How to Record Video, Audio, and Your Screen in PowerDirector
Record a webcam clip, narrate over your footage, or capture the screen without leaving the editor.
Updated Aug. 29, 2026 · 5 min read
In a hurry? Use the recording quick guide instead.
PowerDirector records as well as edits, which saves the round trip through another application. One menu covers three quite different jobs: a webcam clip, a voice-over recorded against footage you are already watching, and a capture of your screen. Whichever you use, the recording arrives in My Media and is ready for the timeline without a separate import.
- Go to Media > My Media and open the Record dropdown at the top.
- Choose Record from Webcam, Record Voice-over or Record PC Screen.
- For a voice-over, put the footage on the timeline first: you are narrating against it.
Recording in PowerDirector
Prefer to watch? Here is the whole thing in about four minutes.
Find the Record Menu
Open the Media tab and select My Media. The Record dropdown sits at the top of the panel.
The three entries are separate tools rather than variations on one, and only one of them has a prerequisite.
| Option | What it does |
|---|---|
| Record from Webcam | Opens the Capture window, records a clip to a file, and imports it to My Media when you leave. |
| Record Voice-over | Records audio straight onto a timeline track while you watch the footage. Put the video on the timeline first. |
| Record PC Screen | Opens the Screen Recorder, a separate window that can also capture your webcam and microphone at the same time. |
Record from the Webcam
Record from Webcam opens the Capture window, with the webcam preview at the upper left. Start with the red button at the lower left, or press Alt + R. Click the button again to stop.
Stopping brings up a box to name the file. The recording then appears in the list on the right of the window, where a double-click plays it back.
Leave with the exit button at the top right and the clip is imported into My Media automatically, ready to drag onto the timeline.
Record a Voice-over
This is the one with an order to it. Put the footage on the timeline and cut it first, because the point of a voice-over is that you narrate against what you are watching. Then choose Record Voice-over.
Pick your microphone under Device. Preferences holds a recording time limit, a three-second countdown before it starts, and auto fade. The slider on the left sets the recording volume.
Click the red button and PowerDirector asks which track the audio should go on. Confirm with OK and it records; the same button stops it.
Record the Screen
Record PC Screen opens the Screen Recorder. The row along the top chooses what to capture: the full screen, a game, a particular app, or a custom area. Open preview at the top right shows what will be in the frame before you commit.
A custom area is dragged out on the screen itself, so you can crop out everything you do not want recorded.
The middle of the window sets resolution and frame rate, and whether mouse click animations are drawn into the recording, which is worth having on for a tutorial and off for almost anything else.
The icons along the bottom add the webcam, the microphone and an image overlay such as a logo. The image lands in Video Overlays, where the eye icon shows or hides it and it can be dragged and resized in the preview.
Check the microphone icon before you start. The webcam and microphone are separate toggles and neither is on by default. A tutorial recorded with the microphone off looks perfect and has no sound, and there is no way to recover it afterwards.
The Result
Click REC to start and the stop button to finish, and PowerDirector comes back with the recording already on the timeline. If the webcam was on, its footage arrives as a separate clip on a lower track, so you can move it, resize it or cut it without touching the screen capture.
Haven't got PowerDirector yet? Webcam, voice-over and screen capture are all in the editor, so there is no round trip through another app.
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