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The moves that matter

Kept short and sorted by what people actually look for on a shooting day.

The text format

You write plain text. Six rules are enough, and none of them needs a menu.

Paragraphs are separated by a blank line.
A speaker name goes at the start of a line with an at sign in front: @Tanja, or @Anna Mueller for names in several parts. It holds until the next one comes and gets a colour of its own. @Tanja: Good morning works too, and then the first sentence stays on the same line.
A chapter mark goes at the start of a line with a hash in front: #Opening. Chapters appear in the jump list and on the remote.
Anything in square brackets is a stage direction: [click on Guests]. It stands small and dimmed in the text, is not read out and does not count towards the reading time.
[Pause 2] holds the steady crawl for two seconds. Without a number it is one and a half.
If a line really has to start with an at sign or a hash, put a backslash in front. In the middle of a sentence both are ordinary text anyway, so an email address is safe without you doing anything.

An example, exactly as you type it

#Welcome

@Tanja
Good to have you here. In the next two minutes I will show you how to write your first script.

[click on Projects]
We start with projects, because that is where every script lives.

Getting scripts in

A project has an Import script button. You upload the file, we read it in the background and show you a preview: your document on the left, the script it becomes on the right. Nothing is created until you take it over.

Word (.docx), LibreOffice (.odt), PDF and plain text (.txt, .md).

Word gives the best result, because there we can see the styles: what is formatted as a heading becomes a chapter, an italic paragraph becomes a stage direction. Where a house template uses names of its own, we guess from capitals, colons and length.

If the directions are in the left column and the dialogue in the right one, we recognise that and ask which column is spoken. Without that question the result would be gibberish.

A scanned PDF holds no text, only a picture of one. Nothing comes out of it, and we say so instead of creating an empty script.

The file only sits with us until it has been read, and is deleted afterwards. What remains are the paragraphs for the preview.

On set

Auto-lock set to Never

The prompter keeps the screen awake while it runs. Even so, auto-lock belongs switched off on a shooting day, because otherwise it strikes during the break while the rig is being moved.

Open it in Safari, not from the home screen

An icon on the home screen looks tidier, but on older iPadOS versions it loses speech recognition and the screen wake lock. That is why we do not offer one, and why you should not add one either.

Mirror it when there is glass in front

On a beam splitter rig the presenter reads the mirror image. One switch flips the text, a second turns it upside down for an iPad hanging above the lens.

Pair the remote, by QR code

The prompter has a Pair remote button. It shows a QR code, the phone scans it, and the remote is open. You do not have to create a share link beforehand, the button takes care of that.

Two sets in one project: the location

If two independent prompters run in the same project at two places, give each device a location in its settings, say Hall and Kitchen. After that the two sets no longer see each other and every command stays with its own iPad. The QR code carries the location with it.

Keys the prompter knows

A Bluetooth keyboard or a twenty euro presenter pairs with the iPad as a keyboard and needs no network. That is the remote for the basement with no signal. Every key can be relearned if your device sends something else.

Space bar: start and stop

Arrow up and down: faster and slower

Page up and down, arrow left and right: a step back or forward

Home: back to the beginning

B or full stop: black screen on and off

Shortly before the shoot

The page opened once with a network, so the store is filled
Auto-lock set to Never, low power mode off
Opened in Safari, not from the home screen
The remote paired once and tried out
The script run through from beginning to end once

Sign-off by your client

In the share list of a project you create a link and tick may comment. Whoever opens it sees the text as the prompter will show it, marks a spot and writes a comment on it.

Nobody needs an account for this. The first comment asks for a name, so that you know who it is from.

Notification is collected: one email after a few minutes holding every comment, not ten separate ones. You can switch it off in your profile.

A comment is attached to the place in the text and travels along when you change something above it. If the paragraph is rewritten from scratch, it can no longer be found; then it stays in the list with its quote instead of disappearing.

Ticking a comment off is for whoever may edit scripts in the account. Nothing is deleted in the process, the comment just moves to the bottom.

No network on set

The honest section. It also says what does not work.

What works without a network

The prompter itself, as soon as the page has been opened once with a network. Reading, running, jumping chapters, editing. Whatever you change in the meantime sits in the device and goes up as soon as there is signal again.

What does not work and cannot work

Following along by microphone, because speech recognition runs at Apple or Google. And everything that goes over the wire: the remote, editing from the phone and the second prompter. That is a property, not a fault.

Why there is no Bluetooth link between phone and iPad

Web Bluetooth does not exist in Safari on iPhone and iPad, and because Chrome on iOS uses the engine of Safari, another browser does not help. This is not a question of time but of the system.

A hotspot alone is not enough

A phone hotspot puts both devices on the same network, but the wire runs through our server. So the phone needs mobile coverage. In a basement with no signal a hotspot gives you no remote, while a presenter as a keyboard does.

Connecting your own AI

Under My AI in your menu you create a connection: pick a provider, paste the key, and Check connection fetches the model list once. After that the editor shows a Revise button.

The key belongs to you personally, not to your account. It is stored encrypted and is never shown again after saving.

Nothing of a revision stays with us: no request, no answer, no log. Only what you take over becomes a version.

Besides OpenAI and Anthropic, PrompterPal accepts any address that speaks the format of OpenAI. It has to be reachable over https and public. A service that only runs on your home network will not do: our server could not reach it anyway.

Did not find what you were looking for?

Write to us. We answer in German and in English.

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