The Subtle Nuances between Trial Director 5.0 and Sanction 2.9: A Trial Technician’s Perspective

We all get asked this question a lot from attorneys: What’s the difference between Trial Director and Sanction? From their perspective, it’s all about user friendliness. But from the operator’s perspective it’s a matter of how much more work they prefer to do on the front end or the back end of the trial preparation process.

Comparing the image Functionality

Most clients are now scanning their evidence and typically use Adobe Acrobat Portable Document Format, generally known as PDF. This format is not only email friendly, but also ubiquitous in the legal environment due to its compatibility of email attachments. Let’s reasonably assume that you receive a CD-ROM/USB Flash Drive containing PDFs of mixed images (i.e. black and white document and photos) from your client.

Trial Director readily imports PDF image files without the need to convert them. The PDF images do directly into the software via a simple drag-and-drop process. When using the Sanction software, however, the very same PDF images must be converted to a format Sanction readily accepts. Black and White images will need to be converted to Tagged Image File Format, abbreviation: TIFF and the PDFs that are color will need to be converted to Joint Photographic Experts Group format, abbreviation: JPEG. While Sanction does have an Adobe Acrobat plug-in available for PDF compatibility, our experience is that its functionality is not as seamless and the image resolution is compromised. Once the images are loaded either into Sanction or Trial Director, the presentation features of the respective software are very similar.

Comparing the Video Functionality

Sanction has an advantage over Trial Director when comparing the video component of the software. Sanction is more user friendly, and video clip excerpts can easily be moved by a simple drag-and-drop process. You can choose clips from multiple volumes of a witness and drag-and-drop them in any order to create a multi-clip. When creating multiple-clips in Trial Director, you can only access one deposition volume at a time, as an example, if you want to play excerpts from multiple volumes of John Smith’s deposition in Trial Director, you must call them up individually.

Comparing the Image and Video Synchronizing Functionality

Both software have a different process when synchronizing an exhibit within a video clip. It is our opinion that Sanction is the more user friendly software when combining exhibits with video. Sanction actually shows the operator the exhibit numbers from a drop down menu before embedding the exhibit. Once the image is embedded, it allows the operator to preview the image. Whereas, Trial Director, requires that the operator know the exhibit number, without access to a pull down menu, and they must type in the exhibit number to embed it. Sanction will also allow animation and Day in the Life video to synch with images, whereas Trial Director does not.

In conclusion, operators generally choose the software they use based on how much previous experience the have with it, and their own comfort level. Trial Director came out before Sanction, which may be the reason why many operators prefer it over Sanction, since it has been in use longer. Our company uses both software largely based on the preference of the client first, and then the personal preference of the technician assigned to the case. As with any new version of any software, we recommend that operators steer clear of the latest versions of trial software, until there has been ample time for it to be tested and de-bugged.

Doug Rooney

Good article, however you have a few facts incorrect:

1: Our Sanction PDF Plug-In converts existing PDF files to TIF Images on-the-fly, while within your existing case. However, this is based on the existing resolution of the original PDF File. Often times, when a user opens up the image, it may appear to look pixilated or distorted, which we created a Hot-Key to help resolve that. Normally PDF files will be scanned at 96DPI, which is what we convert to within the case. Using our CTRL-R Hot-Key feature from the Main Case Tree View, allows users to change their existing PDF Resolutions up to 300DPI, allowing the PDF Image to be viewed more clearly and appear more crisp during the presentation. This only has to be done once per-case, as it will save that setting for all future imported PDF Files. It is important to note that ROTATING or DESKEWING PDF files have to be done within Adobe directly, however as that functionality can be blocked by the rights of the specific Adobe File. Same thing with our Burn-In Annotation Feature (particularly functional with Exhibit Stamps) onto existing PDF Files.

2: PDF files within Sanction (with our PDF Plug-In) can be easily imported into our cases via our drag-and-drop functionality and also via our Import Capabilities too (our Directory or Individual File Import Feature). You can also use our Custom Import Feature if you have created load files to import batch collections of PDF Files as well. Also to note that with our 2.9 Version of Sanction, if your PDF Files have been OCR’d, we have the ability to import in that OCR Text for search capabilities as well.

3: Color items (i.e. PDF Files in Color) do not HAVE to be converted to JPEG Format. Color TIFF images are readily accepted within Sanction and often times, for resolution quality, preferred over JPEGs in an as needed basis. Other image formats like PNG, BMP, GIF are also readily supported within Sanction. Although it’s understood that Color TIFF images would indeed be much larger in size, for today’s storage and laptop processing capabilities this is negligible. Same thing holds true for Black and White images, they don’t have to be in the TIFF format to use in Sanction, the real reason behind that format is the crispness and sharpness of the image is preferable in that format.

Also note that Sanction also has an export ability for any documents or images within Sanction that would need to be created as PDF can be created with annotations for review by expert witnesses or provided to the Court. Often times, this is helpful to show the Exhibit Stamp features or other annotations necessary to be added to the document.

Thanks for the blog posting, if you have any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to contact me or our support staff at any time.

Doug Rooney
Senior Litigation Technology Consultant
Sanction Solutions
doug.rooney@sanction.com
http://twitter.com/mariosandoval mariosandoval

So what is the BIG difference from S 2.9 and 3? and is training involved that is soooo much diff?

Interactive Presentation Solutions, Inc. (IPS)

a total visual resource company

The Subtle Nuances between Trial Director 5.0 and Sanction 2.9: A Trial Technician’s Perspective