PlaybookBball
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PlaybookBball gives basketball coaches the ability to create animated play diagrams and manage their virtual playbooks directly on the iPad. Designed to simplify the visualization of plays through animation, PlaybookBball breaks basketball plays down into individual steps and puts them back together to bring a coach’s vision to life for their players.
With PlaybookBball, basketball coaches can also easily manage and organize their plays as a virtual playbook. Each play can have any number of custom tags that basketball coaches can use to quickly access during game time.
Coaches can also display their plays onto a projector or TV to walk-through plays during a team strategy session (requires the Apple VGA Dock Adapter). And, if players or other coaches want to study the plays on their own, plays can be shared with other iPhone and iPad users of the app (iTunes File Sharing) or emailed as a PDF for printing out hard copies.
To see PlaybookBball in action check out these videos.
PlaybookBball is optimized for the iPad. For an iPhone/iPod Touch optimized version, check out PlaybookBball-To Go.
Features (v. 1.3.0)
- Create ANIMATED, step-by-step basketball play diagrams on a court drawn to scale
- Watch your play come to life with animation and customize the playback speed
- Manage, organize, and quickly find your plays with Play Tags, to create a virtual playbook for game time
- Email your plays in PDF format for hard copy or digital distribution
- Email your play file to anyone with PlaybookBball for the iPhone/iPad (can be opened via iTunes File Sharing, iOS 4 required for the iPhone)
- Create sticky notes for each step to remember anything you need
- Plays are automatically saved and can be deleted too if needed
- Copy an existing play to make modifications and tweaks to the original
- Draw different lines based on the type of player movement (Dribble, Pass, Shoot, Screen, Cut)
- Choose from 10 different team colors (Lines are drawn according to the team color)
- Choose from Full/Half Court, High School, NCAA, FIBA (Oct 2010 Rules) and NBA courts and three different court styles (Whiteboard, Wood, and Blacktop)
- Choose to display 1-10 players per team and show/hide the opponents (Can display an uneven number of players per team, good for uneven plays or practice drills)
- Quickly setup your plays with several built-in offensive and defensive formations (5 player formations only)
- Save custom formations to be loaded in later to draw new plays out of custom sets
- Players can be displayed in three different styles (Position, Position Number, X’s and O’s, or Custom Positions)
- Players can have individual name labels that can be shown/hidden
- Display PlaybookBball on a TV/Projector with VGA Output (VGA Dock Connector required)
- Use Practice Cones to draw drills and exercises (Tap the Cone icon to add a cone at the Place Players step. Double-tap the cone to remove it. Cones can only be edited on the Place Players step.)
Praise for PlaybookBball:
“…Playbook is more ambitious than CoachPad, in that you can see animated versions of plays you’ve drawn out, and it is more refined as well. You can easily delete mistakes in Playbook, and e-mail the plays in a PDF. Storing plays is easy, and I could easily imagine using the animated playbook during games. Given a choice between showing young players scrambled lines on a whiteboard or showing them an automated play on an iPad, picking the iPad option is a no-brainer.” – Finding Team Success With a Little Less Strain – App Smart Column, New York Times (10/6/2010)
“Incredible app – The best app for basketball plays by far! The developer has made some really good improvements with adding color and the ability to change the speed of the plays. The only thing left that I would like to see would be the ability to save it and or email it as a video file. It can now be saved as a PDF but video would be more useful to me. Again, awesome app, well deserving of 5 stars!!!!!!!” – Hulkzx10r, via the App Store.
“Por fin alguien lo hace bien – Funciona de maravilla, es simple y potente. Un perfecto cuaderno con tus jugadas o entremos que puedes mostrar al equipo. He comprado Todas las otras aplicaciones y o bien se colgaban o fallaban o eran un lío. En esta las fichas se mueven a tu velocidad, desaparecen las líneas en su momento, etc. Para mi es perfecta. Enhorabuena. Dinero bien gastado.” – Pargo, via the App Store.
Above comment translated to English (Thanks Nak):
“Finally someone does it well – works great, is simple and powerful. Perfect as a notebook where you can enter your moves & can show the team. I bought all the other apps and they either hung or failed or were a mess. In this app the pieces move at your speed, lines disappear in time, etc. For me its perfect. Congratulations. Money well spent.” – Pargo, via the App Store.
“If you are a basketball coach with an ipad you must get playbookbball or playbookbball-to go iPhone. This is a great app by @playbookbball” – c0achE, via Twitter.
