Father and Son Team Up to Make Advent Calendar App

What could be more fitting for a post here on GeekDad than the tale of a father and his son (and daughter too) teaming up to make their own iPad app? We've mentioned at least one here before, then there was 5-year-old Cassie's "Magical Ponycorn Adventure" which took the internet by storm earlier in the year and I'm sure there are many more out there.

Flippy and Slippy's Advent Calendar was born from the mind of 11-year-old Tyler, at the suggestion of his dad Robert - who makes Flash movies and games for a living. Tyler is very interested in making games and has already written a couple using Game Maker before but never anything like this. They started their project in early October and gave themselves four weeks to build the calendar in order to get it in the App Store by Thanksgiving.

After the initial brainstorming, Tyler drew some sample character sketches and eventually came up with the concept of two cute characters living in an igloo, with an accessory for each day. Then he created all the artwork for the app including an igloo scene, two characters (including different animation states), 25 accessories for the scene, a "book" where users can open their 25 presents, and an exterior landscape. Tyler had free reign over whatever he wanted to draw and came up with all of the accessories himself. First, he drew every item on paper, then scanned and redrew them in Photoshop. Some of the drawings included multiple frames for animation (like an animated jack-in-the-box, and dancing fireplace flames). The finished graphics were then flattened and exported into Flash for the main build.

Robert says:

I develop rich media projects for a living, so this wasn't my first rodeo. It was, however, a first for my son. He mentioned to me at the end of the project that he really felt a better appreciation for how much work goes into developing interactive projects. He learned a lot about Photoshop and frame-based animation, and I was even able to teach him some general programming concepts, like objects, classes, arrays, etc.

Some of the items animate when the users click on them, some play sounds, others trigger a short animation. As kids aren't known for their patience, Tyler and Robert decided to include a reset button so users can start over if they've got a bit ahead of themselves, or if they want to reset the app to use again next year. They also added in a little fun fact for each item when you open them up.

Not wanting to be left out, Robert's 6-year-old daughter Ashley was pulled in toward the end of the project to handle the sound effects. She provided the voice overs and helped choose effects for each voice. She also helped choose items from around the house to use for additional sound effects - a budding Ben Burtt!

Robert has put together a short video interview with Tyler, describing the process they went through in brainstorming the app and the artwork, and some of the programming concepts he learned as well.

It's been fun because it has really inspired my son to develop more apps on his own. Hopefully the passion for the medium sticks. He has spent the last week or so sketching some ideas for a game/story he wants to make. Seems like experimenting with app design/development is becoming this generation's version of the chemistry kit or erector set. This year, he has started a blog (www.hellotyler.com) and we've even recorded a couple of podcasts.

Thanks to Robert for this lovely little insight into the process and for kindly giving GeekDad a review code for the Advent Calendar. He is also offering five more codes to our readers; just leave Tyler an encouraging comment below and we'll pick five winners at the end of the week.