Updated Nov 3 – 5:00 PM
I was fascinated by that blue clicker; it seemed so clunky compared to all the other technology involved in Steve’s keynote; and ridiculously big too, considering that it only had four buttons. Come to think of it, why did it have four buttons? All it needed was ‘forward’ and ‘back’.
Steve likes things with a minimal number of buttons. Just look at how long Apple mice had only one button. Look at the remote for the new iMac.
But that blue clicker really intrigued me. Something about the power that it controlled; how thousands of people were moved when its buttons were pressed.
Steve’s presentations were always technically complex, but designed to seem simple. The stage was always black, the curtains were black, the desk, credenza and demo pedestals were all black. The mechanisms that rolled the demo stations into place, or rise like magic from beneath the stage, were completely hidden, silent and silky smooth. Or so it seemed from the audience’s vantage point.
Steve’s demo desk, which was always at the left side of the stage, looked to the casual observer like a very basic black desk with a monitor and keyboard sitting on top. But there was much more to it. On the backside of the desk was a slide-out shelf which held the demo computer along with the backup computer, both connected to an uninteruptible power supply. There was a KVM switch recessed into the top surface where Steve could easily switch from the main to the backup in case anything went wrong. (This concept is apparently too complex for the guys at Microsoft to figure out, as their demos seem to fail frequently.) During the preparation for a keynote, Steve would work with the product manager for each product he would be showing to fine tune every aspect of the demo. This included deciding on which features to demonstrate, which files or media might be needed (ie QuickTime movies to be imported into iDVD, or CDs to use with iTunes), arranging the files and folders on the Mac’s desktop, and organizing the items in the dock so everything was easy to find and logical. Once this was worked out, it was the job of the product manager and the event team to set up the backup machine so it exactly matched the main machine. This tended to require multiple iterations, as Steve would refine the overall presentation throughout the rehearsals.
…The aforementioned KVM switches were the source of some aggravation at one event. They were perfect for Steve’s needs because they were the first available which could handle ADC monitor signals and USB keyboards. Unfortunately there was a bug somewhere that would occasionally cause the Mac to lock up when switching from one to the other….
For most keynotes, there was a long ‘credenza’ on the right side of the stage with several computers (typically four) which were used for the misc demos that Steve didn’t do himself. The most common was Phil Schiller and Steve doing a speed shoot-out with Phil running the PC and Steve on the Mac. This of course meant that one of the computers had to be a PC. This presented an aesthetic and technical problem, as this was the time of Apple flat panel displays which had ADC inputs; no PC’s could use such a monitor. But it would look awful to have some fugly Dell monitor up there next to three gorgeous Studio displays. So the mad scientists on the event team put their heads together and created a ‘Frankenstein’. They took the guts of a standard 17″ flat panel and custom fit it into a disemboweled Studio display. Lined up on the credenza, it looked like an Apple display. I should mention that this had no impact on what the audience saw during the event, because they were seeing the computer’s video cards feeding the big projectors. The monitors on the credenza where only there so the demo person could see as they ran their demo.
Video projectors extraordinaire
When Steve was doing the dual screen set-up (before he switched to HD) they had six projectors, three on each screen projecting the same image in perfect registration. I heard from one of the crew that they used to use just two on each screen, but if one bulb went out, the image got much too dark to be acceptable. But with three, one burnt out lamp would have much less visible impact. This one-third brightness drop would not be too noticeable to most viewers. The projectors were made by Digital Projection, and if I recall correctly were 13,000 lumens each!
The men behind the curtains
…presentation software before ‘keynote’…Steve used a development version of Keynote for at least a couple of his big presentations. Before that he used QuickTime player to run his slides. It was just a Quicktime movies of still images, manually advanced a frame at a time.
…multiple rehearsals of individual demos in the days leading up to the event, and at least one complete dress rehearsal with all presenters.
…problem with slides changing unpredictably.
…problems with mousing on black lacquered surfaces, and the solution.
…redundant redundency systems
…feeding video from all those computers, tape players, dvd players and hand-held cameras to the big screens…quite challenging given the range of resolutions, frequencies and frame rates.
…at the big venues, they had to deal with the fact that the audio and video would be out of at the rear of the auditorium. This was caused by the long distance the sound had to travel from the stage. They actually had to use digital delay systems so the sound and video being piped to the back would be in sync with the sound radiating from the front.
…
Bo – you’ve ask many great questions, some of which I’ll be answering in upcoming segments. There will be a lot about my ‘babies’, which were iDVD and DVD Studio Pro. Mike
BTW, thanks for the iDVD app. That one turned me into the dvd-freak i´m today.
I’ve noticed that thing have been with Jobs for several years
Apple gets all the woodworking for their Retail stores done by “Fetzers Inc.” which happens to be a local company.
I just graduated from high school, and was talking to a friend of a friend who was big into woodworking when I found out he was working for Fetzers. I was like “Oh, the guys that do stuff for Apple.” He was like “How…no Why do you even know that?”
They probably store a lot of this stuff between keynotes and such. Really no need for dozens and dozens of black desks to be tossed out — that’s wasteful.
My favourite Steve-ism during Keynotes is the distracting sip of water while he’s waiting on a busy Mac – very clever technique.
greetings all! I’ll get right to it then and ask if the clicker Steve Jobs uses at every keynote is made in house or if there is a place I can get one for myself. Acually I should like two, one for me, and one for my church I work at. If you wish to follow up my question please email me because I just found this site today and probably won’t check it again thanks for your time.
the reMOTE controls the RObot!
Ok folks, the blue clicker story….here is what I know. Many years ago, at least 30 when the Woz and Steve were getting apple off the ground one of the most facinating hobbies was hacking the phone systems. Remeber the Captain Crunch whistles, you guys probably don’t….anyways our dear young Steve was stopped by cops and he had a very primitive little invention that spoofed the dial tones in public phones. The cops knew nothing about telephony let alone technology …this box was called the Blue Box…it is my idea that that very same box is the construct of the famous blue clicker!!! Nothing more, nothing less…but isnt it ironic to have carried it this far through his life, its like the ring in the fellowship….FRODO LIVES.
I think I have the answer to one of the bullets points regarding video switching. they would require a scaling video switcher, folsom, extron or even vista montage. Which upscales all video resolutions to common resolution to enable seemless switching on all video inputs.
I currently work in video presentation services, though I haven’t done work for apple. I don’t see it on the video technology side being greatly different.