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Interactive Books
Tim Demeter
Marketing Director
Little Bahalia
Publishing

©2013 Little Bahalia Publishing LLC. littlebahalia.com

Little Bahalia
Publishing

We make interactive storybook apps
We are a creative company, not developers

Four currently available on the app
store
Astrojammies
A Troop is a Group of Monkeys
A Shiver of Sharks
Teeny Tiny Trucks

We make interactive storybook apps
However…
The things we’ll cover today will work for ANY
type of animated app, not just kid stuff.

My
story...
I come from
Comic Books
Misfit-Media
Graphic Smash
Clickwheel
Kabuki Robot

(and a little bit of consulting
for Marvel)


Animation without a studio!


The online marketplace means new opportunities for distribution.


Emerging technology means you don’t need a
fortune.
MacPro $2169 + Maya $3675 = $5844
ipad $499 + Demibooks Composer Pro $10 = $509


…for more than 700 years, artists, philosophers, scientists,
and book designers have tried to challenge the book's
bibliographic boundaries. They have added flaps, revolving
parts, and other movable pieces to enhance the text.
— Ann Montanaro, “A Concise History of Movable and Pop-up Books.”


interactive books


What is an e-book?


What is an ENHANCED e-book?


What is a book app?


WARNING:

technology glossary
technology glossary

formats
e-Book
ePUB is a free and open ebook
standard by the International Digital
Publishing Forum (IDPF).
Files have the naming extension
.epub.
Designed for reflowable content.
eBooks can be read on any reader
device, such as the Nook, or Sony
Reader.
Kindle uses k8


“Enhanced”
e-Book
ePub format now allows for rich
media to be inserted, such as
animations, sounds, and video.
Considered the “in-between”
solution because it provides a degree
of rich media while still playing on
reader devices.
Can be found in Apple’s iBook store
or the Kindle store.
Interactivity very limited.

Book Apps
Stand-alone “Book App”
Apps, short for “applications,” are
mini software programs all on their
own, designed to play independently
on a device such as the iPad.
The sky is the limit: 3D effects,
animation, game functions, sound
and video are all possible.
Will often play on smartphones and
Internet browsers as well.

Motion Comics
Comics with limited interactivity,
animation and sound.
Originally created because iTunes
didn’t support PDF.
Level of interactivity is usually more
in line with an enhanced eBook.
Sometimes they’re built to play like a
feature and have no user interaction.
Can be read online and usually on
mobile (unless its done in Flash) as
well as apps like MadeFire. Also
available on DVDs and Netflix.


Examples!


Questions?


Where do digital books come from?


traditional
publishers

kids’ app
developers

“born-digital”
publishers

Abrams, Chronicle Books, Simon &
Schuster, HarperCollins, Penguin

Oceanhouse Media, Callaway Digital,
Nosy Crow, Night & Day

Ruckus, SnappyAnt, InkPad Press,
Little Bahalia, Calloway, Open Road

Profile: legacy of publishing picture
books for children and distributing
them through mainstream retail
channels. Will either hire agencies to
develop high-profile titles or use inhouse resources.

Profile: often started by gaming pros
or other developers, these
companies rely less on original
content and either license
characters, or use royalty-free fairy
tales in the public domain.

Profile: based on traditional
publishing model, but look ahead to
how to make best use of platforms
to publish original children’s
literature for digital. May also license
famous characters.


I have an idea for an interactive book.
What do I do?
What do I do?


interactive books
•

Are tactile; invite reader participation

•

Cry out for sound or movement

•

Are not gimmicky

•

Do not draw attention to the device

•

Use sounds and visuals elegantly

•

Can be too stimulating for bedtime stories

•

Are best when shorter than picture books


What’s the process for making a book app?


success factors
•

Beautiful and well written

•

Aware of the possibilities, yet not exploitative

•

Edited, tested and revised

•

Great marketing

•

Blessing from the Book People and the Mommies of the
world—helps remove the “screen stigma”

•

Eagerly read, and poked and punched, by kids


Using DemiBooks Composer
to create animation.


format your art


Get out of the paper
mentality!


create and save different states of an element

layer everything! (and name your layers!)


