The Ugly Duckling (Enhanced Version)
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3.1 • 7 Ratings
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- $1.99
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- $1.99
Publisher Description
An illustrated fairy tale with sound track and short movies built-in. By a pond some little ducks were born into the world. All of them were beautiful and looked like pretty fluffy balls, except for one. This last duckling to hatch from its egg looked very different from the rest. It was gray, fat and very ugly. All of the animals laughed to see such a strange looking duck. How will the ugly one get along in the world? And what will happen to the duck when it becomes grown up?
The book comprises text, illustrations, sound track and short movie clips built-in.
Customer Reviews
I just got suckered
I just bought this book to read to my child. Boy did I get ripped off. Shame on apple for allowing this publisher for polluting the bookstore with this ripoff.
"enhanced" version is a joke
this series from potrus publishing is overpriced & underwheliming to say the least.
It's worth $1 not $3.
The basics: while the illustrations are sericeable enough, the typography is atrocious -- especially for young readers that need clean kerning etc.
As for enhancements: these are confined a miserly sprinkling of embeded videos that simply offer a pan&zoom of the scene - which act as interstitial pauses for parents to briefly discuss the muse-en-scene.
This static design seems like a fossil from a circa1993 CD-i world.
No effort was made to utilize modern interactive technologies ...
animatics fx: the canvas tag in html5 could have been used to mount the characters in a montage of scenes that could come alive as kids exploited the touch controls (truly gifted graphic designers know how to use SVG vector artwork to simulate watercolors, pastels, or other effects) ... In this mode, the text is reduced to the level of open captions (key words & phrases over the illustrations).
* SMIL: even if the designer was going to keep a basic static approach, the least they could have done was to exploit mpeg4 audio as an aid for young readers (AAC+ isn't called "enhanced" for nothing!) ... It allows the text track & audio track to be synchronized so that with a bit if effort a karaoke effect could be an optional mode (pace CD-G).
* path-based characters: if these titles really were going offer enrichment, then the designers would have add-value by creating their own query-engine (unl-flavored rdf-based) so that the touch interface would have allowed the kids to visually explore & reason about the relationships & concepts embedded inside the narrative eg
~this duck hasA feeling ("sad" excerpt)
~this duck isA ("brother" scene)
~the other duck performs a role ("friend) == when obstacle, then offer support.
bottom-line; the published has made the absolute smallest effort to just also down some poorly laid-out text & some generic drawings ... And charged too much for the priviledge.
Don't waste your money on these digital retreads. If you want the old-school approach then just buy a large format illustrated book.
The right tool for the right job.