Songs Used in Our Videos

I've been receiving a lot of e-mails about the song used in the original "3D Edition" announcement video. Each time I put together a screencast or video, I usually spend a few hours scouring the net for a great song that captures the feeling of the video and is available with a podsafe or creative commons license. Sometimes it takes a bit of hunting, but there is some wonderful music out there.

Here are direct links to some of the music I have used recently. Enjoy the music and please support these artists who have allowed their music to be used for creative projects.

• Wake the Sun - by The Matches (used in current "3D Edition")
• ditto ditto - by ditto ditto (used in original "3D Edition")
• Turn Out The Light - by The New Amsterdams (used in "RSS importer and Chart Backgrounds")
• The Blue Roses - by Rookie of the Year (used in "NetNewsWire Importer")
• Its About Your Soul - Delphinium Blue (used in "Tick Marks")
• Stop - by the Plain White T's (used in "Recently Played Songs")
• Mystic Chants - by Anne Young (used in "Lord of the Rings Timeline")

Bee Docs' Timeline - 3D EDITION (video)

I am very happy to announce Bee Docs' Timeline - 3D Edition! I've put together a five minute video to tell you all about it:

WEB:

Watch Now

DOWNLOADS:

Apple TV Optimized - 159.9 Mb (zip)
iPod / iPhone Optimized - 41.3 Mb (zip)

About 3D Timelines - Part II.

When I designed the first product (a web-based document management system) for Bee Documents back in 2002, I started with pen and paper and then used Adobe InDesign to complete the prototype.

Since that time I have used Apple's Keynote software to do design and prototyping for dozens of websites and desktop applications. For me it has several advantages over Photoshop, which is the classic tool of choice for this kind of work:

• I find it much faster to draw and make adjustments with Keynote.
• The effects (rounded corners, tinted fills, gradients, drop shadows) are all very Mac like.
• I can link up the Keynote presentation and add animated actions to simulate the interactive behavior of the application.
• People who are not designers can participate in the design with me since it is intuitive to drag things around and make changes using Keynote

As an example, see the following two screenshots. The image on the left is the Keynote file I used to design the "T2" website. This was one of several possible designs that I can created. When I played the Keynote file, I could interact with the links and videos as if it was a real website. The image on the right a screen capture of the real website.

However, as well as the current process is working for me, I keep thinking about cinematic software, touch interfaces, animation, motion, and "No Limits Design". The technical barriers are falling for this kind of software. I'm concerned that prototyping tools that encourage page-by-page designs may limit creativity.

To that end, I have been experimenting with video as a prototyping tool as well as some motion graphics tools such as Apple's Motion.

Several months ago, I transformed the 3D Timeline idea that I had sketched into the following video using Apple's Motion:

I wanted to be able to test readability of the timeline at distances and get a sense for whether this would be a useful feature that helps solve the challenges of presenting timelines or if it was only eye candy.

...to be continued...

Great Minds Think Alike

Here is a video demo that my brother David did for his NYC Art Gallery website:

As he was working on his video, he didn't know I was doing demo videos for Bee Docs' Timeline. When I posted my first video on my personal blog, he sent me an e-mail right away to make sure that I knew he wasn't copying the idea. I guess both of us have always been a bit sensitive towards appearing unoriginal.

In any case, David made a fun video and a maintains a good website if you are into art and are visiting New York. Check it out.

Making the First Demo Video

I've been hard at work producing the first Timeline 2.0 demo video for the new website. It will show the process of creating a timeline of your recently played iTunes tracks in under a minute. At first some of the videos on the website may be ordinary screencasts, but I have a vision for making little "short films" for each demo that are more fun to watch.

Last Friday, my friend Tony J and I spent the morning running around Pioneer Square in Seattle getting video footage for the intro to the first demo. I have been building my chops on the Final Cut Pro suite and, of course, bug fixing for the big release as well.

Here are some "production stills" from our first day of shooting:

Demo Videos

Along with getting Timeline 2.0 ready for launch, I have been preparing a new website for the release. The new website will feature a selection of timeline charts along with videos that show each timeline being built from scratch in a few minutes.

Here is a shot of my sketch book with some storyboard ideas for a "jazz piano" and "baby's first year" timeline videos: