The Daily Grind

A Development Blog by SMALLMEDIUM

Update: Avatar Creator 2 is now available (iTunes Link) and it’s a free upgrade to all of our 1.x users.

We wanted this to be a surprise but it’s been a while since our last update so we wanted to let all of our users know that we aren’t sitting on our laurels…

If you would like to skip the words and just see the pictures just click here.

Thanks to you and all of our supporters who have made Avatar Creator the #7 Top Paid Social Networking app in the US.

We’ve taken the very best of our user feedback and we’re packing it into a BIG update for the app. If you too want to contribute your ideas for Avatar Creator please email us at ideas@smallmedium.com.

Among the top requests that we are fulfilling in the next update of Avatar Creator are:

• More hair, especially womens hairstyles, more modern mens hair styles and longer hair
• More poses
• Colored poses
• A faster and more fluid interface
• A more user friendly contact list
• Slimmer head shapes
• And more eye selections with a more youthful look

Well, you asked for it, and your voices were heard. All of these and many more features (over 20 new features) will be included in our 2.0 update which we will be submitting to Apple for review very soon.

We’re going to make this app deserving of the 2.0 designation that we are giving it and we know you’re going to love it.

Please keep in mind that we must always wait for Apple to approve our updates. This is as frustrating for Smallmedium as it is to our users. But I personally promise to you that once 2.0 is launched you can expect new updates to follow, we’re always listening to our user feedback and are constantly improving the Avatar Creator app.

When will 2.0 be available to you?

We can’t say for sure because we are at the will of Apple’s review process, but our estimate is that it will become available to everyone by mid to late September.

If there is any way we can get this to you sooner then rest assured we will do everything we can to make that happen, but ultimately we are at the whim of Apples Review Process, which as of late has been garnering Apple some bad press because of their inconsistencies and long delays on app approval.

Make no mistake, creating an app like this takes time and love but we’re committed to making Avatar Creator even better so we’re putting all of our blood, sweat and tears into this update and for future updates to come.

If you have any comments or ideas please feel free to leave them on this blog post or email us at ideas@smallmedium.com.

Thank You,
Jordan Wan
Software Development Manager
Smallmedium

For those that can’t wait to see the new artwork, you will find a selection of samples below.

We are still in production so there will be even more hairstyles and many other avatar parts added to 2.0, we know you’re going to love it!

Below you can see the new poses that we’ve created for you. Notice now that they are finally in color. This was a technical challenge as we had to make the skin tones adapt to your avatars skins. But we really wanted to be able to do this for users so we’ve worked hard to make it possible and I can tell you personally that they look fantastic when you pose your avatars.

What it takes, this video is a time-lapse of the production process for hair it represents 130 minutes compressed to just a few seconds. This is just half of the story, what it doesn’t show you is the hand drawings that Chad makes first that we use as a guide.