May 21, 2012

The Daily: Now Available on iPhone

Today, the news publication application, The Daily, has finally ventured outside of the iPad realm, making the application now available for both iPhone and iPod Touch. The Daily, which became available a little over a year ago launched only with the iPad. This was a smart move at first, due to the iPad being so welcoming for magazine/newspaper readers, because of the large screen size. However, iPhone users felt forgotten by the publication.

The Daily for iPhone, now available in the App Store, isn’t as visually appealing as the iPad version. In fact, it seems a bit of a simple and dry design. However, the features are still there. You can view headlines, news slideshows, and more. However, due to the smaller device size, The Daily felt it was appropriate to compliment it with a smaller cost. The Daily for iPhone users is now available for $1.99 a month, and $19.99 a year. If you are already an iPad subscriber, access to The Daily for iPhone is free, so enjoy!

Google Drive: The Overview

Google released, on Tuesday, Google Drive, a service that allows you to save you digital information in the cloud. You can access the information you save on Google Drive online and on your smartphone. Google Drive is working toward becoming competition with other cloud based services like Dropbox. Google Drive is compatible with Mac, Windows, iOS, and Android. You can collaborate with the documents you save on Google Drive. Google Drive gives you 5GB of memory for free to any user. Today, we will take a look at a couple of features in Google Drive.

Features in Google Drive

Like other cloud based services, Google Drive is working toward becoming the service that will have your information safe and available anywhere. From your laptop to your iPhone, Google Drive wants to be the service that keeps your information safe. However, unlike other services, Google Drive allows you to make changes and edits to your and other files saved on the service. This is perfect collaboration that you won’t find with the other services. Google Drive is also linked with Google search. For example, when you search for a photo in web search, there is a section on the options section on the left that allows you to just select to search for your photos.

Availability and Costs

Google Drive isn’t available yet, it is expected to be available in the near future. However, we do know how much Google Drive will cost. Google Drive took a tip from Dropbox and ensured that all users will be able to use free space to start with. All users get 5GB to start, from there if you require more space, it will be available for $2.49 for 25GB, 100GB for $4.99, and 1TB for $50.00. These prices are monthly. Still, when compared to Dropbox for example it’s cheaper to choose Google Drive. With Google Drive, 100GB costs $59.98 a year, $200 a year with Dropbox.

Top Five Camping Apps for iPhone

Traditional camping is a lost tradition of family fun and gathering. With the popularity, and ease of having a vacation in a nice, warm hotel with service at hand 24/7 may seem a bit more appealing than having to cook your own meals over an open bon fire. However, camping does not have to be a difficult or boring event. There are many ways to make camping a fun experience for all of the family members involved. Today, we will take a look at five iPhone applications that can make your weekend enjoyable.

Camping List for iPhone

It is important to make sure to have everything that you need for your camping trip. Once there, unlike a hotel where you can ask the front test or go to a near by shop for the necessities, camping is not as convenient. Camping List helps plan what you need based on which trip you are going on, whether it will include hiking, fishing, biking, and more. The list is separated by category, depending on whether you need toiletries, clothes, and everything in between. The lists are all editable, making it perfect for you trip for only $1.99.

Classic Camping Cookbook and Meal Planner

Camping can mean not having the conveniences of a full kitchen. As a result, dining while in the wilderness can seem near impossible. However, that is not the case with the Classic Camping Cookbook from Coleman. The application outlines various meals you can plan and prepare from the tools and foods you brought along and have with you. In addition, to prevent you from having to search around in a panic and make up foods to prepare, you can also use the dedicated meal planner that comes with the application, allowing you to plan for your meals by the day. From Western Tortillas to Campfire Cobbler, the choices are near endless.

TrailBehind

When camping, it is important for you to know the best trails based on what individuals who have spent time there have to say. TrailBehind is the Yelp of camping, allowing you to see user generated reviews of various trails and summits around the country. TrailBehind allows you to get directions as well as see trails that are near you based on distance.

Accuweather

There is no way of having an enjoyable camping experience if there is a storm near. Accuweather and many other weather applications on the app store are essential for your camping trip. Accuweather uses its high quality design, and graphics to show you the weather for the day, along with humidity, visibility, sunset or rise times, and more. You can also get the week’s forecast and weather reports. The application is free; however that does mean that it comes with a couple of ads, which some have found a bit annoying.

MotionXGPS

One of the best parts of camping is being able to enjoy the wonderful scenery. MotionXGPS is the best backpacking and hiking app for anyone venturing out. MotionXGPS allows you to see where you are, plot where you want to return to, and gives you to fastest trail to where you want to go. The app uses downloaded maps, meaning it is meant for offline use of course. This is all for less than one dollar. Because of the constant drain on your battery, it is essential to get an iPhone battery-pack case to prevent not knowing how to get back due to a dead device.

Top Three Apps That Help with Sleeping

It’s a proven fact that individuals are finding it harder to get a good night’s rest. Not only is it difficult to actually get in the bed to sleep, but also it’s even more difficult to stay asleep and get in all eight recommended hours. In the morning, this leaves us groggy, irritable, and not able to make it through the rest of the day. However, these three applications available on the app store make it easier to not only go to sleep, but also to stay asleep and awaken renewed and fresh.

