Softvision

Softvision was a UK-based video production company which produced a wide range of audio-visual-based information and learning programmes (software learning videos) primarily designed to help users understand and leverage emerging software applications from software publishers that included Microsoft, Lotus Software, Borland, Novell, WordPerfect, Corel, Software Publishing Corporation, IBM and others.
Coinciding with the emergence of Microsoft Windows-based software, the videos featured an “expert” from the software publisher alongside the Softvision presenter, who played the part of a typical software user.
Several company CEOs provided introductions to videos featuring software from their companies, including Bill Gates (Chief Executive Officer, Microsoft), Steve Ballmer (Chief Executive Officer, Microsoft), Jim Manzi (Chairman, President and CEO, Lotus), Philippe Kahn (Chief Executive Officer, Borland), Paul Brainerd (co-founder, Aldus), George Korchinsky (General Manager, Symantec Corporation, Michael Cowpland (Chief Executive Officer, Corel), Paul Grayson (co-founder, Micrografx) and Edward Zander (Chief Operating Officer and President, Sun Microsystems).
History
Softvision was founded in 1990 in Sweden by Anders Larsson who was running a small advertising agency that handled the Microsoft account. In order to become familiar with the various Microsoft software packages, he asked one of the Microsoft trainers to go through each product in detail while he recorded it with a video camera which would allow him to view it again when time permitted. This led to a similar concept for a wider distribution. The first Softvision product was a three-hour learning video featuring Microsoft Windows and based on a dialogue between an expert and a new use. In 1991, Larsson brought Lars Welinder (a Swedish entrepreneur based in the UK who had previously worked with Larsson to launch a business-to-business communications agency) to Softvision to develop the business into a European commercial enterprise.
In 1995, the group was consolidated into a new company, Softvision Group Plc, and further capital was raised in a private placing. The group then consisted of wholly owned subsidiaries in the UK, Belgium, Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France, Spain, Portugal and Scandinavia. The following year the Softvision Group's were listed on the OFEX trading facility in London.
In April 1997 Softvision was acquired by Global Communications Plc, a UK-based publishing company. Some of the original Softvision team went on to form Itvision, a company developing bespoke software using video streaming for the Internet and corporate intranets.
Production
Softvision developed a recording studio in Kista, Sweden where all major productions were filmed. Initially products were filmed in Swedish for the Swedish market, with Larsson as the presenter and various experts from the Swedish subsidiaries of software companies featured. The company chose English as the next language market. Stephen Berry, who was then working for Microsoft in the UK appeared as the expert for the first English title (Microsoft Word for Windows). Berry joined Softvision, and the company developed learning videos in languages including Swedish, English, German, French, Finnish, Spanish and Dutch.
Softvision developed a bespoke production system that enabled it to make videos in close to real-time. During production, the presenter operated an off-screen control panel that controlled studio lighting, selection of fixed cameras, zooming to particular areas of the screen and the insertion of chapter titles and music. The presenter and expert initially appear together “sitting inside” the software while they introduce the video and discuss the software. When the expert shows how to do something in the software, they “fade” into the software and the screen tracks the mouse during the learning activity. If the screen became inactive for any length of time (for example, during any extended discussion, the presenters appear back in the picture until the point is understood and the production can continue.

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