Popar Books

$27.99, Windows

Teaches: science, reading

CTR Review

This is a series of traditional-looking hard cover printed picture books, but the pages have codes on them that can be recognized by a traditional web camera. When the page is "seen" by your Windows computer web camera, objects, such as bugs or trucks become animated, or appear to jump out of the page. We've seen a technology similar to this in The Search for Wondla, and Mattel also released a set of Avatar toys with the technology (called Instant Immersion). But according to the developer, "this is a completely different technology and Digital Tech Frontier is not affiliated with Total Immersion." You can either hold the book up to the camera or use an included iPaddle that shows printed codes. The technique, called "augmented reality" uses a special plugin. After a ten minute one time installation using the included disk, you must launch the program that starts your webcam. After you see yourself on the screen, you find one of the images on the page and show it to the camera. Presto, the objects come to life. The effect is amazing the first time, but how long until the novelty fades? There's also the added hassle of starting up your Windows computer. Perhaps there might be an app version? This technology was used two years ago in a line of Mattel Avatar toys and Topps playing cards.