Here are few tools which can be used to create tutorials. These screen casting tools are free alternative to some of the higher priced utilities. This list covers both PC and Mac utilities.

1. Wink

Wink

This is a Presentation and Tutorial creation software. Wink is an extremely useful tool for creating tutorials on ‘how to use any software’ for e.g. MS-Word/Excel. Wink can capture screenshots and mouse movements. Users can add explanations boxes to specify their own explanations, titles and buttons to generate a very interactive tutorial. It works well with all Windows versions and various versions of Linux.

Users can also record voice as tutorial is created for explaining purpose. Images in BMP/JPG/PNG/TIFF/GIF formats can be used. It has Multilingual support and also supports output formats like Macromedia Flash, PDF, PostScript, HTML. Wink also features some advanced Capture Tools which Capture screenshots automatically based on mouse and keyboard input thereby generating perfect captures in limited time frame.

All these features come in standard Windows-based user interface wherein the user can simply perform drag-and-drop editing to create high quality tutorials. With unrivaled features this is distributed as freeware for business and personal use.

2. iShowU

iShowU

iShowU is a tool that enables both audio and video capture. This tool is designed to record anything on the screen of the computer. This tool produces no encoding delay as soon as recoding is done the video is available. iShowU has simple settings to control capture  from a single-window interface. Users can even capture mouse positions, Pause / Resume recording at any time, automatically feed completed videos.

iShowU features extremely useful, built-in presets . This tool supports any QuickTime compression method. It is one of the easiest tools to create tutorials. All the user needs to do is to drag the capture rectangle to record and enter it.

3. CamStudio

CamStudio

This extremely interactive tool can record all screen and audio activity on the computer. It creates AVI video files of industry-standard and using its built-in SWF Producer converts AVI video files bandwidth-friendly Streaming Flash videos. This can be used to demonstration videos for any software program. CamStudio is the perfect tool for creating video tutorials for school or college class.

4. Screencast-O-Matic

Screencast-O-Matic

This is free software. Screencast-O-Matic is one of the easiest ways to create a video recording of screen and up loading it from the browser.This is a completely web-based application and allows the user to create video recordings from their browser itself. This simple tool has options for creating titles, descriptions, notes at certain times in the video, and even allowing comments. This also makes the screencast searchable.

This is in its beta version which easily integrates using Java. The process is very simple. The user needs to click ‘Create’ on the website. Screencast-o-Matic starts recording video and audio on hitting the red record icon and it provides a 15 minute window of time

5. Jing

Jing

Jing is an interesting project that instantly captures and shares images and video from the computer. This unique tool is a freeware and works well with both Windows & Mac. The procedure is quite simple. Download and Install Jing. Then the user needs to Run Jing and click on the Capture button and next select something.

It can easily grab an image or even record a video. This ready tool also enables editing of the image along with preview option. User can share their creations by uploading the file to Screencast.com, Flickr, or to their own FTP server. The URL will be copied to the computer for later use. Jing is one of the best screencast applications.