“Just purchased the iPad version of the playbookbball app. Easy to learn and use. Great, so far. ” – Bill, Coach at Our Lady of Grace 5th and 6th grade, via email.
Screenshots
 Tutorial |
 Half Court Pick and Roll |
 1-4 Pass to Wing, Player Settings Menu |
 Back Door, Edit Player Menu, Notes |
 Half Court Back Door Shoot |
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Videos
PlaybookBball – Half Court, Shoot, Search and Tagging
PlaybookBball v.1.1.2 (iPad) – New Features
PlaybookBball (iPad) Demo [Large]
Credit – Basketball image by Sophia
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How can I send a complete play to one of my coaches to view on his Ipad?
Hi Ken,
To send a play to another coach, tap the ‘Plays’ button then tap on the play that you’d like to send. After that, a menu will show up. Select ‘Email Play’ and enter in the other coach’s email address and send the email.
With their iPad attached to their computer, the other coach will need to open iTunes and import the play file using iTunes Files Sharing. To use iTunes File Sharing, from within iTunes select your iPad from the left pane, then in the right pane, click on ‘Apps’. From the Apps section, scroll down to the bottom and there you should see a section for ‘File Sharing’. In this selection select PlaybookBball and then select Add… and select the play file that was emailed.
It’s a bit cumbersome, but currently this is the only way to share plays with other Playbook users.
Please let me know if you have any other questions. Thanks!
Daren
How do you create players on the board? I realize you are working on some sets which will make it easy. But is there a way to tap on the screen to create the player icon?
To Add/Remove players for a play, tap on ‘Settings’, then tap on ‘Player Settings’, then tap on ‘# of Home Players’ to modify the number of Home players or tap on ‘# of Away Players to modify the number Away players. Finally, select the number of players you would like displayed for the play. When you are done, tap back until you see the ‘Done’ button in the upper right of the Settings menu to accept your changes.
Great and then can you arrange those players on the court before beginning to start recording a play? I am justing thinking how I would use this in a game situation if I called a timeout. So you don’t have much time and you want to create a play on the spur of the moment based on game situation & player match ups
The latest update includes several preset formations (1.3.0). The next update (coming in the next few days), version 1.3.1, will support the ability to save custom formations as well. So, whenever you need to create a new play you will be able to more quickly create a new play by selecting the a saved formation and immediately begin drawing your play without as much setup.
Wow, you are A) very thorough in your development and B) responsive to your audience. Plus it seems like you are passionate about the coaches / player community.
All the best and congratulations on a wonderful body of work.
Thank you for the compliment! And, thank your interest. I feel that if I can’t please my customers (coaches/players) then I have failed in making a good product. So, I strive my best to understand how coaches/players will use these products to make the apps as useful as possible.
Daren, this stuff is fantastic. I posted this on my FB. I know lot’s of coaches that could use this. BRAVO my friend!
Thanks for the compliment and thanks for helping to spread the word Dave!
If I buy the VGA adaptor for my iPad, will I be able to A) see the plays with a projector and B) be able to see the plays mirrored on my iPad while I see them on the screen? I hope the answer to both is YES!
It’d be great to have “playbook sessions” in the video room with my teams where they can see the movement from above as well as practicing our offenses and defenses from ground level.
Hi Ryan And Heather,
The answer is YES to both questions. PlaybookBball can output its display onto a TV/Projector and you will be able to view and control the app from the iPad. However, due to some limitations with the way animation is handled, only each step will be displayed on the TV/Projector rather than the full animations.
Daren
How do I start a play with a player other than #1 having the ball?
I got it just change the number to the player number you want and switch the duplicate number to number one. Thanks
Hi Albert,
It sounds like you were able to figure it out. In case you hadn’t, I was going to let you know that you can change the position of player 1 to anything you want so then the ball can start out with that player.
Good luck!
Daren
Does anyone have any plays they are willing to share? Is there a library of existing plays anywhere?
I was wondering if it was possible to illustrate multiple options in an offense, if yes how?
Thanks
Mike
Love your program. Can you customize each player position by player name or initials. Can you have a roster of names and substitute new player in. This would help all young players in knowing where they are and help them follow there movement through all options of the play. If it is unable to do this,is it possible to add feature and how long do you think it would take to have an upgrade with that feature available.
Thanks for your time
Hi Mike,
Unfortunately, there is not yet a way to illustrate multiple options. I am looking into adding whiteboard support to go along with the animation feature and I think this would allow you to draw up options as well as make any other sort of annotations that you’d like. Hopefully I can add this feature in soon, but I am still trying to brainstorm how exactly it would all work together with everything else in the app.
