The following is a list of suggestions that you may find useful when recording your talk.


  • You are free to use any recording medium you feel comfortable with. There are two very easy methods, either will record your talk and save it in a form suitable for YouTube.
    • Use PowerPoint to make your slides, you can then very simply record your entire presentation within PowerPoint using the instructions here.
    • Open a Zoom meeting, share your screen with your slides and click record.
  • If you choose a different method, please make sure the format is supported by YouTube, e.g. MP4, MOV, MPEG4, AVI, WMV, and FLV.
  • We accept slides in the PDF format. If you do not use slides to present your research, we kindly ask you to provide a summary/conclusion slide.
  • When using slides in your talk, make sure that the slide number is clearly visible for easier reference during the asynchronous discussions.
  • It is easy to waste time over-optimizing a prerecorded talk. See the public talks of the Cosmology from Home conference series to get an impression of what others have done in this medium.
  • You are free to choose the structure of your talk. You can use the default of a recorded “webinar” if you wish. Otherwise, feel free to experiment. Some possibilities are:
    • Recording a presentation of slides with voiceover using other software, with additional features, e.g. StreamYard or Open Broadcaster Software.
    • Recording yourself being interviewed by a colleague (in person or on Zoom).
    • Recording yourself in front of a blackboard.
  • Keep the time limit of the talks in mind as talks are strictly limited to 18 minutes.

  • If you like, you can briefly introduce yourself before you talk about your research, for example by mentioning your name, affiliation and research interests.
  • Make sure that the room you are recording in is well lit and free of distractions, and that you can be seen and heard clearly in your recording.
  • Whichever method you use, remember that you as a speaker will probably appear somewhere on the screen during your talk. Keep that in mind when writing your presentation slides so that you don’t obscure important parts of any slides.