If you’re working from flat art
learn to love the pen tool.
(Or tolerate using it a whole lot.)


image size protips


File Format Tips
• Create all files at 2x the final size (for retina screens)
• All frames within an animated element MUST be the same pixel
dimensions
- The largest instance defines the size of all frames
• Save all animation files as PNGs with transparent backgrounds
• Save all files SEQUENTIALLY within an animated element in one ZIP file
• Give your ZIPed animations descriptive filenames that you will remember
• Aim for no more than 20MB of imagery per page


File Format Tips
iPad cannot render compressed images (png and jpg)
without decompressing them.
- Therefore, smaller file sizes help the final App size
but NOT memory usage
- You can help manage usage by reducing pixel
sizes


File Formatting Tips
•iPad stores textures/imagery using the Power of Two:
1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512, 1024,
2048

• Any image that exceeds a Power of Two size will use
the next largest size when displayed on screen.
If you have an image that is 278x523, it will be held
internally as a 512x1024 sized image.


•For example, if an image is 257x514, trim it to 256x512.

The extra 3 pixels
will save you 1.5 MB!


All that and we haven’t even opened Composer yet???
Questions about file formatting?


Yep. All that gets real easy once you’ve done it a few
though.


NOW it’s time for Composer…


Questions?
Questions later? - getsatisfaction.com/demibooks


Alternative Tools


Kwiksher
Desktop
Software
iOS and
Android
More
powerful,
more difficult


Adobe InDesign
CRAZY expensive - requires on-going subscription
Really meant for a monthly ebook publication
Does not make apps

Powerful animation tools • Limited Interactivity
• HTML5 works on most devices

What is Gamification?
Wikipedia says:
Gamification is the use of game thinking
and game mechanics to engage users in
solving problems. Gamification is used in
applications and processes to improve user
engagement, return on investment, data
quality, timeliness, and learning.


What is Gamification?
Tim says:
Gamification is the use of “video game style
elements” outside of what you’d typically think of as
a video game.
It’s a fancy form of interactivity based on the notion
of challenges and rewards.
Apple prefers gamification in apps.


How can I use it?
•

Are not gimmicky!!

•

Invite deeper participation or “replay value”

•

Offer user rewards or unlockables

•

Use points or currency

•

Invite personalization

•

Add value

•

Appeal to reluctant readers


My App is all done!

Now what..?


Questions about getting onto App Stores?


This is all too good to be true..?


It is.
•

Formatting challenges for different hardware

•

Discoverability challenges

•

Software limitations

•

File size is your enemy

•

large, clunky apps get bad reviews

•

You take up too much room you get deleted


Creative thinking can get you around those challenges
though. Newspaper strips were done in three boxes. Our
limitations are nothing.


Now the hard part.


Pricing and Freemium
• Pricing is tricky…
• Most book apps are
$1.99-$3.99

• In-App purchasing is

increasing in popularity
dramatically

• ‘Freemium’
• Free apps can serve as great
advertising for other products
or services


Digital Media
•

Facebook - give them something to like and share

•

Twitter - engage your audience

•

YouTube - post trailers

•

Website - your storefront

•

SEO - build your store in the right neighborhood

•

Advertise - PPC, Project Wonderful, Link Trading


Discoverability
•

Over 1 million apps in the Apple App Store

•

You’re competing vs. all forms of app entertainment (games,
etc.)

•

Discoverability is your biggest challenge

•

Featured Apps have a MUCH higher chance of success

•

Get reviewed, on the App Store, online, off line

•

Get downloads - giving your app away for a short period can
increase sales in the long run

•

Cross promote with other apps


PR
•

Do it yourself

•

Use your free download codes for press

•

(Update your app for more download codes)

•

Choose media that will cover you

•

Build relationships with bloggers and editors

•

Volume, volume, volume (most people will ignore you)


Crowdsourcing
•

Don’t do it unless you REALLY need it.

•

Going to the crowdsourcing well too often rarely works

•

Clearly explain what the funds are for

•

Launch a campaign after you already have an audience

•

Promote until it hurts and then promote some more

•

Get your rewards out ON TIME!


Marketing Questions?


Are digital books inevitable?


(Source: USA TODAY, OCT 2013)

So this is
happening:
Over the last two years, the shift has been drastic. Among
children under 2, the survey found, 38 percent had used
mobile devices like iPhones, tablets, or Kindles — the same
share as children 8 and under who had used such
technology in a similar survey two years ago.
Tablets, in particular, have become far more common. Forty
percent of families now own tablets, up from only 8 percent
two years ago. And this year’s survey found that 7 percent
of the children had tablets of their own.

So yes, I think this stuff is inevitable.


These are all just guidelines.
These tools are waiting for someone to do something with
them that hasn’t been done yet.
Go do that, please.


Questions about anything?
Anything we didn’t cover you’re wondering about?



@ timdemet
er

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