

Show HN: Turn sketches on paper into app prototypes - muratmutlu
https://marvelapp.com/iphone/

======
davedx
Fantastic! We need more of this kind of thinking. "No computer required"
should be the default, not the exception.

I've been playing with some ideas in my head for a while now that we should be
able to build most apps this way, and not just prototypes. If we can extract
the default widgets and behaviour from applications and make them reusable and
connectable without code, then we'd be taking steps towards a real revolution.

I am really excited about the direction we're going in with products and tech
like this.

~~~
collyw
I agree this is a great idea for prototypes but I disagree that this is a way
to build anything but the most basic of apps. There are way to many subtle
choices that we make as developers, that require knowledge and reasoning, and
an understanding of what we are trying to build. Visual programming has been
tried multiple times, but it has never had any mainstream success.

~~~
mentos
Blueprints in UnrealEngine4 I think are a great example of successful visual
programming.

~~~
michaelmior
Thanks for the pointer. Never used Unreal Engine but just watched some of
their Blueprint demos. Pretty cool stuff!

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nobbyclark
How does this differ to popapp ( [https://popapp.in](https://popapp.in) )
which I've been using for over a year now ?

~~~
_zen
No offense, but did you bother to research Marvel _at all_ before asking this
question? popapp app's landing page makes it very clear the workflow is
physical paper -> photo -> storyboard, whereas Marvel's landing page is very
clear their workflow is PSD/etc. -> storyboard.

Sometimes I feel like HN asks "how is this different from X app" without doing
any research, just to be lazy.

~~~
volaski
No offense, I don't know where you did your research but I don't see anywhere
on Marvel's landing page where it makes clear its main flow is PSD ->
storyboard. In my opinion, Marvel's landing page makes it very clear that
workflow is paper -> photo -> storyboard just like Popapp, but also supports
importing a PSD image (which doesn't seem like a groundbreaking
differentiation). Granted, the founder explained the difference somewhere
above but they're still "improvements", they fundamentally do the same thing.

------
muratmutlu
Hey all, happy to answer any questions about our new app! It's been a long
road to get a stable version of this out so keen to get any feedback

~~~
elwell
Any plans to increase the depth of the prototype beyond simple wireframe
linking? (e.g., a drawn camera icon pops open the devices camera, editable
fields, etc.)

~~~
muratmutlu
We have some plans to try and add more and more realism without needing much
user input. For example on the web app you can access your iPhone prototype
and add things like fixed header and footers, app icons, iOS7 transitions etc

The hardest part i've found is trying to include this all in the iPhone app
design. This version is definitely our base, from here we can start adding a
few more things to make your prototypes more app-like

------
pvnick
What a great idea! I've been using Balsamiq for a few years now, but I usually
sketch my idea out on paper before translating that to the editor manually. I
would kill for this kind of hot-linking functionality for general web apps
with the off-the-cuff feel of hand-drawn sketches.

Just browsing your site, it looks like your main app is used like that, albeit
apparently for more refined mockups (I'm sure I'm mixing up terminology here,
but I'm not a designer so bear with me). Next time I have to design a site
I'll try integrating Marvel with my Balsamiq workflow and see what happens.

~~~
muratmutlu
That's a great combo. We wanted to make something that fits into the full
workflow, from sketches on paper to wireframes and high-fidelity visuals.

So you can easily use the iPhone app to start with sketches and then use the
web app to get into more detail

~~~
pvnick
Ah, there you go, that makes sense. Now I just need to get an iPhone ;)

------
aaronetz
App looks nice (can't check it out, no iDevice). I like the simplicity of it.
Do you plan on adding any vision capabilities, like auto-detecting rectangles
as candidates for buttons, circles as candidates for radio buttons, etc? I can
also see you app used to make quick&funny games, which you can send your
friends. Think taking a picture of a street, with a bar door as a button, and
then taking a picture inside, making the bartender a button, then a picture of
the drink, etc...

~~~
muratmutlu
Hey! You could give our web app a spin
[http://www.marvelapp.com](http://www.marvelapp.com), no iPhone needed :)

We don't have any image recognition stuff coming or pre-made elements but we
are adding transitions/animations so that you can get a sense of what your
apps might feel like.

~~~
aaronetz
Very nice! It took me roughly 2 minutes to upload the sample photos I had on
my dropbox account, and link between them like a little game. Very intuitive
interface.

~~~
muratmutlu
Thanks!

------
dasmithii
This is great - reminds me of a hackathon project, Scribe, from a while back.
We never finished, but the idea was a three-step process.

1\. Sketch a web app on paper.

2\. Snap a picture of your drawing.

