’m not affiliated with Camtasia in any way.

@Schnicker