Shipshot guide

A practical workflow for app-store screenshots

Most of the time spent on store screenshots is not spent producing them. It is spent rewriting captions after the screens were captured, recapturing after the copy changed, and discovering a wrong dimension at the end. Ordering the work correctly is what makes a set achievable in a single sitting.

First, write the frames before opening anything

Spend the opening stretch writing the set as plain sentences: what frame one argues, what frame two adds, where the differentiator sits, how it closes. No tool, no canvas, no design. Every later step is cheaper once this exists, and skipping it is the reason most sessions overrun.

  1. Write one sentence per frame describing what it must make the reader believe.
  2. Cut the list until no two sentences overlap.
  3. Decide the number of frames from the argument rather than the maximum allowed.

Second, capture everything in one pass

With the frame list written, you know exactly which screens you need. Prepare the demo account once, then capture every screen in a single run so the data, device chrome, and interface state stay consistent. Capturing screen by screen as you design is what produces sets where the clock and the content jump between frames.

  1. Set up one demo account with realistic content before capturing anything.
  2. Capture every screen on the list in one continuous session.
  3. Keep the untouched originals so a later recomposition needs no recapture.

Third, compose one frame completely before the rest

Build a single frame all the way to finished — text size, position, background, crop, margins — and only then apply that treatment to the others. Composing all frames halfway means every subsequent decision has to be made several times over. Deciding once and repeating is the largest single time saving available.

  1. Finish one representative frame entirely, including the caption treatment.
  2. Apply the settled treatment across the remaining frames.
  3. Adjust individual frames only where content genuinely demands it.

Fourth, handle targets and locales last, then check

Produce the additional targets and language versions once the composition is settled, because every earlier change would otherwise multiply across all of them. Then do a single mechanical pass on the finished exports: dimensions, formats, alpha channels, counts, ordering, and any leftover source-language text. Shipshot keeps screens, text, and layout separately editable so this last stretch stays an edit rather than a rebuild; you still upload the exported files to the stores yourself.

  1. Generate the remaining store targets after the composition is final.
  2. Produce and review each language version in place.
  3. Run one mechanical check across every exported file before handoff.

Review checklist

✓ The frame-by-frame argument was written before any tool was opened.✓ All screens were captured in one pass from one demo account.✓ One frame was finished completely before the treatment was repeated.✓ Targets and locales were produced after the composition was settled.✓ A single mechanical check covered dimensions, formats, counts, and stray text.

Questions to ask before handoff

What wastes the most time in practice?

Rewriting captions after the screens are captured and the frames are composed, because the change then propagates through every target and every language.

Is it faster to design first and write captions later?

It rarely is. The layout depends on how long the captions are and how many lines they need, so writing last means redesigning.

Can this really be done in one session?

For a first set with a handful of frames and a small number of locales, yes, provided the argument is settled before the design starts.

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