ToonDoo's slogan is: "World's fastest way to create cartoons." Oh boy is it true!! This tool has a huge variety of characters, expressions, colors, backgrounds, props, and text boxes that you can use. You literally just click and drop and play around with your Toon. There were many buttons to add/edit everything on your Toon. The layout of the creating tools was very easy to understand and was clearly labeled. I thought it was neat that after you chose your characters, background and props, you could click the upper right hand corner of the panel to get everything copied onto the next panel. From there, it was easy to edit expressions and change the dialogue as needed.
I loved the cartoons available on this website; they were just so adorable and colorful, like actual cartoons! The best feature? How EASY the site is to use in order to create a cartoon. I love simplicity. Everything was simple to use on this website; easy to create, edit, save, share, and embed. ToonDoo is definitely a website that students would be able to use (VERY user-friendly). I am already planning to use this website towards the end of the school year with my 1st graders so they can create a ToonBook. I can also see so many uses for this awesome website in my future library. Maybe to create ToonDoo book trailers, book reviews, favorite book toons, and introductions at the beginning of the year. Time-permitting, I can't wait to create more Toons on ToonDoo. I give ToonDoo 5 out of 5 ¡YUPIS!
My Comic on Pixton
Their slogan is “The World’s Best Way to Make Comics.” In this case, I don’t necessarily agree with the slogan. I liked the site, but I didn’t love it. Pixton does offer a variety of characters, expressions, colors, backgrounds, props, and speech bubbles. You also and click and drop to add features to your comic and the characters are posable (which means you can move any part of their body). However, I was very frustrated at the beginning when I kept clicking “Choose a Character” and after having chosen two, nothing happened. It took a lot of clicking for the panels to appear. I tried scrolling over the buttons because it was confusing to know what they were used for, but some did not give me a description. I also noticed that the buttons, posable characters and panels were very sensitive to the touch (or click I should say) and my comic kept changing on me at random while working on it.
I feel that this website is for people that are more familiar with making comics. The downgrade for me was the fact that it had so many extra features to use that it actually slowed the creation of my comic. Having said that, I do like how my comic came out. It is colorful and I like the mouth expressions I used. So, in conclusion, it was a bit challenging to create and edit my comic, but saving, sharing, and embedding it, was easy. I think that younger students could use this site to create comics, but they would definitely need more tutorials to make it a more seamless experience. I believe older students would love to use this website to make comics. I give Pixton 3 out of 5 ¡YUPIS!
My Comic on Make Beliefs Comix
This website is super easy to use. It may not have as many features as the other websites I created a cartoon/comic with, but I liked it just as much as ToonDoo. The choices for your comic are accessed by using red arrows back and forth and clicking on the character, object, or blank talk or thought balloons. Once you click on what you want it is automatically added to the panel you are working on. From there you can resize, move, and tweak anything you add to the comic strip. The one drawback I could see was the fact that each panel had to be created from scratch individually. There was not an option to copy from one panel to the next.
I really liked the look of my comic strip because it reminded me of the classic look of the black and white comic strips in the newspaper. It looked just fine to me even without the added color. Everything was simple to use on this website; easy to create, edit, save, and share. It had the extra bonus of offering more privacy for students than the other sites, since you don’t have to create an account. This is such an easy and fun site to use that I think my first graders can use it to create comics. MakeBeliefsComix is that simple to use! I give MakeBeliefsComix 5 out of 5 ¡YUPIS!
My Voki on Voki
Voki characters can be customized to look like historical figures, cartoons, animals, and even yourself! You can give your Voki a voice by recording with a microphone, using Voki’s dial-in number, or uploading an audio file. Voki characters can be emailed, shared on social media, and embedded on websites!
I found this interesting tidbit from the Voki website. What does the name Voki stand for? Voki is a combination of the words “vox” and “Loki”. “Vox” is the Latin term for voice. Loki is a Norse god from Norse mythology. Loki is a trickster who has the ability to change his shape. Fitting name since Voki gives students and teachers the ability to change the character’s appearance and add a voice!
Since I don’t own an iPad or have one from my school, I asked what options were available to me to be able to do the Tellagami app part of the assignment. Even though it was extra, I still wanted to try it. After attempting to borrow an iPad did not work out, Dr. Perry suggested that I give Voki a try.
Truthfully I left this website until last because it looked like it would be a challenging site to work with. Voki actually turned out to be one of my favorites. Unfortunately, they didn’t have a character that looked a little like me so I chose one that had similar features and played around with it. On the free Voki account you have limited choices on the characters available because the website has Voki Classroom, which is a paid service. Voki Classroom has lots more character choices. However, after you choose your character everything from hair, eyes, make-up, mouth, colors, clothes, accessories, background, and voice options can be edited to your liking. The cool part of the voice options is the text-to-speech feature. I used to use text-to-speech a lot on my kindle, sort of giving it an “audio book” feel. So even though I usually record my voice, I used one of the many female voices available to choose from on the text-to-speech menu. It was so awesome! I just typed in what I wanted to say and Voila!, instant monologue.
The final product was so unique it looked sort of like a postcard or your very own speaking icon. I definitely think that this is a site that students can use to make their own speaking Voki character. Voki is a very user-friendly educational online tool. Voki is a site I will definitely use when I have my own library and in the classroom now. Maybe make a lesson at the beginning of the year where we can introduce ourselves. I am so glad I had an opportunity to try out something similar to the app we had in the assignment. I give Voki 5 out of 5 ¡YUPIS!
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