Using ShareTheBoard is very easy but, as always, there are a few tips and tricks that’ll help get you from “OK” to “Wow!” Here’s how to get to perfection when it comes to your camera setup…
First things first, if you have access to a ceiling-mounted camera (with a direct view of your board) or a dedicated whiteboard camera: you’re pretty much done! This type of setup ensures your camera will clearly “see” your board and all presenters, and it will minimize any unwanted glare. If you’re not lucky enough to be using one of those types of cameras, pick the right one for your specific setup.
When you’re ready, start a new session of ShareTheBoard. The first thing you’ll do is identify the surface to be shared. This is also the ideal time to set up your camera:
- It’s good to use an external camera whenever possible (as opposed to a built-in laptop camera), as it will offer you the ability to adjust the camera’s placement relative to your shared surface.
- Generally speaking, the higher you can place your camera, the better: this will help eliminate glare on your whiteboard (especially on highly reflective boards, such as glass surfaces) and will provide for a more comfortable viewing experience for your audience.
- Position your camera to capture the entire surface you’re hoping to share, along with enough space around it to make for a natural viewing experience. A good rule of thumb is to try to have your board take up 25-75% of your screen.
- If you put the camera too close, you may “chop off” parts of the presenter, creating an awkward viewing experience.
- If you put the camera too far, you may make it hard for your viewers to see your smaller board contents.
- If you’re still seeing glare on your board despite trying different camera placements, you may want to use the Spatial Zeroing feature:
- This feature effectively tells ShareTheBoard which parts of a selected work area should be ignored. It’s most commonly used to ignore the space between boards when sharing multiple surfaces simultaneously but can also be use effectively to eliminate pesky glare.
- It’s worth noting that ShareTheBoard intelligently ignores moderate reflections and glare; the Spatial Zeroing feature should only be used in those cases where a glare is particularly troublesome.
- And if your camera isn’t perfectly in front of your board, never fear: ShareTheBoard can digitally zoom in on your selected work area and even allows you to keystone your image to help straighten it for remote viewers.
- If you’re working with remote viewers, you may prefer to use two cameras:
- This setup allows you to have one camera focused on you while another is focused on the whiteboard.
- Indeed, in some cases, you may have to use two cameras… or a camera splitter… or the ShareTheBoard content camera. Read here for more info.
- If you have multiple cameras at your disposal, switching between them is very easy: just go to Settings (during your ShareTheBoard session) and select the desired camera from the dropdown menu.
- Finally, a few words about camera-related errors that you may encounter when first setting up your ShareTheBoard session:
- “No camera found”: If you have a camera, check if it’s being used by another application (if it is, turn it off there). Or connect an external camera (ideally with 1080p resolution).
- “Camera is busy”: Looks like the camera you’ve selected is busy. If it’s being used by another application, simply turn it off there then click: Try Again
- “Disabled access”: If you’ve disabled (or never enabled) ShareTheBoard’s access to your camera(s), simply follow the on-screen instructions to give app.sharetheboard.com access to your camera.
