On Libraries and New Media, powered by Library Journal and School Library Journal
In an ambitious foray into transmedia, Razorbill has teamed with the special effects company Framestore to produce The Creature Department (2013). The making of the new novel by Robert Paul Weston, starring a cast of fantastical characters, was a unique collaboration—with Framestore playing an active role in the book’s creation.
The Book App Alliance aims to help locate quality book apps amid the tides of Disney, Dora, and Dr. Seuss products. Alliance founders also want to foster best practices.
It’s oh so easy to overlook what’s happening online—and if librarians, educators, and parents don’t notice it, why on Earth should kids?
Transmedia isn’t just a new buzzword that belongs to academics or high-priced media consultants. It’s an approach to storytelling that boasts a range of potential curricular applications that applies to literacy and the content areas.
The nonprofit Reading With Pictures (RWP), helmed by the ebullient Josh Elder, has partnered with digital comics distributor iVerse Media to set up ComicsPlus: Library Edition, a new service allows libraries to circulate a wide selection of digital comics with both user-friendly and library friendly features.
“The early books are really, really rough,” says school librarian John Schumacher, who helped launch the online Nerdbery Challenge. “They’re completely dreadful. They’re really long. They’re just not very good.”
When students make a beeline for Google, these tips can improve their experience.
Telling a brief story around a single photograph seems like such a simple idea. Add to that a sharing element and you think: another clever web platform. But there’s a lot more to Cowbird.
These picks aren’t so much about products, things you should run out and buy, but rather the overarching concepts that’ll potentially shape and be shaped by our collective imagination.
These transmedia titles—including Pottermore—operate on a variety of platforms to support and extend the reading experience and tantalize tech-savvy youngsters who like to spend their leisure time plugged in.
