Features · Brainstorm

Brainstorm pages

Overview

Brainstorm lives under a project's More ▾ menu. A project holds as many pages as you like, and each page keeps one subject: a sequence's look, a character, a scene being pulled apart. A page is a plain white canvas without edges — no grid.

On it go sticky notes, typed text, checklists, reference images, web links, attached files (a sketch, a PDF, a script), comment threads, freehand sketches, and columns that stack cards in order — drag a card into a column and the column arranges it, drag it out and it's loose again. Things are wired up the way a node graph does it: point at a card and ports appear on its edges, then drag one onto another card. The wire curves from one to the next, follows both about as they move, and carries a word along it — “Filtered”, “Secure socket”. A board card makes another page and opens it, so a board can hold boards.

Undo steps back through anything you just did, and a shift-drag picks out several things to move or delete together. Drop files straight on the canvas, or paste a picture or a link.

A board is live. Everyone who can open the project can be on the same page at the same time, see each other's faces and pointers, and watch cards move and sketches appear as they're drawn. Each board is its own session, so being on one never disturbs a live review.

Picking anything up opens its settings, the way a paint program does: a wire takes any colour, a width, dashed or solid, curved or straight; a sketch takes a colour and a width; the pen has its own colour and width; notes and text take a type size.

A board is a stack of layers, listed beside the canvas with the front of the stack at the top: what each layer is, whether it's showing, bring forward, send back, delete. Everything is a layer, so a sketch can sit behind a card or over it.

A sketch is a layer, not an object: the pen stays in your hand and the next stroke lands on the same layer, each stroke keeping its own colour and width, and nothing gets boxed up when you stop. ⌘/Ctrl+click a sketch to pick the whole layer up and move or scale it, then click the board to carry on drawing. The marquee draws a box round part of a sketch and picks out those strokes, to move or scale on their own.

The eraser rubs out sketch lines rather than whole strokes: sweep through the middle of a line and it's cut where the eraser covered it, leaving what it didn't touch. Its size follows the pen width, and one sweep is one step of undo.

How to

1. Open a project → More ▾ → Brainstorm.
2. ＋ New page, then name it for the subject.
3. Pick a tool — select (V), note (N), text (T), to-do (L), comment (C), draw (D), erase (E), arrow (A) — or a column, image, file, link or board card from the toolbar.
4. To wire two things together: point at one and drag a port from its edge onto the other, or take the arrow tool and drag from one card to the next (clicking one then the other works too). Double-click the chip on a wire to write along it, and pick the wire to change its colour, width or shape.
5. Sketching: draw, and keep drawing — it all lands on one layer. ＋ Sketch in the layer panel starts a new one; ⌘/Ctrl+click a sketch to move or scale the whole layer; the marquee (M) picks out part of it.
6. Drag to pan, ⌘/ctrl+wheel to zoom, shift-drag to pick out several, ⌘/Ctrl+Z to undo, Delete to remove.

Controls

Known edges

Anyone on the project can add to a board and move anything on it; a page is deleted by whoever started it or by a producer, and its cards, pictures and files go with it. Deleting a column takes the cards inside it, and deleting either end of an arrow takes the arrow. Undoing a deletion brings the card back as a new one. Directors can look but not change. Clients never see a board. Text saves when you click away. Files are capped at 200 MB.

See also

• Live review sessions
• Previz