Friday, April 11, 2008

Springboard: a storyboarding software

A long time ago I promised to tell y'all about Springboard, a small but powerful storyboarding software I'm using. I love this software, and here is why.

  • Basic drawing tools: the drawing tools are good enough for getting the point across, but they're too simple for beautifully executed artwork. This makes it easier for me to stay focused on storytelling.
  • Zoom: you can zoom in and out. It's great to be able to take a step back and "watch the film", then go in again and draw. These screenshots show my 'story pass' for "catch!".

  • Export/Import: When I was happy with my story pass, I did a 'drawing pass' - exported the panels, re-drew them in a different program, and imported them back in. You can even do this automatically, using an "external editing" feature.
  • Presentation: Once the stuff is ready, Springboard offers an amazing variety of presentation outputs - you can pretty much arrange the panels into every storyboard format known to man. You can export them to HTML, as I've done in my previous post. The presentation can include text (there's a text box for each panel), timing (you can time it inside Springboard, play it, and even export it as AVI), headers, footers, filename, date - you name it.
  • It's CHEAP!
The program does have some flaws, especially concerning stability. However, (a) I'm using an old version, so they might have fixed some bugs, and (b) the problems are absolutely minor compared to the software's amazing advantages.

Check it out! The trial version is fully operational except for printing (at least, that's the way it was when I first tried it).

2 comments:

Bruce Dickson said...

Gus, after much searching and many trials, our team found and - very quickly - settled on Springboard. Our needs happen to be pretty basic at the moment and Sprinboard's accessibility is a perfect match. But our plans are ambitious and our needs will soon be far more demanding; yet we can easily see how Springboard will readily support our efforts all along that path. While that remains to be seen, so far this software is doing precisely what it should: letting us get on with the creative.

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