Interactive Magazines

Hi Guys,

I've noticed that a lot of the online magazines use software to animate the page flips of their magazines or brochures. What's the best company to use?

Has anyone used them before? I know some you need to host on servers etc. Ideally I'd like a simple piece of software/app that allows me to convert pdf into the page flip style.

There must be some freeware version floating around too??

Any help would be much apprecaited!

cheers

Steve
 
thanks for the links! yes this is what I mean, however I think you need to be quite proficient in Flash to use these. I know there are some software based apps the links you've provided are more a flash aid.

Cheers
 
I think they're just add ons for Flash, so you don't need to know how they work. I'm sure there are some software based ones though; a Google should find what you're after.
 
Here's a couple of other free one's I've come across FlippingBook flash page flip engine - PDF to flip book convertor or xml-swf version and Issuu - You Publish

I've not used either of these but think they look pretty good. We developed our own version at work http://www.zeenit.co.uk which has a pretty user friendly back end (add internal/external links, video etc) - example of mag jetskiermagazine we use it for a few of our own bits and set up versions for clients to use, I don't know the charges as I don't very often get involved in it... but could find out if your keen.

The market leaders as far as I'm aware are Home | Ceros digital magazines and interactive publications but I image they would probably be out of budget... depends how big the job is.

One thing to bear in mind when designing is font sizes etc need to be much larger so they can be viewed without zooming in otherwise they are just annoying and lose the point.
 
THe last agency i worked at - had an app called 'pagecurl' or something similar - just dropped in jpegs after specifying page count etc.

Worked a treat.

Think it Page Curl - or pagecurler.

Something like that.
 
I'm a big fan of the previously metioned issuu.com, the new version has added features for customising backgrounds and even adding a soundtrack if you wish. Also is really easy to embed live thumbnail versions onto websites and blogs, generates the HTML code for you.

The other bonus is there are loads of great portfolios and inspiration books you can bookmark, which then gives you a virtual library shelf of your chosen publications, you can download the PDF too, quite neat. One of the best for inspiration is a Bangkok user called Hahru click on the thumbnail on my blog to view his books,

Russell Hall Design: Great Online Inspiration Books
 
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