have been scouring the net to figure out how to get better results than what i'm getting with the camstudio (love the program, and it looks great until i pull it into premiere). I have read that it can be a codec issue or an fps issue, but before i follow those trails, i was wondering if there is a screen capture software that works well with premiere, without a lot of hassle. (not necessarily free, just reliable and hassle free with good quality in premiere elements) Anyone have experience with this? thanks in advance!

Camtasia is excellent.

thank you steve :-) installed the demo, and i really do like it. However, is it just me or are the volume controls difficult? i mean, i simply want to adjust the volume on the imported track (on track 2), but i dont have a simple volume control. hmph. lol still get quality loss when i take it through premiere elements, but its worlds better than before, and there may still be adjustments that i have yet to figure out. thank you for the tip! If i can figure out a couple of little details, then i'll probably go ahead and buy it.
:-)

Well, we've used Camtasia and Adobe's Captivate to make tutorials for <http://www.muvipix.com>. They're both excellent, and I've never had a problem with either.

Chuck Engels is really the expert on both those program though. You can find him on the Muvipix forum daily.

ok, i am getting the hang of the camtasia, and decided to reverse my method, and import the premiere edited avi into camtasia, rather than the camtasia clip into premiere, then save it as a wmv for youtube, with far better results (though, the video clip portion that i put through premiere and imported is distorted just a tad (like a widescreen squish, just a hair), so i must be doing something just off. Here's the resulting video...
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9H-2alppJU>
If someone ever finetunes the process of importing captures into premiere without the major quality loss, i'll switch to that, cuz i far prefer ending in premiere for the editing control.

Have you checked in with Chuck Engels yet, Josie? As I said, he's very well versed with both programs.

Hi steve, have not checked with him personally, but i browsed the forum. What a great information source! I have to admit, a lot of it is above my head, so i probably am not getting the most out of it :-(

He's also a very nice guy (and a close personal friend).

I'm sure whatever you asked him he'd be glad to answer, no matter how elementary.

Thank you for the insight, i'm going to see if i can summarize my situation and see what he thinks.
thanks again :-) for taking the time to help me
jo