How to Make Help Center Videos (Short How-To Clips on Mac)

A good help center video shows one task from start to finish. It is recorded in a test account, shows no real customer data, and looks like every other video in your docs. The workflow has five parts:

1. Pick the articles where video helps.
2. Script the clicks.
3. Record in a seeded demo account.
4. Blur anything that still looks real.
5. Export with a saved style, and keep a list of videos so you can re-record them when the UI changes.

Below is that workflow on a Mac, using the built-in recorder and using Screen Bolt, the recorder we make. It applies to any support how-to video, whether it lives in a knowledge base, a help desk or an in-app help panel.

What a good help center video looks like

• One task. The video does what the article title says, and nothing else.
• Same steps as the text. A reader can follow the written steps and the video side by side.
• Readable where it's embedded. Help center videos often play in a narrow column next to the article, so small UI text needs zooming in.
• No real data. No customer names, emails, account IDs or API keys.
• Consistent style. Every article uses the same background, padding, cursor size and aspect ratio.
• Cheap to replace. When a button moves, you can re-record the video quickly.

Which articles need video

Video helps most where text alone struggles:

• Tasks that cross several screens or menus.
• Articles where finding the control is the actual problem ("Where is the export button?").
• Drag-and-drop, hover menus and right-click menus, which are hard to describe in words.
• Articles that are correct but still generate tickets.

Some pages don't need video:

• One-setting answers.
• Billing and policy pages.
• Reference tables and error-code lists.
• Any feature your product team is about to redesign.

To decide where to start, sort your help center by views and by the number of tickets that link to each article. Make videos for the top 10 first, then expand.

One task per video

Use a title test. If the video's title needs "and" ("Invite a teammate and set their role"), split it into two videos. A single-task clip is easier to follow, and a UI change breaks fewer of them.

Before you record:

1. Write the click path as a numbered list that matches the article's steps exactly.
2. Decide the start screen. Begin where the article's first step begins, not on your dashboard.
3. Decide on narration. A silent video must make sense from the screen alone, so plan short text labels for the key steps. If you narrate, write the script first. Our guides on reading a script while recording and this tutorial video script template cover that. In Screen Bolt, the Script button opens a teleprompter window that isn't captured in the recording.
4. Keep the video only as long as the task needs.

Screen Bolt does not create captions or transcripts. If your help center needs captions, add them with your video host or another tool.

Built-in recorder or Screen Bolt

The built-in recorder is enough when the video is short, nothing private is on screen, and plain full-screen footage is fine.

1. Press ⇧⌘5 (Command-Shift-5).
2. Choose Record Entire Screen or Record Selected Portion.
3. Click Record.
4. To finish, click the stop button in the menu bar.

See how to screen record on Mac for the details.

A dedicated recorder helps once you need blur, zoom and the same style across dozens of videos. The rest of this page shows how that works in Screen Bolt.

Recording with test accounts

Record in a demo workspace. Don't use a real customer account or your own production login.

1. Seed fake data. Create made-up companies, people and projects. Use example.com addresses, which are reserved for documentation and examples.
2. Match the plan. If the article covers a feature on a higher tier, record in a workspace on that tier so the screens match what readers see.
3. Use a clean browser profile. Set up a separate profile with no bookmarks bar, no extensions and no saved autofill. Autofill dropdowns are an easy way for real emails to slip into a recording.
4. Silence notifications. Turn on Do Not Disturb or another Focus from Control Center before recording.
5. Fix the window size. Size the browser the same way for every video so all your clips have the same proportions.

Our checklist for preparing your Mac for a clean recording covers the rest.

Record a browser window in Screen Bolt

1. In the recording bar, click Window.
2. In the picker, click your browser window, then click Record Window (or press Return) to confirm it.
3. Click the red record button.
4. Follow your click script. If you need to set something up mid-take, click Pause. Pause gaps are removed from the recording.
5. If a take goes wrong, click Discard and restart. This deletes the take and returns you to setup.
6. Click Stop. With the default after-recording setting, the editor opens.

Window mode records the window on its own, even if something covers it. To record a whole screen, use Display. To record part of the screen, use Area.

Two habits help the auto zoom:

• Click into a field before you type in it. Screen Bolt creates zoom regions from mouse clicks, not from typing. A click on the field makes the zoom land on that field.
• Move the cursor deliberately. While zoomed, the view follows the cursor.

If a zoom is missing, press ⌘K in the editor to add one at the playhead.

Blurring customer data

Test accounts still leak. Watch for:

• Your own email in the account menu.
• A real customer in a "recently viewed" list.
• Internal IDs in URLs.
• API keys on settings pages.

Screen Bolt gives you three ways to cover them.

Blur regions in the editor

1. Open the Effects panel and find Blur / Privacy.
2. Click Add Blur Region, or press B. A 5-second blur is added at the playhead.
3. Choose a Style: Gaussian, Pixelate or Solid Color.
4. Set Blur Intensity (5–50), the Region position and size, and the Duration (0.5 to 60 seconds).

A blur region keeps the position and size you set for its whole duration. That makes blur regions a good fit for things that stay put, like an avatar menu or a sidebar list.

For keys or account numbers, which must be completely unreadable, use Solid Color. A light blur or coarse pixelation can leave text partly legible.

