Technology: Never give up – even when it seems hopeless

Fed up with webinars and technology in general? Don’t be. Persevere, get help from your friends and your patience will be rewarded, says Krystyna Gadd. 

Anyone who knows me at all will know how much I love my iPad and Apple Pencil. In fact, I have been heard to say “If the pencil were a man, I would have run off with it by now!”. Sad I know, but what I love is the ease with which I am able to create simple graphics and share electronically.

Most of the graphics on our website are drawn on the tablet by me and I love that! It’s not that I think I am a great artist, but it feels like ‘us’ rather than a glossy corporate entity.

There are many people in training who need help creating great posters for their training sessions. More and more though, people are asking about how to create graphics to include in PowerPoint and ‘are there any online webinars to show how to do this?’

I have done webinars, but this is my challenge: finding a way to stream the output from an app on my tablet live into a webinar. I have tried and I have failed…and failed, and failed…even with the help of TJ’s deputy editor Jo ‘webinar queen’ Cook! I have logged onto forums and other geeky connectivity type stuff, half understanding what the jargon might be telling me (mentions of “sandboxing” threw me!) to no avail. Until the 14th of February 2017…

In the Creativity Flashmob on Twitter, Mark Gilroy (@thatMarkGilroy) and Jo (@LightbulbJo) suggested we have a play to see if we could crack the problem. The day before, I downloaded a piece of software called Reflector 2 which allows you to mirror your tablet screen onto a PC. With much tweaking I experienced a eureka moment. These are the settings I needed:

  • Download Reflector 2 onto your PC or Mac
  • On your tablet choose to mirror your display onto the PC (on iPad and Mac you use AirPlay)
  • To be able to use the audio, in Reflector 2 on your PC click on the audio button to make it change to green (otherwise no sound)
  • On your webinar platform choose screen sharing. So far we (Jo, Mark and I) have found it works on:
    • Zoom (you will also need to “Share Computer Sound) before you select the screen you want to share)
    • Webex
    • Adobe Connect

I am delighted, giddy beyond belief and want to encourage others not to be dismayed, put off or disheartened if what you would like to do, does not meet with what you can do. So click, click again, download and play until it breaks, but don’t give up. It’s worth it!

More about Reflector 2 here

 

About the author

Krystyna Gadd is the founder of How To Accelerate Learning. You can contact her on krystyna@howtoacceleratelearning.co.uk and on Twitter @KrystynaGadd

 

More from Krystyna Gadd 

The Creativity Flash Mob: a new way to spark creativity

Views on trying a new collaboration tool – Tricider

 

 

Jonathan.Kennard

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