Nancy Drew remains every girl’s favorite teen sleuth. After creating a successful line of Nancy Drew games for the Mac and PC, Her Interactive wants to bring Carolyn Keene’s heroine to the iPad, and they’ve turned to Kickstarter to do it.
A rock history aficionado can find a number of solid apps (general and specific), to feed his ceaseless hunger for the skinny on his musical idols. A new Kickstarter project now gives backers the chance to go behind-the-scenes. One pledge tier even lets fans contribute to the e-book.
While they weren’t hit makers in their heyday, King Crimson still commands a devoted league of gentlemen followers (and some ladies too, of course). King Crimson bassist Tony Levin had long been an avid photographer, and thus an unofficial tour diariast, having released two books documenting his time on the road with Peter Gabriel and King Crimson. Levin, a lifelong musician, now in his 7th decade of life, is bringing his photos to the iPad through a Kickstarter project called Crimson Chronicles.
File Peluche’s new iPad case under “things that make you go ‘awwwww’!” Apple’s iPad is often described as “sleek” but now everyone’s favorite tablet can be cuddly too, thanks to Lenny the Lion. Reminiscent of the omnipresent Pillow Pet, and its spin off, the Cuddle-uppet (“blankets that are puppets”), this soft, stuffed case will appeal to children of all ages.
Lenny the Lion isn’t just cute, he’s practical too. Lenny provides an extra layer of protection for your device, and will help keep your iPad safe from dings and scratches. His fur flips around to create a stand for typing or watching a video. There are even magnets beneath his fur that wake the iPad from sleep when the case is opened.
When it comes to iOS accessories, Kickstarter giveth, and then Kickstarter giveth some more. One of the latest projects, the Motive Stylus, offers users a choice of hard or soft writing tip, as well as a clever magnetized storage option that plays nice with Apple’s Smart Cover.
Inspired by his tendency to forget to pack a stylus with his iPad, project creator Ben Powell designed the Motive so that it would unroll, magnetically adhering to the front of the Smart Cover, yet remain unobtrusive enough that it could be left in place while the cover was in use.
Kickstarters Levi Price and Eric Rea are our kind of designers. When Price’ laptop bit the dust he decided to replace it with an iPad, but though he loved his new tablet (obviously), he was never satisfied with any of the cases that were available.
Price joined forces with Rea, and the two students founded the Fine Grain design company. With Kickstarter’s help, the pair plans to produce Minimalist iPad Cases, as well as a cleaning cloth with original artwork.
Salman Sajid thinks the world needs another iPad case. This Kickstarter might actually be right.
Sajid recently launched a Kickstarter project to fund the Touchtype, a case for the iPad that integrates the tablet with Apple’s wireless keyboard.
The Tabü Duo might be the first capacitive stylus for digital devices that cleans up after itself. This double-ended stylus sports an eraser! ”You can write and erase with just one simple flip, without having any unnecessary distractions,” said Kevin So, product engineer of the Tabü product line.
At present the stylus only erases when used with the as-yet unreleased iOS app Tabü Paper, but the creators of this Kickstarter project plan to make the stylus compatible with most popular iOS note taking apps. When released Tabü Paper will be free, but will likely resemble PaperDesk, the developer’s current note taking iOS app.
How well do you know your digital music library’s album art? Ergonomidesign, creator of Sonicspree want to make a game of it. The developers hope to port Sonicspree to the iPad from its current incarnation as a Microsoft Surface application. The app’s creators turned to Kickstarter for help to fund the creation, or re-creation, of Sonicspree for iPad, since it would allow their game to reach a much larger audience. Surface 2.0 debuted with a price tag of $8400 — that’s about the cost of 17 16GB Wi-Fi iPads, so obviously Surface isn’t going to find its way into the game rooms of the average tech shopper.
Form meet function in the diFeltro Fold, a well-turned out bag for the iPad that upholds Apple’s strong design aesthetic. The bag has recently met its Kickstarter funding goal and will go into production within the month.
Behind this good-looking bag are designer Colleen Beckett, architect Andrea Varutti, and web strategist Francesco Benvenuto. This trio has created a unisex bag that is “nice enough to bring to meetings, but not too fancy,” and will protect an iPad without compromising appearances.
Kickstarter backers have flocked to support HiddenRadio & BlueTooth Speaker, an audio accessory, which is compatible with iPad, iPhone, and iPod, that promises to let form and function coalesce into a sleek, modern package.