PICTURE BOOK APPS: A BRAVE NEW WORLD
An SCBWI SF South Saturday Series Event

Saturday, January 14th, 4-6 pm, First Congregational Church of Palo Alto

Picture book apps are the latest rage in the digital publishing craze.  Through their use of narration, music, animation, and touch screen interaction, the popularity of book apps has skyrocketed since the introduction of tablet computers.  For both writers and illustrators, apps invite innovation on a new playing field with fewer gatekeepers.

Please join us as industry as experts share their experiences and insights regarding this potential-filled market and find your place in the brave new world of picture book apps!

A wine and cheese reception will follow the presentations.

Panelists:

Sam Berman, Co-Founder of book app developer Grids Interactive;
Alan Katz (via Skype), children’s picture book author and writer of the book app, Andrew Answers.
Mary Kole, agent at Andrea Brown Literary Agency and blogger at www.kitlitapps.com

SCBWI members $10 advance/$15 door; Non-members $20 advance/$25 door (join SCBWI to receive the member rate!)

About the Panelists:

Sam Berman is the founder and CEO of Grids Interactive, a digital storybook app developer.  He is also the author of Grids first product offering called The Truly Great Noodle an animated highly interactive storybook for iPad. Prior to founding Grids Interactive, Sam helped to found a number of other companies including Toy Bug LLC, where he designed and developed a very popular children’s toy and storybook product called Tickle Monsters. He is currently working with his company to develop a very high-end marketing and sales platform to help smaller app developers get traction on sales.

Alan Katz is the author of many highly acclaimed children's books, including Take Me Out of the Bathtub and Other Silly Dilly Songs, OOPS! and Poems I Wrote When No One Was Looking. He is also the creator of the Ruckus Media storybook app Andrew Answers. Alan is a six-time Emmy-nominated TV writer for the The Rosie O'Donnell Show, many animated shows, the Grammy Awards and Tony Awards. He has also created comic books, trading card sets, web videos, TV commercials and hundreds of other special projects for kids and their parents.

Mary Kole came to literature from a writer's perspective and started reading at Andrea Brown Literary Agency to see what it was like "on the other side of the desk." She quickly found her passion there and, after a year of working behind the scenes, officially joined the agency in August 2009. In her quest to learn all sides of publishing, she has also worked at Chronicle Books and earned her MFA in creative writing at the University of San Francisco. She operates the Andrea Brown East office from Brooklyn, NY, and writes about children's book apps, children's story apps, developers, digital books, and new developments in the digital publishing landscape at her blog, www.kidlitapps.com.