Turning a screen recording into a store-ready preview

Almost every app preview starts as a screen recording, and almost every weak one is weak because of decisions made during that recording rather than in the edit. Capture deliberately and the rest of the process is assembly.

Record clean, at the right size, more than once

Use a simulator or a device whose screen matches your target class, so no rescaling is needed later. Clear notifications, set the battery and clock to something neutral if your tooling allows, and use realistic content — not "asdf" and not a colleague's real phone number. Move deliberately and slowly; a recording of someone who knows the app tapping at full speed is unreadable to someone who does not. Record each action three times and keep the calmest take.

Trim to the action, then to the beat

Cut each clip down to the moment of change plus a short hold either side. Then trim again to fit the beat you allocated it in the structure — most clips end up shorter than feels natural while editing, and almost none end up longer. Dead air at the start of a clip, where a finger is travelling toward a button, is the most common thing to cut and the easiest to miss.

Place, frame, caption, export

Drop the trimmed recording onto the device in your mockup project, choose a framing that keeps the interface readable, add one caption per shot, and animate only what needs to move. Export at the exact class dimensions your store expects, at 30 fps, with a bitrate high enough that the interface type stays crisp. Then watch it once, muted, at the size it will actually appear — which is smaller than your editor window and is where remaining problems become obvious.