John Shaughnessy

Summer 2013 / Originate

Sprinkles

A summer internship in San Francisco where I worked on Sprinkles, an Android app for stitching together Instagram videos and reposting them as short remixes.

The internship

A first software job in San Francisco

After junior year of college, I interned at Originate in San Francisco. It was the first time I worked professionally as a software engineer, and also the first time I lived in the city.

My main project was Sprinkles, an Android app for combining Instagram videos. This was before TikTok and before mobile social video editors were everywhere. I was new to Android and video, so a lot of the work was figuring out the media, editing, export, and sharing details on an actual phone.

Originate built apps and prototypes for other companies, and the developers there were used to turning early product ideas into working software. We put Sprinkles on Google Play at the end of the summer, but the app was not maintained after the internship.

San Francisco

A summer in San Francisco

The office was close enough to Ghirardelli that the interns could walk down to the store and get a free chocolate almost every day. It is a small memory, but it is one of the things I remember most clearly: being in San Francisco, getting paid to program, and having a daily routine with the other interns.

The photos show Ghirardelli Square, the former chocolate factory on the waterfront. It is not really part of the app, but it is part of how I remember that summer.

Wide street-level view of Ghirardelli Square in San Francisco with the sign and clock tower visible.
Ghirardelli Square in San Francisco, near Originate's office during the internship.Source: The wub / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
The Larkin Street entrance and clock tower at Ghirardelli Square in San Francisco.
The Larkin Street entrance and clock tower.Source: Roman Eugeniusz / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)
Ghirardelli Square sign and brick buildings in San Francisco.
The Ghirardelli Square sign and brick buildings.Source: Ryan U / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)

Screenshots

Screenshots from the archive

  1. Sprinkles event list with kickball and bowling video collections.

    Events

    Events collected short video clips that could be stitched together.

  2. Sprinkles screen with rows of videos grouped under events.

    Video Buckets

    The app grouped Instagram videos so users could browse what was available.

  3. Sprinkles share screen with a kickball video preview and social sharing buttons.

    Share

    After editing, the app helped send the result back out to the social apps people already used.

  4. Sprinkles screen with a grid of selectable video thumbnails.

    Sprinkles

    A grid of clips made it possible to pick the videos for a remix.

  5. Sprinkles edit screen showing selected clips in sequence.

    Edit

    The edit screen handled the basic job: choose clips, order them, save, and repost.

Sources