Thanks for asking!
Daren
Hi Robert,
Glad you like the app! Yes, you can customize the player names and positions. It’s possible to add a label to each player (tap on a player to bring up the Edit Player menu and tap on ‘Player Name’ to edit their name). You can also change the Player Display Style to Custom (Settings > Player Settings > Display Style) and for each player you can enter in a customized position.
Unfortunately there is not yet any roster support. In the short term, I am focusing on making the play diagramming the best that I can before expanding to other ‘non-core’ features such as rosters.
Thanks!
Daren
Yes it would be good to have multiple options on showing where the ball is being inbounded to as well as allowing the in bounder to cut after the pass.
Also how do you make the ball shoot in the basket not over the backboard
Great program overall!
Is there a way to pause the play during the”run” mode?
Great app!
One suggestion, for the “delete” play function, you should add an “are you sure” confirmation, as with a touch (ipad), it is easy to make a mistake…
Just a thought… love the app!
Rod…
Hi Ken, I’ve just submitted an update enabling whiteboard support. This will allow you to draw in multiple options in addition to the animation features. As for the ball going over the backboard – that is a bug that I’ll will fix in a future release. Thanks!
Hi Rod. Thanks for the compliment! There is not yet a way to pause the play during playback, but it’s on my to-do list!
Hi Rod, thanks for the suggestion. I’ve added an ‘Are you sure?’ for deleting plays in the update that I just submitted to Apple.
Thanks for great support and a real nice product. Is there a way or capability to move TWO players at the SAME time? For example, to show a pick and roll more effectively, it would be nice to show the defensive player moving with/at the same time as the offensive player setting the pick; or, allowing the visual of two offensive players moving without the ball.
Thanks in advance,
Patrick
Hi Patrick, thanks for the compliment. It is possible to move as many players as you’d like for any step. Just tap and drag on the player that you’d like to move and a motion line will draw accordingly. Remember that PlaybookBball animates plays and that the play creation begins on the ‘Place Players’ step where you can setup a the player’s initial position. After setting up the initial position tap Next (bottom toolbar) to begin drawing each player’s motion. Good luck!
Just downloaded latest iPad update. However I am not sure what the new icons are for. One looks like an eraser and the other is a line with a reverse loop ?
Hi Albert. I figured that your question might be a common one so I wrote a more detailed post to answer your question. Please take a look at the following link: http://www.daren.com/2010/12/a-note-about-new-icons-in-the-playbook-apps/ and let me know if you have any questions. Thanks!
Hi Daren, excuse me for my english write.
I received your great application like a gift. My question is why not i have the option to send email like in your picture
The version is 1.3.4
Thanks
Octavio
HI Octavio. In order to send an email of a play there needs to be at least one step in the play. Tap the next step button on the bottom toolbar (>>) to go from the Place Players step to Step 1 of 1 (to begin animating the players). Then you should be able to send the play via email. Good luck!
Daren
Is the only way to email plays to people that have your app?
Also do they have to have a Mac? And can they see it on an iPhone?
Thanks
Mark
Enjoying the app, but wondering if anyone has a bunch of standard plays that they are willing to share. I’m coaching a group of under 12′s & under 14′s and this would speed up the usage.
Thanks
Stephen
Hey Daren,
First off… Great app! I have played and coached basketball for the majority of my life and grew up in a family of coaches so this app is a must for basketball lovers and coaches of any level.
Unfortunately the app will not open for me anymore. I have installed the new update given, but it will still not even open up for me. I dunno if this is a problem with just my app, or if this is an Ipad thing. If you have any ideas or if you could help that would be awesome.
Thanks again!
Andrew
Andrew, thank you for the compliment! I’m glad to hear that you are finding the app useful.
However, I’m sorry to hear that the app is not opening for you any more. I’m guessing it’s because you have an older iOS version on your iPad. The latest version of PlaybookBball requires iOS 4.1 (the latest is 4.3.3), otherwise the app will not start up. Please try updating your iPad to the latest iOS version.
To update your iPad, plug it into your computer and open iTunes. iTunes should ask if you’d like to update your iOS version, click Yes and follow the directions.
Hi Mark. The only way for people to see the plays is to use either the iPhone or iPad versions of the app (PlaybookBball-To Go, PlaybookBball respectively). There is not yet a desktop version of the app available. However, one way for others to view the plays is for the user to Email the Play as a PDF. This way users without the app can see the play, but they will not have the animations. Good luck!