Thanks Stephen. We are back to Microsoft Paint.

Jokes aside, this is a great addition to a very good product! Looking forward the prototyping stable release!

Hey Jason- great question. We built this with quick feedback sessions in mind (though it could certainly scale beyond that). Sometimes you just need to get some live feedback immediately. Given Craft's proximity and context within Sketch and PS, being able to launch this right from your design tool of choice helps maintain a sense of flow and urgency in the design process. We don't see this as a replacement for commenting, rather an additional opportunity to provide another light, touchpoint of feedback earlier in the design process.

Would definitely be curious to get your feedback on how you run design reviews or live feedback sessions today. Are those synchronous or asynchronous? What does that process look like (ex: calling folks over to your desk to chat, setting up a screenshare, etc). Thanks!

Same thought on #1. Also a way to remove/lock/hide a Freehand?

Those things aside, this is an awesome tool which is likely to get immediate and regular use in our workflow. I was skeptical until I checked it out because I've never quite been able to wrap my head around collaborative design tools, but this is more about collaborative communication with anyone on the team which is a need I run into all the time. Also love that it's not competing for voice bandwidth so we can stick with the voice tools that we already use and are comfortable with.

Andy- LOVE the depth of feedback here- thank you for vocalizing your reaction as you played with it. This is exactly type of feedback were looking for. I'd relish the opportunity to get you chatting with a researcher from the LABS team on this. I think digging in to how you approach and run design reviews would be key on actioning from our side. Want to hit me up at stephen[at]invisionapp.com to do a quick session together? We'll make it painless- I promise! :)

Additionally, the whole 'solo focus time' and/or 'group presentation' dynamic is an excellent conversation we're trying to pay careful attention to. There are a number of different work styles and mindsets at play within teams that were endeavoring to reverently balance. You're not alone in that. Internally we often follow more of a diverge > converge > diverge path vs true unfettered real-time multiplayer. Part of the fun is figuring out which parts of both of those approaches are composed of 'good practice' vs 'we've always done it this way bias'. Ultimately I think its somewhere in the middle.

Sorry to totally nerd out on design process... old habits. ;)

Hey Jonathan- you can keep updating them if you continue to push via Craft interface (it will know that its the same document and update the same URL). You can't find these on InVision web, right now this is stand alone. There is no export currently though its an excellent request that I'm noting for the team to consider now. Thanks!

Love it Leanne- thanks for the feedback. Chatting with Labs team now through this.

Also one quick note: you can go to freehand.invisionapp.com now and generate a new freehand without needing to go through sketch every time. This won't allow for artboard export if you launch it this way but it will give you a flexible, collaborative surface that you can fire up and dump images into and mark up with team whenever you need without additional tools required.

Hey Luis- Prototype is still in Beta, we're working hard to get that fully-released ASAP. In the meantime hit us up if you'd like to chat about getting on the current beta iteration. :)

Hey Stephen- appreciate the feedback. We've found using this in both remote and local situations to be helpful. On the local side how we've seen this play out is in a 'board room' scenario. In this case there's a central screen (projector, flat screen, or large monitor) showing the Craft Freehand session. Team mates are also connected on their own laptops/ipads and able to toss in sketches, comps, images which in turn show up on the main screen for group to discuss. Essentially it takes the role of a collaborative whiteboarding session in that case.

One instance we've toyed with is a large touchscreen monitor as well which can receive input so that users can literally walk up to the screen and draw with their fingers. Your mileage may vary in that case based on tech available and group size.

All that said- we just publicly launched this and are TOTALLY looking for feedback. We want to hone this and make as potent as possible for both remote and local applications. We covet your feedback. Give it a go and let us know how your experience played out. :)

There's definitely some similarities for sure- good eye. Both are collaborative environments designed for facilitation of live design reviews. Where the two differ is implementation and stage of workflow. Whereas LiveShare is based around InVision prototypes, Craft Freehand is positioned near the front side a of workflow and jumps off from the screen design phase itself.

The kinship and potential intersection between the two products is certainly something we'd love to explore down the road. However, right now they remain completely separate products. Freehand's position within Craft also means you don't need an InVision account to use it out of the gate, you can deploy these sessions directly from Sketch and PS.

This is currently Mac only as is the rest of our Craft suite. That said we definitely have Win support on the request list for consideration (Sketch is currently Mac only, so this would apply to PS only at this point in time).