Pixton

 Pixton

 Basic Information

Pixton is easy-to-use comic book software with premade templates and characters.

Primary Use:

• [General] Create comic book or characters
• [Faculty] Digital Comic Book, Storytelling, Lessons
• [Students] Homeworks, Projects, Lessons

Key Features:

• When creating characters, you are provided with a handful of template images that can be changed to fit your needs.
• Alter the character using a wide selection of adjustments in order to make a completely unique look.
• Pixton has a large amount of different styles from short one-line comics, to large poster sized images.
• It lets you give text and speech bubbles to characters.
• It lets you edit the shape and position of each comic panel.
• It offers unlimited range of expressions.
• It lets you upload your own photos and personalize them the way you want.
• It provides presets, templates, and shapes..

 
Introduction to Pixton EDU 

Category: Interactive Tool

Keywords: Storytelling, Comic Creation, Media Creation

 Detailed Information

Full Description:

Pixton is a comic creation site (as well as Android and iOS app) where creators can both make and share their comic strips. It’s simple to navigate. After teachers establish a classroom site, they receive codes to distribute to students. Students can join by entering the code or teachers can manually add students to their class page. After students create an avatar (in comic form, of course!), they follow the step-by-step comic creator to begin their graphic stories. Teachers can make a specific assignment, or let students create freely. Options include the number of panels and the layout of a page. Visual icons help students add artwork, backgrounds, and text bubbles to comics (students don’t draw their own stuff here but pick from a bank of fun images). A handy link to video tutorials is located right in the workspace, and the videos open up above a comic-in-progress, allowing students to toggle between how-tos and their own comic. Once students save, there are options for sharing the work (depending on the moderation settings established by the teacher).

Tool Access

To access the tool online or for a related download link (if available) please see sources below:

• Basic and trial account but with limited features
• Paid Subscription
• Available on iOS and Android for Free

Advantage/ Disadvantage:

Pixton has intuitive design with plenty of options for sharing work and adding multimedia. However, Limited potential for creating original artwork, and available art depicts mostly human characters. Bottom Line: Students will be motivated to share subject knowledge using the fun language of comics.

Good for Teaching:

Pixton for Schools brings students together in an online classroom to learn about comics and the graphic arts; which, as mediums, build students’ art skills, stretch their creative muscles, and help students think critically about sequencing, context, and story structure. Check out the suggested lesson plans which address subjects ranging from Math to History to Science, or just get students going with a prompt like: “Create a comic that shows one reason why Europeans came into contact with other cultures during the Middle Ages.” The ability to add project assignments with rubrics or scoring guides attached is a great feature, and you can send classwide messages and alerts to students. There are also lots of options for moderating content, which may put you at ease if you’re using Pixton as a first foray into an online writing community with a social networking aspect. Students can share comics, collaborate on projects with other students, and comment on each other’s work. Teachers with younger students may want to set the “beginner” mode, which limits the ways students can play around with graphics and may help them from feeling overwhelmed.

Good for Learning:

Pixton has a lot going for it: simple setup for teachers, easy-to-use interfaces, ability to share comics in a classroom community or beyond, and even multimedia elements like layering audio into a comic. While artwork options can feel limited (characters start to look the same after a while), Pixton is relatively easy to use and offers literacy opportunities for students across a wide range of grades. There’s an incredible abundance of options to adjust graphics, from facial expression to subtle body movements. This can feel empowering or overwhelming depending on the user. Teachers, however, can select an option that limits the graphic possibilities if they feel it’ll be beneficial. Overall, students are creatively guided to make subject-based comics; art and learning are nicely blended here.

  Reviews [For Future Use]

Public and Internal reviews on the quality of the tool and ease of use to learn/ implement.

 Learning Expectation [For Future Use]

General guidelines of how long it typically takes to learn and be comfortable (basic, advanced, expert levels) with the tool as well as what capabilities users have at each level.

• Level of difficulty to learn/ use for each level:
  • Basic  Use/ substitution: 2-4 hours of use
    • General familiarity with the tool
    • Ability to import documents in from MS Word or Powerpoint
    • Ability to create a simple document and share
  • Advanced Use/ augmentation: 20- 30 hours of use
    • General comfort with the tool
    • Ability to make a presentation from scratch including text, graphics, video, and with basic thoughts on style.
  • Expert use/ transformative (modification / redefinition): 40+ hours of use
    • Complete comfort with the tool
    • Ability to offer advice and guidance to others on the tool
    • Ability to use the tool for various design purposes: presentation, booklet, ePortofolio…
    • Understanding of layout, style (font, colors, themes) to meet end users needs

 Examples

 Tutorial Guides

If you are interested in starting with a template, which often have background, color theme, and fonts, it may save time and highlight new design elements.

• Staff Generated Templates

 Lesson

To learn from other faculty or to share your thoughts or resources (e.g. templates) please see below:

• Comments (either blog style or discussion based)
• Upload their examples/ samples (ability to post information in form)
  • Form components: (For future form)
    • Name
  • • Submission type ( Examples, Guides, Lessons, Templates, Reference Link)
  • • Title
  • • Purposes/ Uses
  • • Description (optional)
    • Attachment – Upload or Link
  • Date and Time Uploaded
  • Contact Information (hidden)
  • Download Stats
  • Rating Stats

 Reference

The key resources used to make this resource page. Most all information is public except for specific TCS generated resources. For more examples and resources (e.g. guides, templates, etc) see below:

• Common Sense Media
• Blinklist
• Eductors Technology