Auto-Detect Sensitive Text

You'll find Auto-Detect Sensitive Text under Blur / Privacy. It scans the recording on your Mac with Apple's Vision text recognition and blurs every email address it finds. You can also:

• Turn on Also detect phone numbers.
• Add Custom keywords (comma separated, not case-sensitive), such as your company domain or the names of real customers.

Each detection follows the text through zooms and scrolling. Nothing is uploaded.

Four rules for help center videos:

• Edit first, scan last. Detections are not re-timed after you reorder clips, make cuts or change speed. That includes the J and L keys, which change the speed of the whole video. Finish your structural edits, then run the scan.
• Review every result on the blur track before exporting. The scan blurs every email it finds, including your fake example.com addresses. Delete any blur you want to keep visible.
• Share the export, not the project. The .screenbolt project contains the raw, unblurred recording.mov. Its project.json also stores the matched text as each blur item's label.
• Don't send the raw file. The Share button in the editor toolbar sends that same unedited recording.mov, without your blurs. Use Export for anything that goes into your help center.

Live blur zones while recording

The Blur button in the recording bar lets you draw frosted zones on screen before you record. They appear in the recording and hide what is under them. Know their limits before you rely on them:

• You see them on your own screen too.
• They stay at fixed screen positions, so they don't follow scrolling or a moved window.
• You can't click through them to the app underneath.
• They are drawn on the main display only.
• They don't blur Window-mode recordings.

Use them only for a static area in a Display or Area recording, and check the export. They are a convenience, not secure redaction. More detail is in the effects documentation.

Consistent branding across every video

Decide your house style once: aspect ratio, padding, background, corner radius, cursor size and zoom level. A webcam and sound effects rarely help a help center clip, so leave them off unless your team has a reason to use them.

Save your style as a preset

1. Style one finished video the way you want all of them to look.
2. In the editor toolbar, open Presets and choose Save Current as Preset...
3. Name it, for example "Help Center".
4. On every new recording, open Presets and click Apply next to "Help Center".

A preset stores your padding, corner radius, shadow, inset, aspect ratio, background, cursor, zoom, device frame, reflection, speed, 3D camera, audio volumes and enhancement, sound effects, and first-camera styling.

You can also skip step 4. In Settings ▸ Editing, turn on Use last project settings as default for new recordings. This copies the look of whichever project you edited last, so it only works well if every video you make uses the help center style. For more, see keeping recordings on-brand with presets.

Check what actually exports

Some styling shows in the editor preview but not in the exported file. Build your house style from settings that export:

For a branded background, save your brand gradient as an image file. Then, in the Background panel, choose Image and click Choose Image. Watch one exported video in full before you produce the rest.

Use the same export settings

In the Export sheet, choose MP4 (H.264, the format that plays most widely) and the same Quality every time. 1080p and higher need Pro, and presets larger than your recording are disabled.

Frame rate and compression live in Settings ▸ Quick export. The Frame rate setting also controls recording, so set it before you record. 30 FPS is usually enough for UI walkthroughs.

Each export saves the format and quality you chose as your Quick export defaults. If text looks soft, read our tips on readable screen recordings.

For a short step shown inline in an article, a looping GIF can work better than a video player. GIF export is Pro only. It offers Standard (640 px wide) or HD (960 px wide) and runs at about 10 fps with no sound. It refuses clips longer than 60 seconds and asks first above 15 seconds. The export documentation has the full list.

Exported files are named with the date and time and saved to the Desktop unless you change Save to. Rename each file to match its article slug before uploading.

The free version matters for customer-facing docs. Its exports carry a "Made with Screen Bolt" watermark and are limited to 720p and 3 minutes. The export sheet checks the 3-minute limit against the full recording, not the trimmed result, so record each task as its own short take. Screen Bolt Pro removes these limits for $79 one-time (as of November 2026). See the pricing table.

Updating videos after UI changes

Help center videos go stale as soon as a button moves. A simple routine keeps them current.

1. Keep an inventory. Use one row per video: article URL, exported file name, project name, date recorded, and the screens it shows (for example "Settings > Members").
2. Name projects after articles. In the editor, click the recording title in the toolbar and rename it to the article slug.
3. Keep the projects. By default they live in ~/Screen Bolt Projects. File ▸ Open recent lists only the 10 most recent items. Use Show previous projects or Open project... (⌘O) to find older ones.
4. Check every release. When release notes mention a UI change, filter the inventory by the affected screens.
5. Re-record the whole task. For a short single-task clip, a fresh take is usually faster than patching, and it keeps the video and text in step.
6. Re-apply and re-scan. Apply your preset, run Auto-Detect Sensitive Text again, export, and rename the file to the same name as before.
7. Update the article text in the same pass. Then record the new date in the inventory.

Ask your product team for a heads-up before UI changes ship. Hold videos for brand-new features until the design is final.

Common mistakes

• Real data in the shot. Autofill suggestions, the account menu and "recent" lists are the usual leaks.
• Sending the raw file. Share sends the unedited recording. Use Export.
• Scanning before editing. Run Auto-Detect Sensitive Text after cuts, reordering and speed changes.
• Several tasks in one clip. It is harder to follow and must be redone whenever any of its screens change.
• Mismatched window sizes. The videos look different even with the same preset.
• A watermark in your docs. Free exports are watermarked, so check before publishing.
• No inventory. Without one, nobody knows which videos a release broke.

If you also make onboarding flows or internal process docs, see our onboarding video examples and how to record SOP and process videos on Mac. When a customer issue reaches engineering, see how to record a bug report video.