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Article on Cult of Mac: https://www.cultofmac.com/how-to/freeform-app
More Apple news: http://www.cultofmac.com
The #Apple #Freeform app for #iPhone, iPad, Mac and Vision Pro is a digital whiteboard you can use for brainstorming, a #presentation, #drawing or to gather ideas in one infinitely scrolling canvas.
Produced by Extra Ordinary for Cult of Mac
Music composed by Will Davenport, arranged by D. Griffin Jones
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0:00
apple's Free Form app for iPhone iPad
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Mac and Vision Pro is a digital
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whiteboard you can use to brainstorm
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collaborate draw or make awesome
0:11
presentations on one infinitely
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scrolling canvas here's how it
0:18
works free Form launched in the fall of
0:21
2022 as a free app for the iPhone iPad
0:25
and Mac and later on the Vision Pro if
0:28
for whatever reason you don't have it on
0:30
your device you can download it again
0:32
here from the app store unfortunately
0:35
Free Form is not available on PCs
0:37
through
0:38
icloud.com but that may change in the
0:40
future when you launch Free Form you'll
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be able to browse through all of the
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boards you've created and you can find
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them in smart categories like recents
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shared and favorites to create a new
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board hit the new board button in the
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upper right tap add text box to start
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with some text on the board by default
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it's a single short line of centered
1:01
text for writing longer paragraphs you
1:03
can drag the blue markers on either side
1:06
to make the text box wider the green
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marker in the bottom right will scale
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the text box and its contents bigger
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proportionally from the floating toolbar
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you can change the text size color and
1:19
font for making your headline text pop
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you can also change the text alignment
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to write out a paragraph and make a
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bulleted list now no one likes staring
1:28
at a wall of text but luckily Free Form
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makes it easy to add photos videos files
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rich links and more tap the media button
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and you'll see a list of options insert
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from lets you attach a file from iCloud
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Drive or the downloads on your iPhone
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iPad or Vision Pro on the Mac you'll see
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a separate insert document button in the
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free form toolbar link lets you paste or
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type in a URL to embed as a rich link
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scan will let you scan a document to add
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into the board stickers will let you
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pick from your sticker library of things
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you've cut out of your photos or AI
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emoji you've made camera will take a new
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picture image playground on devices that
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support Apple intelligence will let you
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insert an AI generated image and finally
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photos or videos will let you pick an
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item from your photo library just like
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with text boxes you can drag the blue
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markers around the image to resize it
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you can edit the appearance of media too
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for images and stickers you can hit
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remove background to cut it out as a
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transparency or crop it on a Mac you can
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rightclick for more options on an iPhone
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you can hit the more button on the right
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front or back will move the object in
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front of or behind other objects on the
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board if you want them to
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overlap shadow and round corners are two
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effects you can apply if you'd like and
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constrain proportions will make sure
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that when you resize the object it stays
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the same aspect ratio you can add a
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variety of shapes to your board by
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hitting the add shapes button in the
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middle i recommend adding big colorful
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backgrounds to different sections of
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your board so you can easily tell them
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apart the first objects are your basics
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a line arrow curved line square rounded
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rectangle and circle you can also add a
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variety of triangles blocky arrows
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speech bubbles and a star other
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categories offer loads of clip art
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representing different 3D shapes objects
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animals nature food symbols education
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arts science people places activities
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transportation work and ornaments you
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can drag these around resize them just
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like any other object send them into the
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background change the fill color you can
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even double tap on an object to type
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inside it like a text box on the Mac
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when the grid is visible objects and
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pins snap to the nearest grid point you
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can hold down the command key to drag
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without snapping to the grid on the Mac
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you can also draw custom vector shapes
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using the pen tool which you can find in
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the shapes picker it kind of works
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similarly to the pen tool in Photoshop
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Illustrator and other traditional
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drawing programs a different form of
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text box you can add to your board is a
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sticky note it appears by default in the
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iconic yellow color and square shape
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with a drop shadow but if you want you
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can change the color to pink red orange
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green blue or gray you can use sticky
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notes for calling out important text in
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your board or you can use them as
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temporary placeholder notes to remind
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you of things to fix later on an iPhone
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or iPad you can tap the markup button in
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the lower left this shows the system
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standard drawing and handwriting tools
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this feature really sings on an iPad
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with an Apple Pencil where you can do
5:12
some proper calligraphy and handdrawn
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artwork i find sketching in the Free
5:16
Form app to be much nicer than in Apple
5:19
Notes because Free Form lets you freely
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zoom and scroll on an infinite plane
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whereas notes is limited to the width of
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your screen and doesn't really let you
5:29
zoom finally to present your board you
5:32
can create scenes a scene is like a
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bookmark it shows a specific part of
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your board you can run through a series
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of scenes like a presentation kind of
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like Prei that web app that was popular
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in schools in the
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mid2010s on an iPhone or iPad you set
5:50
the positioning and the zoom just how
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you want tap the more button and then
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tap add scene on a Mac you hit the scene
5:58
navigator button in the lower left click
6:01
show scenes then click add scene you can
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browse through your scenes by hitting
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the left and right arrow buttons hit the
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more button next to any of the scenes
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and you can rename them something
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descriptive replace them print them or
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delete them you can reorder them on a
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Mac just by dragging them up and down on
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an iPhone hit the edit button in the
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upper left corner then drag them up and
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down using the grabbers on the right
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there are two ways to share a free form
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board you can send a copy of it or you
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can send a collaborative link tap the
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share button in the toolbar then pick
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either send copy or collaborate from the
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menu you can choose whether it's visible
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to anyone with the link or only the
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people you invite whether they can edit
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the board or only view it and whether or
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not they can invite other people
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collaborate works like Google Docs you
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can see when somebody is editing the
6:54
document and any changes they make will
6:57
be updated live for everybody on the
7:00
other hand send a copy gives someone
7:03
their own fixed independent version that
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they can edit or modify separately from
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yours and that is my guide to free form
7:13
you can see other deep dives I've done
7:15
on other apps like invites find my and
7:18
preview remember to like and subscribe
7:21
i'm Driffin Jones with Cult of Mac
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