What Do I Think of Storyline? Well, Since You Asked…

This week’s E-Learning Heroes Challenge is to come up with a “Top 10” list of things you’d tell someone about Storyline. You can collect your favorite resource links and curate them any way you’d like.

I basically took everything that I normally say to someone who asks me about Storyline, put it all together with appropriate links, and tied a bow on it. (Not unlike last week’s challenge where I did the same for what I tell future freelancers.)

Opening Screen

The Design

One advantage of the gallery layout on my blog is that I can instantly see what sort of design I should do to contrast with my recent work. Since my last two entries haven’t had vibrant color palettes, and since spring is officially here, I went for bright and springy with a little bit of silliness and a little bit of elegance.

I also didn’t want a main menu with squares or buttons that linked to the 10 points. I wanted the menu to be a creative, vibrant, graphic embodiment of the theme. Once I made that decision, the idea for the springing-up flowers came easily.

Main Menu

Main Menu Flowers: I wanted flower shapes that I could fill with photo captures from their related content pages. So I took out my trusty Wacom tablet and started drawing the basic outlines of the flowers, stems, and leaves. I did it in Storyline by going to Insert > Shape > Lines > Scribble and drew them right on the slide.

Then I adjusted the outline weight and color and did a picture background fill for each shape using a tight capture from each of the larger flower photos.

To make the flowers pop in their hover states, I increased the weight of the flower’s outline by a pixel or two, and increased the size of each flower by about 4 pixels in width and height.

Audio: The sound effects for the flowers are two different sounds on top of each other. One’s a pop and one’s a spring. The singing birds are a piece of audio that I looped. I knew it was possible, but had never done it before. A quick Google search took me to this simple how-to. (Thanks, David!)

Content Page #2

Content Page Colors: To get colors for my text, fills, and outlines that went perfectly with the flower images, I used the heck out of the eyedropper tool.

Content Page #5

Photos: They’re all from Microsoft Clipart. I wanted big, clean, bold, colorful images.

Fonts: I’ve used the title font, Blue Chucks, a couple of times lately. Same with the paragraph font Copse. When you’re a cute font, you’re gonna get used.

Content Page #9

The Content

It is what it is! This is what I tell people who ask, and these are the resources I direct them to.

The Finished Product

You can see it in all of its springy loveliness right here. Enjoy!

 

It’s a Solution! It’s a Fest! It’s SolutionFest 2013!

I’m excited to share one of my projects at the E-Learning Guild’s Learning Solutions Conference as part of SolutionFest 2013 next month. Here’s a summary of the problem, my solution, and the result – plus a link to the project I’ll be sharing.

The Problem

My client needed to train new employees on their sales mobility software and hardware. The existing online training was abysmal, featuring:

• No audio and the whiz-bang pacing of a plow horse.
• No images beyond software screen captures and bullet points.
• No context or instruction to indicate why, when, or how the software should be used.
• No user control, no flexibility for different levels of knowledge, no opportunities for learners to practice, and no opportunities to test.

The Solution

I strove to create upside-down world as compared to that training.

• Context was my focus. If I could show learners when and how the software and hardware should be used, I’d be half way there. We show how the handheld integrates into the sales rep’s 24-hour day, so you see him (and his handheld) going home at night, sleeping, waking up, driving around, meeting his boss in the field, finding sales leads, calling on prospects, making sales, and more. In the introductory lessons, where a real-life sales rep would be taught by his or her manager, you see the sales rep being taught by his or her manager.

• Design carried the rest of the load. I wanted navigation designed for user control, flexibility, and free practice – and visual design that was attractive, playful, and kept the learner focused on what was important. Both types of design were intended to keep learners engaged and motivated.

• Tools I used included all programs in Articulate Studio ‘09 (Presenter was a client requirement), and PowerPoint 2010. The other client requirement was to design for delivery via LMS for learners on PCs, and, of course, to design and develop on a budget.

The Result

This course has just gone into full release, but the managers and trainers who have reviewed it have raved. (In a good way.) Many of them didn’t even realize that certain features existed on their Handhelds until they went through this course.

Their expectation is that employees will be far better prepared to work with their sales mobility handhelds by going through this training, and that going back to refresh their knowledge about a particular topic will also be easy to do.

A Sneak Peek

If you’d like to see what I’ll be sharing, feel free to take a look!

Learning & Using Articulate Storyline: So Far So Happy

I have a good excuse for not posting since discovering Articulate Storyline: I’ve been busy producing courses with it. I knew when I first tried it last March that it had great potential. After having used it consistently for the last six months, I can report that it has delivered beautifully.

Here’s my experience learning and using it so far: I learned it (keeping in mind that I was already fluent in the Articulate Suite programs) by:

1. Taking a one-day workshop at the E-Learning Guild’s Learning Solutions conference in Orlando last March, and Ron Price from Yukon Learning was an outstanding instructor.
2. Buying and referring to Diane Elkins and Desiree Pinder’s book E-Learning Uncovered: Articulate Storyline.
3. Referring to, as needed, Articulate’s extraordinarily helpful blogs and tutorials: http://community.articulate.com/tutorials/products/articulate-storyline.aspx.

My user experiences so far:

• Software-wise it’s stable, quick, and a pleasure to work with. (Quizmaker can only dream of stability like this.)
• Instruction-wise it lets me easily design courses and interactions that are creative, engaging, and effective.
• Development-wise it lets me build those courses quickly and easily. My first course took longer to build than those I’ve done since, of course, but once you’ve got your first course figured out, you’re on your way.
• Client-wise, my clients are thrilled with the variety of features and interactions I can now include, and they’ve never had issues delivering the courses to their learners via LMS.

So that’s what I’ve been up to. How about you?

Highlight of Learning Solutions 2012? Articulate Storyline!

No, I don’t work for Articulate. I’m just a hardworking, in-the-trenches e-learning designer & developer striving to produce the best possible courses in the most efficient amount of time so my clients get the best deal I can possibly give them.

It just so happened that when I went to this year’s E-Learning Guild conference in Orlando last week that I suddenly became an Articulate Storyline beta tester by virtue of signing up for an introductory class for this soon-to-be-released product. I’d heard great things – but who can really say until they get their hands on a piece of software and start using it?

The outstanding news is that it’s a fantastic product that I will buy the moment it comes out. The less fantastic news is that I’m probably not supposed to say much of anything about the details of what it does – but I’m good with that.

Keep your eyes open for upcoming webinars and events done by the fine folks at Articulate (I know Tom Kuhlmann has a series of 4 free webinars coming up via the Training Magazine Network), and who knows… maybe you’ll be a fan, too!