#Astropad studio install#
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For example, we only had a black and white video for months. We started building prototypes that early on they were terrible. Luckily we had enough working knowledge of Wifi, networking, video codecs, and streaming to be dangerous. It became clear pretty quickly that to make it work, we were going to need to build completely custom tech.

#Astropad studio software#

We started with off the shelf software tools that we plugged together to create a graphics tablet, but the experience was awful. A big concern was if it was even possible to deliver the kind of low latency and visual fidelity that we needed to make Astropad Studio a working product.

Take us through the process of designing, prototyping, and manufacturing your first product.īuilding the Liquid technology that powers Astropad Studio and Luna Display was a complicated process.

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We soon fired one of our consulting clients to free up time and doubled down on shipping Astropad Studio.

#Astropad studio mac#

We showed him an early prototype of Astropad Studio running on the iPad connected to his Mac and he looked at us and said, “Guys, this is going to be huge.” Everything changed at that moment. Through a friend, we connected to a director at Pixar who was working on a new animated short – his short would later be nominated for an Emmy. It wasn’t until a year into the process that we got the validation we needed to push the project forward. We worked on Astropad Studio for 1.5 years before releasing, developing the technology on nights and weekends. It certainly didn’t hurt that we had extensive experience with the iPad and Mac, having worked at Apple. We also loved that we’d be building a creative tool as we are makers at heart who have always been inspired by helping others develop their creative projects. We knew that if we could bring this drawing tablet capability to the iPad it would open it too far more people. We were both drawn to this idea because we had experience with graphics tablets from Wacom and we were frustrated with both the cost and skill required to use them. He took a picture of the poster and showed it to me the next day, and since we were very familiar with the iPhone and iPad we started discussing if we could build something to do this with an iPad. One day Giovanni went for his end of day run and came across a poster advertising the Microsoft Surface with a stylus while running Photoshop. We did okay at contracting, but we wanted to build a product company, so we were always on the lookout for and playing with new ideas, and we had a lot of bad ideas. In 2013 we serendipitously met through Twitter again and started doing contract development together. We hit it off but ultimately ended up going different directions for almost 7 years. We first met in 2006 as interns at Apple after being placed in corporate housing together, as I’m originally from Chicago and he’s from northern Italy. Once we tasted the freedom of having a business, we knew that was ultimately the direction we wanted. We separately dabbled in making shareware utilities for the Mac market back in the ’90s with some success. My co-founder and I are both software engineers with an entrepreneurial streak that we’ve had from an early age. What's your backstory and how did you come up with the idea? Our first year selling products was 2015 where we made $500,000 and we’ve grown that to $3.4 million in revenue last year. My cofounder Giovanni Donelli and I started the company in 2013 and through bootstrapping we’ve grown the team to 16 people across 5 countries.

#Astropad studio install#

You plug the Luna device into your Mac and then install the app on the device you’d like to use as your 2nd monitor, and you’re all set!

Our second product, Luna Display is a small hardware dongle that turns the iPad or another Mac into a wireless second display. We’re incredibly proud that Astropad Studio is used by tens of thousands of creative professionals and companies like Pixar, DC Comics, Disney, Nintendo, Twitter, and even Star Wars! Our two main products are Astropad Studio and Luna Display.Īstropad Studio is an app that mirrors your Mac on to your iPad, turning it into a high-end drawing tablet. At Astropad, we make software and hardware tools for creative people. My name is Matt Ronge and I’m Cofounder and CEO at Astropad. Hello! Who are you and what business did you start?