By day, João Carvalho is an IT senior at a hospital, but in his free time, he loves photography — and that’s why he’s been using Playbook for about six months.
This is the story of how João found Playbook, what he uses it for, and which features he loves most.
Initial Encounter
How did you first find out about Playbook? What was it that initially caught your eye?
I found Playbook through a Google search. Like many photographers, I was looking for an alternative storage system to Google Photos because of its limitations. What first caught my attention with Playbook was the 4TB of free storage space on the Artist + Designer Plan.
How was your experience using Playbook for the first time?
Although I was initially drawn to the storage space, once I started using Playbook, I began to get familiar with all its features and ultimately, I realized its overall potential. From that point on, I was engaged with it.
Experience with Playbook
How has your Playbook experience been over time? How has the product made your work and life easier?
When I started using Playbook, it was a bit strange because I was used to a different workflow for storing and sharing my many pictures with Google Photos and on my local server.
Using Playbook wasn’t the easiest initially—I was so used to the flawed system of Google Drive and related systems. However, it was always interesting and enjoyable. Getting used to using the boards gave me a different way of thinking.
Before, I was used to the folder organization system and having to make copies and change the permissions to give people access to their photos. But with Playbook, it’s really easy to just drag and drop photos onto a board and share them that way. Once I got used to it, it was really intuitive.
Playbook helped me on my photography journey because it’s so user-friendly. It made it easier for me to share photos with clients for them to review. Usually, I deliver the final product, and the end user likes the experience of using Playbook. They like it because it’s easy to download a whole gallery of photos with one click, and they also like the visual presentation.
What’s the one Playbook feature that you like the most?
Playbook has plenty of features that I use and like, but the one that really catches my attention — because I’m a technical guy — is the URL of the Publish feature. I’ve always struggled with other systems, but the URL works amazingly on Playbook.
Another element I really respect is that in Portuguese, we have a lot of characters with different accents on them. They often don’t show up on other platforms, but Playbook displays them all perfectly.
Playbook and your industry
How do you see Playbook integrating with your industry? Do you think it will be readily accepted?
It might be a little challenging for Playbook to enter the photography industry because there are already some well established products with great features in the niche.
That said, I think what sets Playbook apart are its features and usability, as well as the look and feel of the galleries and the organizational capabilities that are more complicated on other platforms. That's the feature that will make this platform win.
If you could describe Playbook in one word, what would it be?
If there’s one word I would use to describe my experience with Playbook, it would be “community” . The Playbook developers are open to our suggestions, and they are easy to contact if we want to report a bug or request a new feature. They are really open to molding the product to the users’ needs and adapting it for as many use cases as possible. Playbook feels like a giant community.