What is Dekko Comics?
In order to explain what this product - Dekko Reader - is, you need to first understand the story behind Dekko Comics.
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Back in 2016, we launched a crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter to help fund the production and release of the first two issues of Dekko Comics. This was a comic that turned educational information into fun and engaging comic strips, using a technique I had first discovered myself while struggling at school. By presenting the information this way I was able to enjoy my learning experience and retain the information.
Through this, I gained my first academic A!
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I shared my story in the hope that people would see the potential in what I wanted to do. I genuinely thought it could provide much-needed support for children with learning difficulties like Dyslexia (which I have), Autism and ADHD. I also thought it could help those who had no specific needs but struggled or had become disengaged.
The response at the time was overwhelming with a number of people expressing how they wished something like this had existed when they were at school. Within a short time, we had surpassed our goal and with the money raised, we were able to fully fund creating and releasing the comics as well as attending some conventions to help boost our small company's image.
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Since that first campaign, we have expanded; hiring office staff and a team of artists and releasing a comic a month. On top of this, we create commissions and do workshops and talks at schools and organisations across the UK. Now we're looking to make the next step with the release of a very special app - 'Dekko Reader'.
What is Dekko Reader?
Dekko Reader is the next logical step for us to take as a company and as a project and will allow us to finally expand our comics into the digital market. This, in turn, will offer us the opportunity to address the issues and points that have been raised about the limitations that there are with hard-copy comic. Features on the app will include the option to add colour overlays to the pages, increase or decrease the complexity of the speech bubbles to match the readers level and add a background colour to the speech bubbles to makes them easier to read for pupils with visual stress.
All of these options are designed to make the app as accessible as possible and of course, there will be updates in the future to allow for changes, improvements and new options that we have in store or are yet to think of.
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The app will be the best way to read your digital copies of Dekko Comics and will be free with the only cost being the purchase of the comics themselves.
The development of this app does not mean the end of our hard copy comics as we believe that is a very valid form of reading. This is about giving our readers options on how they read our comics and to provide them with greater readability and accessibility when it comes to their experience.
All backers will receive early access to the app as well as the first four copies pre-loaded onto their account so they can start reading as soon as Dekko Reader launches, which we hope will be in late 2019.
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What do we need from you?
Our target is £20,000 which will give us enough to fully fund the creation of the app with all of the features that we've mentioned included. We appreciate that this is a large amount but it is a necessary amount for the level of development that we require for the vision we have for this app. We have seen what is possible with your support in the past so we have every faith that together we can achieve this too.
What this money will allow us to design and build the following functions of the app:
BASIC APP FRAMEWORK:
App framework (£175)
Sign up/register (£525)
Comic listings (£175)
Integrate purchasing (£700)
Comic document structure (£350)
Comic download (£350)
Comic viewer (£1750)
Preferences (£700)
Back end work (£875)
Testing and revisions (£700)
Design time (£2450)
Transferring twelve Issues to app (£4200)
Deployment (£350)
TOTAL = £13,300
SPECIAL FUNCTIONS:
. £1050 = readers will be able to index and categorise the comics by subjects, issues, characters, or their own personal folders, (ie: “Homework Related”, “Funny”, “My Hardest Subjects”, etc).
. £350 = allowing audiences to customisable colour their speech bubbles to suit their reading needs or preferences.
. £700 = a function to highlight or colour code certain panels or words that are relevant to the reader’s schoolwork or homework or interest.
. £4600 = allows readers to switch between an ‘Easy Read’, a ‘Medium Read’ and a ‘Full Read’ to suit their reading level and preference. This also allows them to progress through their reading development as it improves, (if they are a struggling reader, for example).
TOTAL = £6,700
Risks & Challenges
Part of the challenge we'll face is that this is our first step into the digital industry and so we'll be learning as we go. Every new venture has difficulties and we fully expect this to be true for our progression into this new method of presentation. However, we are working with a very experienced app developer who has already been very positive about the project and has laid out in detail the expectations and steps in the process. We believe that with their guidance we can weather the storm that is app development and ensure the best possible final product.
We also have a large amount of our content already available in this format as our creative process is largely done online. This means that there should be minimal delay between the app being released and the current library of Dekko content becoming available to our users.
As well as the app development itself this venture will require us to increase our staff numbers as we continue to expand and create new departments in the company. This can be an intimidating prospect for a small independent business but we believe that we have the necessary systems in place to ensure that this is a smooth process with minimal disruption. In the long run, we expect this expansion to improve the Dekko process and will mean that we'll be able to have a consistent scheduled release date for our monthly subscriptions.
We know how important communication is in these campaigns and we are committed to ensuring that all of our backers are kept informed. With regular updates on our progress both during the campaign and after when the app is actually being developed. If you have any questions about anything at all please don't hesitate to ask - you're part of the Dekko community now and we are always happy to help.
Other Ways You Can Help
If you can't contribute any money then fear not, we still need your support with as many likes, shares and comments as you can possibly provide.
To be as updated as possible please keep an eye on our social media pages - we have a twitter page @DekkoComics and a facebook page https://www.facebook.com/dekkocomics/ where we'll have regular updates as well as posts for you like and share with your friends and family.
Every little bit helps us to increase our profile and ensure as many people as possible see our campaign. Without this kind of support we would not have come as far as we have today.
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