3\. Our app generates a live site, displaying a link to share.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZAbQi_8y_A](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZAbQi_8y_A)
[video]

------
jbenz
It's a beautiful site. Are you at all worried about the name Marvel?
Especially now that Marvel Comics is trying to work with designers and
developers too? [1]

[1][http://developer.marvel.com/](http://developer.marvel.com/)

~~~
mikeevans
Also this from ElasticSearch:
[http://www.elasticsearch.org/overview/marvel/](http://www.elasticsearch.org/overview/marvel/)

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slazaro
Nice work on the website. Went in, saw the video, got exactly what it's about,
all in 30 seconds.

Especially compared to all those scrolling websites that move things around
while you scroll and leave you with no idea about the product.

------
ermintrude
Awesome idea. Will definitely check it out. Any plans for an android version?

~~~
muratmutlu
Yes 100%, one of my co-founders is a iOS dev so made sense to get the iPhone
out first but Android is definitely coming

If you use the official Dropbox app, you could upload your sketches into the
web app in the mean time however :)

~~~
ermintrude
Sweet. I'm sold :-)

------
qu1mby
Stumbled upon this last week and used it in conjunction with FiftyThree's
Paper app to create a pretty impressive prototype that I was able to view
right on my device.

Bit more of a process when using Paper, as it only seems to be able to export
an entire notebook in PDF, requiring me save pages individually in order to
use them in the app. I seem to recall reading somewhere that MarvelApp was
capable of dealing with PDFs, but I'm obviously mistaken. Would have been a
nice feature, though I'm not sure if many others would benefit from such
functionality.

~~~
muratmutlu
Hey! We're close to PDF support, i think next month we'll have it in.

It's actually a pretty common request as many people have their wireframes and
visuals in PDF format and want to prototype it up so you're not alone :)

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danielhunt
"Marvel App Prototyping would like access to .ai files, .eps files, .pdf
files, .psd files, .sketch files, and images in your Dropbox."

It needs access to a hell of a lot of files in my dropbox account.
_Definitely_ not something I want scouring my files, just so it can show a few
mockups - is there any way to restrict it to being able to access just a
single folder, or is it really an all-or-nothing problem with Dropbox auth?

 _edit_ quoted auth-request page & formatting

~~~
muratmutlu
We actually started with a single folder but the UX wasn't great. It meant
that everyone had to drag their existing projects and files into a specific
Marvel folder in Dropbox/apps.

After we saw that no one was doing it, we figured it would be better to go to
the files, rather than force people to bring the files to us.

We only access the files you choose, also Marvel was approved by the DB API
team to use the service (a bit like the App Store)

~~~
danielhunt
Well, it's pretty frightening that you're asking for such massive, wide-scale
permissions.

I understand that people are permission-clicky-happy nowadays, so it's
probably something that won't even remotely affect your growth - it's just a
shock to see new, tech-friendly services going with permission-grabs (even if
it is, as you say, to allow for better UX)

I can't imagine why _anyone_ would want to give up such massive access, and
potentially commercially sensitive info (that they possibly don't own), but I
definitely wish you all the best with this

 _edit_ typo

~~~
muratmutlu
Sadly we had to request access to your image files otherwise we wouldn't be
able to allow you to use them in your prototype and keep them in sync.

It's a delicate subject I totally understand, thanks for the best wishes!

~~~
orbifold
How hard would it be to offer both options? I.e. access restricted to one or
several folders, vs. access to the whole Dropbox. Also at least between users
you can grant permissions for folders to other Users from within Dropbox. Is
there a way to do the same for Apps?

~~~
muratmutlu
I _think_ this might be possible, i'll look into it!

------
ThomPete
Love it.

Old old sketches of something similar looks ugly as sheit I know :)

[http://000fff.org/uploads/NewFlow_02.png](http://000fff.org/uploads/NewFlow_02.png)

[http://000fff.org/uploads/NewFlow1.png](http://000fff.org/uploads/NewFlow1.png)

We had an idea for how to do a dynamic matrix generator which made a lot of
swipe navigation possible very easily, Will see if I can find the HTML
prototype somewhere.

~~~
muratmutlu
wow this looks great, would love to see the prototype

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espitia
Awesome. I've been using POP which uses the same concept. Will give this a
try!

[https://popapp.in/](https://popapp.in/)

------
orky56
I've put together a blog post evaluating your iPhone app landing page. Feel
free to reach out for clarification or further evaluation. Just started this
service and ready to evaluate anyone else's product as well.

