Gateway High School alum Chris Guenzel and his family create unique drawing app for kids .
From Table to Tablet
Gateway High School alum Chris Guenzel and his family create unique drawing app for kids .
By Jennifer Brozak
Chris , Shannon , Blase and Greta Guenzel
For Chris Guenzel , necessity was indeed the mother of invention . In 2011 , after spending a long day at a Pittsburgh museum , Guenzel and his wife , Shannon , had stopped with their children and extended family to grab a meal at a local restaurant . With six children and four adults in the mix , Guenzel says it quickly became apparent that the dinner had the potential to be “ challenging .”
“ We were outnumbered ,” Guenzel , a 1987 graduate of Gateway High School , says with a laugh . “ It had been a long day , and the kids were being kids .”
In an effort to keep the young cousins “ relatively quiet ” and occupied , he invented a simple game . Every few minutes , he would give the kids something silly to draw , like “ a vampire eating a pepperoni pizza during a snowstorm .” Guenzel would then score the artwork and give loose change to the child with the best drawing . The game was an instant hit . Each time the family would get together to go out to eat , the cousins would ask Guenzel to play “ that drawing game .” Following one of those gatherings , Shannon suggested that the game would make a great app for kids .
“ Like a lot of people , we ’ re always tossing different ideas around ,” says Guenzel . “ But we thought this one had great potential , and that it would be a fun family project .”
“ It showed our kids that when you put your mind to something , and you work hard , that it will pay off . We ’ ve all learned from this .”
However , he works in pharmaceutical sales , and had no idea where to start . He turned to Upwork , an online freelance marketplace , for help . He soon found a developer and artist who could work within his budget .
Bringing the app — which the Guenzels named “ Doodle What !?!”— to market wasn ’ t without complications . The first developer had to quit the project due to a health condition , and Guenzel soon found out that all of the features he wanted to include on the app wouldn ’ t be possible within his budget . Still , the family persisted , bringing the app to fruition with the help of developer Mirza Zaim of Genial Solutions . From start to finish , the project took more than a year .
Before Doodle What !?! launched in April of this year , Guenzel ' s team took the app through 11 different versions . His children , 12-year-old Blase and 8-year-old Greta , served as beta testers , as did their cousins , Aria Lauritzen , 12 ; Fiona Lauritzen , 9 ; Julia Parente , 11 ; and Connor Parente , 9 .
The children , who are all Norwin students , were heavily involved in the design process and also contributed various nouns , adjectives and verbs to the more than 1 million quirky drawing combinations the game offers , such as “ a caterpillar smooching on a basketball court ” or “ a ballerina bowling at the zoo .” Shannon , a former English and special education teacher and Gateway graduate , helped to craft the storyboards to present to the developer . She also provides the monster ’ s voice for the app ’ s YouTube commercial .
“ Shannon is the one who had the vision and the idea ,” says Guenzel . “ She helped me with the big picture .”
Doodle What !?! amassed 250 downloads in its first few weeks , and the Guenzels continue to have ideas for both updating the app and for creating additional apps in the future . Chris named his burgeoning tech company KnuckleMonster Games , after the name of his rock band , Knuckle Monster , for which he is the drummer . “ I didn ’ t know what to expect when we started this process , but I ’ m not doing this to get rich ,” he explains , pointing out how difficult it is to compete in a market that ’ s flooded with apps like Angry Birds . “ It was just a great experience for all of us . It showed our kids that when you put your mind to something , and you work hard , that it will pay off . We ’ ve all learned from this .”
Doodle What !?! is available for download for $ 1.99 from both Google Play and the App Store , where it ’ s received numerous 5-star reviews . For more information , visit doodlewhat . com . n
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