Introducing Project Aqua: A creative playground for kids and parents
Children naturally have an instinct to create. Put a crayon in a child’s hand and something magical follows. Research shows that fostering this natural instinct for creativity among young children can improve problem-solving, critical thinking, empathy and ethical awareness later in life.
Project Aqua, launching today, is a free iOS app to inspire kids and parents through activities that grow creative confidence.
Where creativity and play come together
Project Aqua offers a vibrant mix of experiences for kids and families to explore their creativity. The activities help kids develop new creative skills, learn about new ways to create and proudly share work with their family.
Project Aqua helps families turn a few minutes of creativity into a daily habit and keep creativity alive during the years when it matters most.
“When your child freely creates, they learn to believe in themselves,” explains Child Development Specialist Dr. Siggie Cohen. “Every drawing, story, and idea becomes a small step toward confidence and self-expression. When creativity is part of everyday life, it shapes how kids see themselves and what they believe they can do.”
A project from Adobe Labs, Project Aqua was built by a team of Adobe parents who worked with hundreds of children, educators, and artists to design an experience that plants the seeds of lifelong creativity. Project Aqua includes a variety of creative experiences.
Fostering imagination & discovery
- Superhero Rock: Children can bring their heroes to life, crafting original comic worlds and anime-style characters.
- Fashion Island: Fashion-forward kids can become designers by sketching, styling, and showcasing their own imaginative looks.
- 3D Dunes: Kids can make their flat drawings pop into 3D and move those 3D creations in any space with augmented reality.
- 1-2-3 Pass: 1-2-3 Pass makes creating art interactive — and fun! — as friends or family pass their device back and forth to co-create mythical beasts and wild inventions, one reveal at a time.
- Magic Filters: A child’s finished drawing can be transformed with AI filters, powered by Adobe Firefly, to explore new textures and styles, turning a sketch into something unexpected like claymation or origami.
Developing creative skills
- Video Viewpoint: Video Viewpoint can help children expand their drawing skills, with videos featuring children’s book illustrators sharing the craft of drawing, design, and storytelling in ways that feel personal and possible.
- Tracing Tropics: Children can learn from the masters in Tracing Topics, which shares bite-sized lessons from great artists that show kids how to explore brushstrokes, color, and style in a way that makes art feel alive and achievable.
Building a portfolio
- Capture Cove: Most kids have dozens and dozens of drawings and paintings on paper. Those pieces often get scattered around the house and some get lost. With Capture Cove, you can scan paper drawings as easily as taking a picture. You’ll end up with a piece of digital art that can be enhanced with digital paint and magic filters.
- Aqua Museum: Project Aqua helps kids build a personal gallery that grows and evolves with their creativity. It’s not just a place to store art, but a stage to showcase it. Each museum is personal. Kids can decorate their galleries, paint the walls, choose background music, and invite friends and family to visit.
Aqua is built entirely around a child’s imagination and provides a distraction-free environment for their creativity. It also works offline, perfect for a long flight or just to pass the time in a doctor’s waiting room.
Project Aqua is available for free on iPad and iPhone. Download it today and start creating together.