Two questions...

Chuckm4614 wrote: 2. When I insert a video file into a slide, I have found that I need to leave approx 1 second at the front and 2 seconds at the back for it to play correctly and not jump around (skip parts of the video).  In having to doing this, is there a way to have the video fade in or have Captivate show the first frame of the video prior to playing it?

Are you setting this timing based on local playback/preview?

Have you tested in an LMS/Webserver?

One of your testing goals should be to get as close as possible to the user experience in their environment. If ALL your users are on the LOCAL network with you, and in the same building, no problem. If one, or anyone, is outside that situation, you have to consider how they will experience your course.

If some of them are further away, maybe still using dial-up, maybe not on FIOS or High-Speed internet, you might consider adding some more time, and a button to 'continue' after the video ends, as there will be variance for different users on different network connections.

That 1 - 2 seconds on your development machine may turn out to look like a 35 - 45 second pause until the course loads.

I've also noticed that if I have anything else open while editing/developing in Captivate - I get screen flicker and very slow response from Captivate.  Anyone else have this issue? Hopefully this make sense to you guys.  I'm running Captivate 9 on a MacBook Pro.

The two best friends of Captivate are RAM and FAST hard drive space!

So, a solid-state or hybrid drive in your laptop is a good investment, AFTER you add more RAM!

Thirdly, I would add: a robust backup strategy! Time Machine is your friend.

First question: if that 'something' is not interactive, use the Timing panel, set it to 'Display for the rest of the project'.

Beware: this is not possible for interactive objects, with the exception of my favourite shape button.

Second question: grab a static screenshot of the first frame, and put that as an image before the start of the video. Too bad there is not an automatic feature for that, AFAIK.

I have no Macbook pro, still on Windows and am always multitasking but my desktop has some power (starting from SSD, 32GB RAM, NVidia 2GB card).