Foldify

The idea at the heart of Foldify is sweet, innovative and exciting, and we want so, so much to be able to tell you that it’s wonderful and that you should download it right this second. Sadly though, it’s hampered by some flaws.

And that’s a shame, because the concept is lovely: pick from a selection of basic 3D shapes – geometric boxes and the like, simplified figures, a car, a house and so on – and then paint your own designs onto them. The clever bit is that while you actually paint onto a 2D surface – a fold-out net that you can then print, cut out and easily assemble – your marks also appear live on a 3D model beside it. What’s more, you can rotate the model as you paint, so you can easily see what the result of your creativity is, and understand how marks you’re making wrap around the edges.

Once you’re done, you can print your creation at three preset sizes, either directly to an AirPrint-compatible printer, or by emailing a PDF to your PC or Mac, and printing from there.

As well as the option of making your own designs, you can browse a gallery of community efforts – some very good – and download them too, so you can print and assemble them.

The process of creating your own designs varies from fun to frustrating. If you’re happy to use the library of (very cute and accomplished) components such as eyes and arms – adding to them with In-App Purchases – then it’s mostly fine, but the built-in drawing tools are fiddly. Worse, it’s too easy to make mistakes, and too hard to correct them.

This is, ultimately, a fun little app that had the advantage of helping teach kids about how 3D shapes can be flattened out to 2D and vice versa, but its drawing engine needs to be polished, and it needs the ability to import or define your own libraries.