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Entries in Thomas and Friends (2)

Thomas Animation Remake with DoInk on iPad

Here is a great example of what can be done with the right tools and a healthy dose of animation talent. If you are already a regular visitor to the DoInk homepage you may have seen this video featured before.

It is a remake made entirely in Doink's iPad app, with some help from iMovie for the final edit. Although not yet finished (there are still some scenes from the original Thomas episode cut in) we think it shows a lot of talent and patience from YouTube user known cryptically as ccddxxjj.

There are plenty more animations from the Doink community over on their site where you can share your creations no matter what level you are at and let others re-use them if you want to.

DoInk also highlights the work of some of the more talented animation artists along with some interviews on their blog.

Have you created something with the DoInk iPad app you would like to share with us? Post a link in the comments and let us see your stuff.

Thomas Needs Rescuing on your iPad

Callaway Digital Arts bring us a new Thomas and Friends story with the Misty Island Rescue app. This lovely story brings the most recent in a very popular series (especially with the iPad Creative kids) to the iPad with the style and quality that we have already seen in other Callaway titles.

App Highlights

We liked the style of animation that features on every page. It feels in keeping with the book itself because it is the illustrations that you would see in the paper version that are animated, so it really feels like the book is coming alive. You can see what we mean in the video below.

Whilst each page does have an animated element to it (usually drifting mist if nothing else), not every page has interactivity. Callaway have added a yellow glow effect on elements you can interact with when the page opens.

Unfortunately this didn't stop our little testers stabbing at every bit of the page they thought should react to them and they found this a bit frustrating.

Clever Narration

The narration is very good and great quality, but if the kids get impatient (as they do) and start touching the interactive bits of the page, the narration cleverly pauses. It can then be resumed by clicking on the white circular arrow underneath the text.

It would help if this resume arrow was a bit more obvious because we missed it the first few times we used the app to be honest, maybe a different colour on the white background or using the yellow glow effect.

Fun and Games

There are some other features included in the app to keep little ones busy including Jigsaw puzzles, join the dots, games and colouring pages, all of which the kids loved. There is also a video featuring the Misty Island theme song.

We think that Thomas and Friends Misty Island Rescue is a well illustrated, carefully animated and visually appealing iPad book that will provide Thomas fans with plenty of value. If you have little Thomas fans using your iPad we recommend you check out the video and App Store link below.

Thomas and Friends Misty Island Rescue is available on the App Store for $4.99 (£2.99).