In case you missed the news, we recently launched a new demo area (access it via our main site) where you can jump straight into the Shorthand editor and try out many of the features on offer.
Hopefully you've already had a chance to explore the editor, but either way, here are just some of the features available to try out, including ways to add rich, immersive media, create interactive experiences and tailor the mobile experience.
BUILD A STORYBOARD AND TRY OUT DIFFERENT STRUCTURES
As you add sections you will see them collect in the storyboard area in the right-hand side of the editor, as well as in the main story view.
You can try out different structures and orders by simply dragging-and-dropping sections in the storyboard, or click the 'x' button to delete a single section.
Click 'Add section' at the bottom to add one of the six section types available.
And remember you can use the Preview feature to check out how your story looks across screen sizes. Open up the Preview URL on a mobile browser to check the smaller screen experience (and see below for ways to tailor that view).
APPLY FORMATTING TO TEXT
Highlight text at any point to apply formatting. You can also move title text, and some text columns, across the screen – look out for the green arrows.
Text-focused sections offer header and pull-quote formatting, as well as bold, italics and hyperlinks. The styling is based on your story's theme – click 'Themes' to change what is applied by default (those with Shorthand accounts can set up personalized themes), or customise the stylings for a story in the editor via CSS.
CREATE INTERACTIVE ANIMATION WITH SCROLLMATION
Use either of the Scrollmation sections – Background Scrollmation or Two Column Scrollmation – to break down visuals into an interactive experience, with layers or elements building up as you move further into the narrative. A great way to communicate context step-by-step: from maps to stats. And again, no coding required.
Instead, create the collection or sequence of images required outside of Shorthand, then simply add in order to the editor to create the effect. You can also tailor the mobile experience for these sections – there's more on that here and further below.
CREATE IMMERSIVE REVEAL EFFECT WITH FULL-SCREEN IMAGES
Add layers, depth and contrast as you scroll through multiple full-screen images. This is achieved using two or more Text Over Media sections, each with an image in the background. As you scroll into the second, the first gets replaced, creating the peel-off effect shown above, which can be incredibly powerful in delivering extra context, perspective and meaning.
TAILOR THE MOBILE EXPERIENCE
While Shorthand stories are fully-responsive, you may want to tweak things even further, so we have different tools to allow you to easily tailor the mobile experience. That includes the ability to have a different image shown on portrait screens if the default central crop is not ideal. And you can also choose which images show, and in some cases where, when Scrollmation sections are shown on mobile screens. There's more on that here.
GET TO GRIPS WITH DEVELOPER TOOLS e.g. CUSTOM HTML
While Shorthand was created to make it easy to create media-rich, interactive and fully-responsive stories online, without any coding, we also have tools to enable developers to build further on the out-of-the-box options.
Whether that's using custom CSS to override the theme styling story-by-story or custom HTML to embed interactive, social media posts, advertising, contact forms or anything else into your story. Add a full custom HTML section, or insert HTML within a text column using the 'Add HTML option'.
We also give you the ability to add custom Javascript in Shorthand (just not in the demo area to avoid too any breakages!).
OTHER FEATURES TO TRY OUT IN SHORTHAND DEMO AREA:
• change styling with theme switcher ('Themes')
• integrate and personalize sharing setup for social media icons ('Sharing')
• build navigation menu ('Nav Menu')
• add Google Analytics tracking ('Settings')
• edit meta information to enhance SEO ('Settings')
• and more.
Access the Shorthand demo area via our main site to see just how easy it is to bring your narrative to life, and enhance your storytelling.
