Digital Arts & Crafts Studio
© 2007 Fisher-Price, Inc.
Transform a Windows-computer into an easel for preschoolers, with the $50 Digital Arts & Crafts Studio from Fisher-Price. About the size of a standard QWERTY keyboard, the device plugs into your computer's USB port, which also supplies it with power. So no batteries are required. After installing the software included on a CD-ROM, children can freely scribble using a marker-sized stylus that combines both electromagnetic (for position) and mechanical (to turn on/off the ink) inputs. There's a menu of other pen-based activities that vary in quality, including coloring book pages, dot-to-dot puzzles and craft ideas. The heart of this device is in the scribbling, which children can do using 256 smudge-free colors, plus a variety of shapes and stamps; all by touching one of the light-up menu buttons. A text entry tool makes it possible to type on a picture, and you can import your own digital photos for editing. A password protection adult menu limits printouts and lets you manage a child's work. Drawbacks include just one level of undo and a confusing password system. The pen feels too large and clunky, and it requires a bit of pressure on the surface of the touch pad -- which reduces feelings of accuracy -- and there's certainly no pressure sensitivity. So this is no Wacum tablet, by any stretch. But it does work, and offers a nice way to turn a Windows computer into an art center. Perhaps the best part is that the markers never dry up. Watch the demo at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7hofrTlVHc.
$50, Windows
Teaches: art, creativity
CTR Rating: 84%