You create a special test build of the app that you send to users using something like TestFlight, at the end of the video, you see the lady turn off recording, so I assume you can turn it on through the same interface
A closer look at the lookback.io site makes me think the user will know they're being recorded.
> Send your app to users using TestFlight and ask them to start recording. You can also ask them to perform certain tasks you've prepared, typically sent via email.
As sksksk noticed there is an interface that comes with Lookback from which the user can turn on and off the recording. In newer versions of our SDK there is also a small indicator in the top menu so the user doesn't forget that the app is currently recording.
1. Use a tripod for your camera.
2. please fix your lights! You probably aren't hung over, but the lighting suggests baggy eyes. Lighting is easy. Use window light. Heck, you are even shooting with with a front-facing camera on your phone, so it should be easy to pick some lighting that works nicely :-)
Both of these things are cheap or free, and will drastically improve your presentation, IMO.
I understood that this is the camera display from the phone as the user is using your app...is that not correct? Because I thought it was kinda cool...
EDIT: fellowshipofone's response seems to confirm :)
I still think this misses the point. We're looking at a 'report' of a fictional user session when suddenly the user, who we believe we're watching interact with the app, begins to address us. It's clever and shouldn't have been done any other way!
I think they were going for more of an authentic look rather than a polished look. What they are showing is more closer to what you are likely to see from your users.
If you're not taking simple, easy steps to improve your presentation, what you're being isn't authentic but sloppy. You dress down in old jeans and a t-shirt, not the shoes you work in the garden with.
Exactly, I don't think most participants will spend hours in front of a mirror to "casually dress down" before testing your product (nor do UX researchers, who are presumably the primary target audience care).
The entire application is centered around recording the users while they are really using your application. Nobody really uses a tripod on their phone and I would doubt you have the best lighting when you're just searching for a song on spotify.
Users are not going to have lights, or stand in correct place for lights. So you would see awesome clean well lit video in their examples, and horrible dark noisy video from your users. Might feel like there was a disconnect. Better to get a realistic example in my opinion.
Been trying Lookback for the test phase of the latest version of our app and the feedback there is good, but seeing users using your app and interacting with it is priceless!
Yes. I haven't optimized it for games yet (there are several shortcuts you can take in such a scenario), but it works fine for the OpenGL games I've tried with.
Hey, also cofounder here. It should work fine, but you'll have to write a little bit of Objective-C for it. We plan to make it a drop-in kind of thing for PhoneGap, RubyMotion and other such tools.
Does the user need to approve the recording of your face and screen? If not this could be a serious problem when someone with a mildly-nsfw app (but acceptable to app store) decides the record all the naughty stuff their users do and blackmail them.
Congrats on the launch, looks impressive and very nice.
What caught my attention was how you managed to snap the keyboard and status bar and get the app past approval (which is what I assumed from the demo). But after giving it a go, it seems that your SDK doesn't actually capture the kbd and status bar.
Being curious, I did some further digging into your SDK and UIKit. I presume for the demo, you must have used a custom SDK build so that you could tap into some private APIs? You can get the UIWindow for the keyboard via public APIs (UIApplication's -windows) but the status bar is private (_statusBar ivar on UIApplication; easily accessible with -valueForKey:@"_statusBar"]). Note that _statusBar is a subclass of UIView (direct subclass of _UIScrollToTopInitiatorView which is a subclass of UIView).
So for anyone else wondering how they capture the full screen, that's the way it seems to be done :)
Oh, by the way, if anyone's doing screen / view capturing, I highly recommend looking into the new iOS7 APIs (-drawViewHierarchyInRect:afterScreenUpdates: and -snapshotViewAfterScreenUpdates:).
I seem to have missed the FAQ - thanks for the pointer. For me, a lot of value would be derived by having the ability for any user to send us a video of the problems / questions they're having (e.g., how do I do X, etc).
I realise that Lookback is mainly geared towards internal testing but it should be easy to aid the support workflow, too. Capturing the status bar is the only private API you actually need to use to fully recreate the screen, although I don't know whether the team behind Lookback is using additional priv APIs for other parts.
We're working on a version of the library that is AppStore-safe, e g for the bug reporting use case. It's not nearly as performant, but works good enough, at least in iOS 7.
Nicely done! The automatic logging of custom view names in the timeline is a nice touch. Are you planning browser/web(app) support as well?
I'm currently using Reflector to record the screen, along with a separate camera to record the user's face and hands. It's a more complex setup that makes remote testing significantly more difficult, so there is definitely value in this, if the price is right.
I don't get it: it's beta but it's already been used by companies. Should I be in doubt when I see this in a landing page? It looks like they bought the theme with that and decided to keep it.
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[ 3.1 ms ] story [ 92.6 ms ] thread> Send your app to users using TestFlight and ask them to start recording. You can also ask them to perform certain tasks you've prepared, typically sent via email.
As sksksk noticed there is an interface that comes with Lookback from which the user can turn on and off the recording. In newer versions of our SDK there is also a small indicator in the top menu so the user doesn't forget that the app is currently recording.
On a presentation note:
1. Use a tripod for your camera. 2. please fix your lights! You probably aren't hung over, but the lighting suggests baggy eyes. Lighting is easy. Use window light. Heck, you are even shooting with with a front-facing camera on your phone, so it should be easy to pick some lighting that works nicely :-)
Both of these things are cheap or free, and will drastically improve your presentation, IMO.
Cheers!
I understood that this is the camera display from the phone as the user is using your app...is that not correct? Because I thought it was kinda cool...
EDIT: fellowshipofone's response seems to confirm :)
In this instance I agree that better (less realistic) lighting would show the product in a more favourable light. (excuse the pun).
It's not "deceiving the customer" it's just advertising, and it works, we shouldn't shy away from that because of some notion of "realism".
puts on tinfoil hat
What caught my attention was how you managed to snap the keyboard and status bar and get the app past approval (which is what I assumed from the demo). But after giving it a go, it seems that your SDK doesn't actually capture the kbd and status bar.
Being curious, I did some further digging into your SDK and UIKit. I presume for the demo, you must have used a custom SDK build so that you could tap into some private APIs? You can get the UIWindow for the keyboard via public APIs (UIApplication's -windows) but the status bar is private (_statusBar ivar on UIApplication; easily accessible with -valueForKey:@"_statusBar"]). Note that _statusBar is a subclass of UIView (direct subclass of _UIScrollToTopInitiatorView which is a subclass of UIView).
So for anyone else wondering how they capture the full screen, that's the way it seems to be done :)
Oh, by the way, if anyone's doing screen / view capturing, I highly recommend looking into the new iOS7 APIs (-drawViewHierarchyInRect:afterScreenUpdates: and -snapshotViewAfterScreenUpdates:).
I realise that Lookback is mainly geared towards internal testing but it should be easy to aid the support workflow, too. Capturing the status bar is the only private API you actually need to use to fully recreate the screen, although I don't know whether the team behind Lookback is using additional priv APIs for other parts.
Thanks for all the private API hints :D
I'm currently using Reflector to record the screen, along with a separate camera to record the user's face and hands. It's a more complex setup that makes remote testing significantly more difficult, so there is definitely value in this, if the price is right.