Kappa Jizo 绘本应用程序 by Kaori Hamura Long is a highly esteemed winner of the very prestigious 2021 A' Design Award 铁奖 in 移动技术、应用与软件设计 Competition Category.

铁移动· 2021

Kappa Jizo 绘本应用程序

by Kaori Hamura Long

Client: Moss Moon Studio

A' Design Award 铁奖 Winner in 移动 Category

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Colors

The Design

About Kappa Jizo 绘本应用程序

《河童地藏》是一款面向移动设备的互动绘本应用。故事鼓励孩子们以开放的心态接纳来自不同背景的人。应用提供英语和日语两种语音旁白。在故事播放过程中,孩子们可以点击、拖动和缩放画面中的角色与物件,应用中还附有涂色页面。所有插画均以铅笔在纸上手工绘制,随后经过扫描并进行数码上色。语音与音乐均为本应用专门录制。其宗旨在于培养尊重之心,消除偏见。

The Recognition

About the A' Design Award 铁奖

Kappa Jizo 绘本应用程序是 A' Design Award 铁奖得主，这是授予满足人们对设计精良的创作所期待的专业与工业要求的优良设计的声望认可。铁奖得主展现出其创作者的高超技艺、高度专业化、专家级的理解力和创造能力。预计Kappa Jizo 绘本应用程序将成为一件备受推崇、令人钦佩且被珍爱的创作，既实用又创新。这件赢得 A' Design Award 铁奖的设计整合了行业最佳实践，并拥有与专业知识和才华相结合的称职技术特性。Kappa Jizo 绘本应用程序因其严谨而受到尊重，旨在提供有助于让世界变得更美好的生活品质改善。

Behind the Design

Press Kit

Credits, team members and technical details provided by the designer.

Unique Properties: This hand-drawn interactive picture book app will get children thinking about the importance of being open-minded towards people who are different from them. Kids can listen along with audio recorded in English or Japanese and they can also have fun with interactive characters and the coloring page. They can tap, drag, and pinch the characters and objects while the story plays. The children will find that they can be friends with people even though they come from different backgrounds.
Dimensions & Packaging: 2048 x 2732 pixel (214.9mm x 280.6mm)
Tags: picture book app, children’s book app, book app, children’s book, picture book, iTune, Google Play, Japanese book, kid’s book app, app, jizo, app jizo, kaori hamura, kaori hamura long, moss moon, mission, moss moon studio, tolerance, prejudice,
Production Technology: First, the storyboard and dummy book was made and then created illustrated pages with pencils and paper. Then the illustrations were scanned and colored in Photoshop. There, all the layers were separated, heads, eyes, arms, etc. for animation. The sprite sheets were created using the extension software called Kwik in Photoshop. We recorded voices and music in Garage Band, and the sound files were imported into Kwik programming. All the pages were published into Solar 2D programming software to build for Xcode (App Store) and Android Studio (Google Play).
Design Challenge: The creative part came quickly and naturally for the artist, but the challenge was to create programming without knowledge. Even as an artist and writer with no programming background, she made her first interactive picture book app using the Photoshop extension called Kwik. With easy to use interface within Photoshop, she was able to program her book the way she wanted. However, submitting the app to App Store and Google Play was a totally different challenge, and she has to keep updating the app according to the technological changes.
Research: Once the artist decided to take on a challenge to make her picturebook into an interactive picturebook app, she had done an extensive research to create it without too much knowledge of programming. There were few software and extension choices to create an app without extensive knowledge of programming, so she has tried out a few. She decided to use the Photoshop extension program called Kwik, and their tech support was beneficial, so she decided to use the software.
Inspiration: Living in a time of the divided world, with bias and hate crimes rising, the artist felt that she had to do something to teach the next generation that it doesn't have to be that way. By changing our mindset, we could change the world to be more united, respectful for people with different backgrounds, and show love for each other. She wrote the story and made a picturebook and decided to turn it into an interactive picturebook app.
Project Duration: The manuscript and dummy book was created in October 2007 in Vermont, U.S.A. The app development started in 2015 and was released in June 2017 in Fukuoka, Japan. The updated version was released in October 2020.
Operation Flow: It is an interactive children's book app for Apple and Android devices. The reader can listen along with audio recorded in English or Japanese. Children can also have fun with interactive characters and the coloring page. They can tap, drag, and pinch the characters and objects while the story plays.
Team Members: Creator/ Illustrator/ Voices/ Music: Kaori Hamura Long
Voices: Bill Long
Voices: Mika Long
Image Credits: Image1-5: Illustrator/Writer/Music: Kaori Hamura Long,
Voices: Kaori Hamura Long, Bill Long, and Mika Long