Customize Camtasia (Favorites, Presets, & More)

Learn how to personalize Camtasia to save time and add your frequently-used video enhancements and custom properties.

Save a Preset

Save custom properties for annotations, behaviors, visual effects, cursor effects, and dynamic caption styles.

Drag an annotation, behavior, visual effect, cursor effect, or dynamic caption style onto the timeline.
In the Properties panel, edit the properties to customize.
Click the button to save the custom properties as a new preset.
The Add Preset dialog appears. Enter a Preset Name and click OK.
Note: Customizing the preset name is not available for annotations.

Camtasia saves the preset to the Annotations, Behaviors, Visual Effects, Cursor Effects, or Dynamic Captions tab. User-saved presets are indicated with the icon (Windows only).

Note: To view preset annotations (callouts, arrows, shapes, etc.), select Annotations tab > a subtab > Style dropdown > User.
Callout Style dropdown with User style selected

Add Your Favorites

Add frequently-used annotations, transitions, visual effects, behaviors, animations, cursor effects, and audio effects to the Favorites tab.

Package your Favorites to share with others to:

Maintain a consistent look and elements across videos.
Help your team build professional videos based on your favorite video enhancements.
Save time by having ready-made enhancements easily accessible.

To add to Favorites:

Click to select the desired tool.
Hover over the item to add and click the Favorites icon.
Camtasia adds the item to the Favorites tab.

To remove an item from the Favorites tab, click the icon.

Customize the Editor Tool Order

Quickly move your frequently-used tools to the top in Camtasia Editor.

Click and drag a tool to reposition it within the list of tools.

Tip: Detach the timeline to quickly reorder the entire set of tools.

Tools in the More menu cannot be reordered. To reorder the entire set of tools, select View > Timeline > Detach Timeline press Ctrl+3 (Windows) or Command+3 (Mac).

Set the Default Editor Tool

Camtasia sets the default tool to the Automatic option, which opens the Media Bin or Camtasia Assets subtab when you open or start a new project.

Default tool preference

To change the default startup tool:

On Windows, select Camtasia Editor > Edit menu > Preferences > Program tab > Default tool dropdown.
On Mac, select Camtasia Editor > Camtasia menu > Settings > General tab > Default tool dropdown.

Add Color Labels to Media on Timeline

Assign color labels to media on the timeline to help identify media types or sections while editing.

Color Label context menu and example on timeline

Right-click (Windows) or control-click (Mac) on the media and select Add Color Label. Choose the desired color.

Restore Camtasia Defaults

Reset default annotations, visual effects, behaviors, cursor effects, audio effects, and dynamic caption styles in the selected tab to the original defaults.

Click to select one of the Tool tabs.
Right-click (Windows) or Control+click (Mac) in an empty area in the tab and select Restore All Default (Windows) or Restore Default (Mac).
Camtasia restores any deleted application defaults and maintains your existing user-created presets and Favorites.