Three Questions For Grant Glas, Principal, Invisions Technical Arts

Even if you have only been half following along with SPD over the past year you have probably noticed that a fellow named Grant Glas has a lot to say about iPads. In fact I can't think of any posts made here having to do with the iPad in which he hasn't commented extensively. His level of engagement aroused our curiosity enough to get in touch with the man and find out what he is working on. We're thinking he must have something cool related to the iPad in the works. Here's what we found out...

Your enthusiasm for iPad development has not gone unnoticed by many of us at SPD. What's your story? What are you currently working on?
 

GG: I run a company called Invisions Technical Arts that focuses on making apps for small publishers. Not only do we make apps we have also produced a tool that empowers non-coding designers to produce apps without the aid and overhead costs of traditional engineering; we call our tool APP Press. To demonstrate its abilities we built "The Chili Chef" App which has been featured in the iTunes store.

"The Chili Chef" was actually an article that ran in a local Indianapolis magazine several years ago. We approached the publisher and presented the idea of re-packaging some of their old magazine articles starting with the Chili story knowing these great recipes and beautiful photos were just sitting on a shelf, it got us thinking... why not convert all this content into something new?

 

The ability to craft a user experience without needing to write code sounds very powerful. Can you give us more in sight into how App Press works?

GG: Our product is a web based CMS that allows both print and web designers to quickly and easily build iPad and iPhone apps. For example the designer on the Chili Cookoff project built out this app in one week without having to code a line. The copy and photo elements were scanned in and transcribed from the original article then broken down to a background layer which remains static and a content layer which can be rendered interactive. The designer simply exported the images from Photoshop as jpgs and uploaded them into the CMS. From there they positioned and scaled the assets in each layout for the iPad and iPhone.

From there I'm guessing this works in a Dreamweaver kind of way, where a designer can create hot spots and link the content together while choosing from a library of interactions, is that about right? How has interest been so far, are you hearing more from small publishers or other design studios?

GG: App Press and Dreamweaver are similar in nature because they both allow designers to create a sophisticated, visually attractive interactive projects without specializing in writing code for a specific platform. The UI and features of App Press however are quite different--we hope simpler and more inviting for small publishers and small design studios. Regarding interest so far, it's hard to say since App Press has just been made public, check in with us in six months and I'll have a better sense!

 
See Grant in action:
http://www.invisionsta.com/

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