To gain an understanding of the competition for the app, we researched existing apps on the marketplace, keeping a focus on trying to find apps that were the most uniquely creative.
1) Windosill ($2.99)
Windosill is a combination of a game and an interactive physics toy made by Vector Park (Patrick Smith). It uses real-time 3D rendering with flat lighting and no textures to create a look that feels completely two-dimensional while having support for rich interaction. The subtle use of 3D, visual design, sound, and nuanced interactions/dynamics within the game are the strong points of this application. It doesn't beg for your attention, it earns it. It was also made by a single person, which is very inspiring. The weakest point of the app is that the line between toy and game is blurred a bit more than it should be. If you get into the mindset of trying to get to the next area rather than playing with the toys (a byproduct of all games), you'll miss out on a lot of what the author was trying to offer. What we can learn from this app is that elegant but polished design and interactivity can go miles. In addition, the app shows the power of adding interactive physics to an application.
2) Numberlys ($5.99)
Numberlys is an interactive children's book / short film made by Moonbot Studios. It is about how a group of numbers invented the alphabet. The strongest aspects of the app are the strong, unified art direction, production quality of the visuals, and the menu interface. The app includes many small interactive segments and games, but I found the menu design to be the most engaging. The app is divided into "pages", and to move between pages, you rotate a giant gear. Smaller gears interlock with the primary one, and moving them up/down effectively enables or disables the setting that each smaller gear represents. It's a great visual metaphor that both relates to the concept of the app and clearly communicates each element's purpose. The area with the greatest room for improvement was the activities that help you form each letter. While some were fun and clever, others were difficult and/or stressful to interact with. Also, due to all the elements being prerendered, it lessened the sense of interactivity that I might have felt from an app with real-time 3D graphics. I think the concept of highly intertwined parts which all influence each other (such as the gears) could be an interesting route to take with Ringling's app, as the mind, heart, eye, and hand are intricately connected to each other with a Ringling artist. I've always found complex but understandable articulation highly fascinating, and I'm sure that prospective users would take interest in the concept as well.
Singing Fingers is an app made by Eric Rosenbaum and Jay Silver that lets you record sound and displays the result as blobby lines. Running your fingers over the lines will replay segments of the recorded sound. The concept of the app is fantastic, and the method of interaction is very straightforward. The primary downside is that the visuals aren't very appealing (the blobs are aliased, among other things). What really intrigues me about Singing Fingers, and why I think that it's relevant to Ringling's app is the way in which users get to see their own creations being transformed, visually represented, and re-experienced. Since we're showing prospective students how Ringling could change them, what better way to do that than transforming their creations and world before their very eyes?
