I'm curious to know how those of you who have published apps to teh store go about creating your screenshots, particularly if you're a totally blind developer. I had hoped that taking the screenshots on 1 device (my iPhone) and then uploading them would be sufficient, and that scaled versions would be produced. I've since learned that this isn't the case, and that app screenshots seem to be rather more complicated than simply screenshots of the app itself. It seems people design them to include branding and other visual elements that don't necessarily reflect the app UI.
Obviously graphic design is a non starter for a blind developer. So those of you out there, how do you do it? Or is this something that we simply have to find someone to help with?
Comments
Fastlane
Hi Ashley,
Have you heard of Fastlane? It is a command line tool to help with taking screenshots and things like that. I am not sure exactly how it works, but it can help to programmatically take screenshots. You can also take screenshots manually on your device and then save those to your Mac.
There is also a service called AppScreens. I am not sure how accessible it is, but it will let you import your app from the App Store, and help you create rich screenshots based on AI.
I hope these tools can help, and let me know if you have any questions.
@Michael Doise
Hi Michael,
I did try Fastlane but it isn't very automated, at least not enough to be able ot generate all necessary assets entirely non-visually. Frankly it's an unnecessarily complicated mess. It also only supports screenshots taken programatically from the XCode simulator as far as i can tell, so it can't be used for an app that has to run on a device.
AppScreens and App Launchpad were also tempting and they could work, though they rely heavily on screenshot branding using pre-defined templates. Naturally none of the templates are accessible to us, and nor is the editor.
I ended up writing a python script to do this. It generates the canvas of the correct dimensions for the various screen sizes, scales and applies a screenshot taken from a real device or the simulator, adds branding, a title and subtitle as necessary, and then produces a folder of assets ready to upload to App Store Connect. I plan to release this once I've squashed any bugs, in case it is useful to other developers. I may even make an app, since plenty of people seem to be experiencing similar issues, sighted and visually impaired alike. If there is any interest in this, let me know.