In 2015, one of the biggest maker trends we saw on Product Hunt was the creation of tools to help people make it easier to build and market their apps. The process of building an app takes engineering and design talent, time, and often some cash. If you’re short on any (or all) of those things, the following five tools will make the app development process a little bit easier.
Keep reading for a list of products that will help you create animated prototypes, build screenshots for the App Store, design a quick mockup directly from your phone, and more. Happy designing. :-)
Building an app is hard work on its own. But once you’re ready to launch it on the App Store, you have the final (and tedious) task of building screenshots to display your app’s functionality. If you do this on your own, it can take hours.
Luckily, LaunchKit created App Screenshot Builder to help you do it in a fraction of the time. You can create screenshots for every iPhone size, choose from custom layouts to make exactly what you need for your particular app, and co-edit designs with your entire team. The basic version of the builder is free. But if you want to upgrade to the pro version, it’s only $49 for the entire year — well worth it for the time and hassle it’ll save you.
Comet officially arrives in 2016, and a lot of people are excited for it. This new addition to the Adobe product line will help you with pretty much everything—from wireframing and prototyping to interaction design and sharing.
You can check out a live preview of your progress in real time, seamlessly add interactions and animations to test how users will experience your design, and send your work to other team members so they can comment directly on the designs.
Comet is in many ways a mix of Sketch and InVision (which, by the way, are now integrated, so that’s a great alternate option). One distinct advantage of using Comet is how easily—and unsurprisingly—it integrates with Photoshop and Illustrator. If you use either of those tools frequently, Comet is worth looking into when it launches this year.
If you’re looking to build a fully animated prototype for your app, Flinto for Mac is just the tool you’re looking for. With this program, you can build app transitions without any programming support. You can also build between-screen navigation controlled by swipe or tap gestures, as well as add scrolling areas with layers.
Basically, if you’re not a designer or programmer but you want to build a prototype that doesn’t look crappy and allows you to achieve proof of concept, Flinto is a must-have.
We think it’s pretty rad that the Facebook team is making a bunch of their design resources open source. The team writes: “Most people find this file useful for mocking up apps. Others use it to concept ideas or create custom interface elements that work harmoniously with those native to iOS. Whatever your use, we hope you make good stuff with it.”
Whether you’re a designer using Photoshop or Sketch, or you’re looking for tools to create an iPhone or Apple Watch mockup, you’ll find it here. The entire Facebook Design Resources page is dedicated to helping designers make it easier to conceptualize their app ideas for Apple Products. Keep an eye on this page in the future—the designers note that they will continue to release different templates for other digital platforms such as TVs, tablets, and wearables.
5. Napkin
Design quick mocks, directly on your phone.
If you need to create a quick mockup on your phone, there’s no easier way to do it than by using Napkin. This tool gives you control over various layers so you can really make your design pop. Just a few of the things you can play around with: photos, shapes, fonts, icons, and colors.
We envision Napkin being especially useful when you’re sitting in a meeting talking about how you want something to look on a mobile screen. In a few minutes, you can convey a visual idea and remove any of the annoying guesswork that is often involved when a team is designing, well, anything. Doesn’t hurt to have this app on your phone if you frequently work on creative projects—whether for fun or for work.