[http://www.criticalgaze.com/study-on-marvels-iphone-app-
land...](http://www.criticalgaze.com/study-on-marvels-iphone-app-landing-
page/)

~~~
dully
How about mine? [http://spinmealarm.com](http://spinmealarm.com)

------
marcomassaro
Great work on the app and page. Everything is laid out very clearly and I'll
definitely use this on our next iOS app project.

~~~
muratmutlu
Thanks! Hope you find it useful :)

~~~
marcomassaro
Quick question about marvelapp which I'm going to try out as well. Why make
dropbox or google drive a requirement to use it? Doesn't that create a higher
barrier to entry for your visitors? Why not just allow anyone to sign up and
upload files? (Like invisionapp)

~~~
muratmutlu
Good question!

After freelancing in agencies, startups and design teams for so long I saw
that everyone was using Dropbox for projects and design file storage.

With designers making hundreds of changes to their designs each day, the time
it would take to keep your prototype updated is prohibative. So we figured
instead of forcing the user to bring the files to our cloud solution, why
don't we just go to theirs?

If we let users leave their files where they are it's one less click and thing
to manage. We just keep the files in sync so the prototypes update
automatically with the user lifting a finger.

On the flip-side, no everyone uses Dropbox of course and it's a barrier. But
it allows us to save money on storage which we pass back onto the user and
provide a great free plan (no upload or project limits)

~~~
marcomassaro
Makes sense! Keep up the good work.

------
nhannah
Too funny, I spent an hour the other day figuring out what font was being used
in Murat's Break App rendering on dribbble. Great work on marvel.

[https://dribbble.com/shots/1468163-Break-
app?list=searches&o...](https://dribbble.com/shots/1468163-Break-
app?list=searches&offset=56)

~~~
muratmutlu
haha it's Din Pro!

~~~
nhannah
Ah, I was close! I knew it was Din after some comparing and settled on
DINAlternate-Bold as it was a native ios font.

------
pjmorris
I love this idea. I'm thrown by 'discriminate' being misspelled [1] on the
most public, visible page they have.

[1] [https://marvelapp.com/iphone/](https://marvelapp.com/iphone/) 'Take your
pick, we don’t descriminate.'

~~~
muratmutlu
The shame. I'll get that changed, thanks!

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kyro
Downloaded. Really well-designed app. Love how it's for web and mobile. Any
chance you'll support Sketch files?

Edit: Another comment here implies you already do. Went to go confirm but your
menu button doesn't seem to be working (iPhone 5)

~~~
muratmutlu
Thanks! We actually finished .sketch support weeks ago, however the Dropbox
API doesn't recognise the format yet (it sees it as a folder) so we've got to
wait until it becomes available. Soon as it does we'll push it live :)

------
jastr
App looks great and really useful, but those Dropbox permissions are
excessive.

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redbonsai
I love this! I could see this being a HUGE timesaver with my workflow.

Question for you: Is working with prototypes offline in your roadmap? I have
limited connectivity where I work, and playing with your app has been
troublesome.

Thanks!

~~~
muratmutlu
Yes that's 100% coming, we just need a bit more time to get it right.

We launched a feature in the web app where you can download your prototype as
a ZIP containing html/css/js to run offline but we really want to have offline
in-browser working for everyone

~~~
redbonsai
Nice! Really cool feature.

In my comment I was more referring to the iPhone app side of things as that's
my typical use case. I noticed that I need an active connection to do pretty
much anything.

~~~
muratmutlu
This is definitely something we have planned, our main aim was just to get
this version released (it was a long painful road) but the next step is
sorting out its offline capabilities

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danieltillett
Great work. What I really like about this is how it lowers the barrier of
entry for non-tech people. It is the sort of application I can show my wife or
kids and let them play.

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stasy
Where did they get those printouts of the iPhone? Is there one with 3.5 inch
and 4 inch screen?

~~~
muratmutlu
Here you go! I made some for the site but it hasn't gone live yet
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/zacd5pe198irch0/iphone5x3.pdf](https://www.dropbox.com/s/zacd5pe198irch0/iphone5x3.pdf)

~~~
stasy
Thanks!

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josephschmoe
I like the idea, but taking a picture of text with my phone feels clunky.

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apierre
I can already do the same with Sketch and their Mirror app but I like the
Dropbox feature.

~~~
timmins
Are you sure? You can flick through the artboards in Sketch but you absolutely
can not let a user independently operate a prototype.

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camus2
nice app! dropbox integration is a plus.

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hellbreakslose
seems like a mock up app

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seivan
Everytime I see “No coding required.” I laugh hard and then proceed to
prototype with code on a real device, using the native framework.

------
danieldrehmer
Video is narrated by Wilfred

