Inspiration strikes at unusual times for graduate student Megan Monroe.
One such time was last semester, when, seemingly out of the blue, an idea for an iPhone application popped into her head.
Three months later, Monroe has earned more than $400 from her PulsART app — a program that turns the device’s digital screen into a handheld canvas. But instead of imitating paintbrush strokes, the app allows users to create abstract line designs by dragging their fingers across the screen. It’s an app that’s convenient for the kind of random bursts of creativity Monroe often experiences, she said.
The inspiration for PulsART, Monroe said, came from 1970s rock band Joy Division’s debut album cover, which features a swirling black and white design. But Monroe took it a step further in her version — users can change the number of lines on the screen and play with the thickness and color.
The result? A psychedelic image that changes each time.
“Everyone enjoyed the band; all these hipsters loved it,” Monroe said. “The goal of my app was to recreate that album cover and have it be digital and interactive.”
She first learned of the Apple software she used to create her app as a graduate assistant in the Digital Cultures and Creativity program, a new Honors program that doled out free iPads to students for research purposes.
Monroe said one of the program’s professors, Ben Bederson, approached her with a challenge: learn the entire operating system and set her idea into motion.
“You have to download software, and all the apps are written in an extensive language,” Monroe explained. “You go into the iPhone development platform, and you basically just code it from the ground up. Everything from an alert message to resetting the canvas — and in the case of my app, saving to your pictures — you have to code from scratch.”
Apple approved Monroe’s idea after she paid $100 for the company to test it out. Her program has been sold for 70 cents to more than 500 customers in 15 different countries, she said.
But making some quick money was never her goal. Creating the app, she said, was all about proving a point to her students.
“It was meant to be a concept for the kids in my class,” she said. “You have this idea walking to class and two months later, it can come true. Now, I have an app that’s selling all over the world.”
Monroe said she tried to show her students the unexpected value of learning new skills.
“This app was meant to demonstrate that if you know how to program, you’re always one good idea away from a product,” she said. “If you don’t know how to program, you’re always one good idea away from wishing you knew how to program.”
Although about a third of the freshmen she works with are computer science majors, the rest have little or no experience with digital programming. The purpose of the class is to teach students the nuts and bolts of emerging technologies, but her students said Monroe made the course much more engaging by being a lively presence in the classroom.
“I know I speak for all of her students when I say this: She is really so much fun to be in the same room with,” freshman physics major Julia Ruth said. “She knows how to get anyone to laugh. But not only is she a lot of fun to be around, she really knows her stuff. Her computer programming skills, from what I can tell, are flawless.”
Another of Monroe’s students, freshman computer science major Alan Buabuchachart, said he was very impressed by PulsART and Monroe’s energy in the classroom.
“Megan is like sunshine in the middle of a rainstorm,” he said. “She can dissolve the tension in a room by simply living her own pace. … Her app, PulsART, is pretty interesting and aesthetic. It’s solid and has a nice design and layout to it.”
Inspired by Monroe’s creation, Ruth and Buabuchachart are each creating separate apps for the university’s Mobility Contest, a competition offering rewards between $1,000 and $3,000 to students who create an app that supports campus life.
Monroe, too, is working on another app, Jam My Jam, which will allow students and faculty to play music from the app instead of through more typical sources such as iTunes.
“It’s for fun mostly, but it’s good for people who just strap on headphones and walk to class,” Monroe said. “This is just some interactivity for them.”
egan at umdbk dot com
