Towards the Development of a Platform for Children Virtual Books based on Augmented Reality

Abstract

In the current world, people can both support and improve their skills using new technologies. Particularly, the reading process could be enriching employing virtual reality features, adding educative virtual content in books. A virtual book is composed by 2D/3D content superimposes over a physical printed book, focus into obtain a new perspective of the classical reading process. Then, if this perspective can be added from the early stages of reading process, it could improve that process. Most tools to create these books are associated with a specific domain and development (e.g. editorial-based formats and conditions, according to the kind of book), and they are not free to access. We present a robust and efficient platform to develop interactive books using augmented reality, mainly we focus on children books. The platform is web-based offering a simple and dynamic platform for writers and final users. This is capable to create, distribute, and manage books in a customized way, adding resources such images, sounds and videos. We evaluated our proposal in 20 people measuring the time to complete a virtual book in the created platform, moreover, we achieved a questioner to obtain how difficult the process is. Results allow identifying the advantage and disadvantage for users, validating our approach obtaining satisfactory results. We are focused on continuing the expansion of the virtual book development process, which might be a new expansion research field in our country.