Sleep for iPhone

If you need to get to sleep, it is essential to have an application that gets you there in the most enjoyable and peaceful way possible. Sleep for iPhone does that. Sleep allows you to listen to various sounds that are relaxing, soothing, and can get you to sleep in a fast but steady pace. Sleep is one of the most popular apps in its category, featuring 100 sounds that can get your head to the pillow soon. Aside from sleep, Sleep for iPhone is great for any need to relax as well. From a stressful day at work or school, Sleep can help you slow down. It runs in the background, allowing you to hear your alarm in the morning. Lastly, it works great for children with Sleep’s lullaby feature. For 0.99, Sleep is an essential app for everyone needing to get a good night’s sleep.

Deep Sleep with Andrew Johnson

It can seem a bit cliché for some individuals to rely on a recorded voice meditation to get to sleep. However, Deep Sleep is an application that works well for anyone wanting to get a good night’s sleep. You are able to adjust settings for how the recording starts off and ends, as well as how it is in the middle. The application runs in the background. Lastly, Deep Sleep is an application that is a bit more affordable than other options, for just $2.99, compared to some reaching over $5. The voice of Andrew Johnson will surely help you get to sleep quickly and to stay asleep.

NightStand HD for iPhone

Now that you’ve had a restful sleep, it’s now time to wake up. The best way to wake up is with a suitable alarm application. NightStand HD is the perfect application for that, being a famous alarm application on the App Store. Nightstand HD has support for multiple alarms, from stopwatches to timers, and alarms to wake you up all in between. If you won’t want a loud beeping sound to welcome you to a new day, Nightstand allows you to wake up to your own personally chosen iTunes playlist. The app looks beautiful, and for only $2, the price is beautiful too!

Review of Photoshop Touch for iPad 2

While many of my friends seemed to not like the idea of Photoshop on the iPad, I thought it was something that should have come a lot faster. The touchscreen interface seems to welcome the intricate features that are required to make the full use of Photoshop. This is something that my Macbook trackpad just can’t do. However, once the software arrived, I hoped that my expectations would be met. Today, let’s take a look at Photoshop Touch for iPad to see if it’s an application that is worth the download for iPad.

Interface

When you look at the desktop version then you look back at the iPad version, you will be quite surprised at how simple Photoshop Touch actually is. Photoshop Touch does this the right way by making it simple without skimping on the important features that are needed in Photoshop. You have everything from Clone Stamp to Brush and everything in between. Your main interface is quite simple to understand. You have a back button at the top left area that allows you to exit out of a photo that is in your Workspace. You can also add a photo by clicking the button next to it. You also have options, pencil settings and much more.

The App’s Performance

Photoshop Touch is very easy to navigate through and it seems to come without any major glitches. This is due to the fact that all the features are condensed and not a fully powered Photoshop workhouse in your little iPad. It is tailored for the iPad, which makes the performance a lot faster. As mentioned before, using the finger to get many of these operations done is something I really find essential for the intricate stuff. It’s an app with the software feel.

How to Get Started

To begin a project, you must first add your photo. To do this, you have many options. You can look up photos already in your iPad’s album. In addition, you can take a photo straight from your iPad for Photoshop Touch. Plus, you can take advantage of the social networking features that allow you to easily import from websites like Facebook. While there is Google support, it’s the images domain, which surprises me because with Google +’s great photo settings, and with it’s good implementation as a standalone app a couple of months ago, I felt Google + would have had a great second home on Photoshop Touch. However, it’s not the case yet. So, as we move on, we see that after you have chosen the photo needed, you are now ready to make the corrections.

Possibilities of CS5 for iPad

I would love to see more of the other Adobe family products found on iPad as a standalone application. Instead of Premiere Pro, how would Premiere Touch sound? It seems fitting to have more of Adobe’s other products in an iPad form. In addition, with Apple’s imminent release of the iPad 3, a better camera is expected to be in the works. Apple, Adobe, are you listening?

Strengths and Drawbacks

Photoshop Touch is a great application that I am excited to finally see on iPad. There are a couple of things that I wish I would have seen on this release though. For example, Photoshop photos aren’t really shown to their full glory on Photoshop Touch, while Photoshop Touch photos can. This seems to be a start with the varied options for photo importation, but I hope to see this feature in a new release. In addition, while it does have this cloud version known as Creative Cloud, you can’t make sure of iCloud for your Photoshop Touch creations. Lastly, you can’t use it on iPad 1. This was expected, but it’s still not something we want to see. There are many more drawbacks, I’m sure, however for a release model, Photoshop Touch is doing itself right so far.

Photoshop Touch: $9.99

Smartr for iPhone: The Only Address Book You Need

When iOS 5 came, I was surprised by the number of friends I have that had a Twitter page. If you aren’t familiar with the feature in iOS, if your contact has an email in your address book, it will be checked by the Twitter profiles to see one that matches. If it does, it will be added to their contact on your iPhone and their contact photo can be updated with their Twitter photo. This was a great way of adding social media contacts to my friends, but I wanted more. I wanted an address book that used many of the sites I use everyday, multiple times a day even. I found that with Smartr, an address book that accumulates your contacts by social media, including even some of their updates. Let’s take a closer look.

Some Great Features

To work, Smartr uses some of the information found in the native iPhone contact book. This gives you the basis of who will start out in your Smartr contact book. From there, the Smartr application uses email addresses from your contacts to gather social networking websites that they may be apart of. You can also connect websites they are apart of, which will add their most recent information and updates. This will, in the end, allow you to just select a contact and reply to a post or send them a message on the respective site. Thankfully, Smartr uses iCloud!

How To Begin

Before collecting the information of your friends, Smartr wants you information first. To begin, you must add your social networking information. You will have to add your email address, social media websites, etc. In choices for emails, you have many choices, from Gmail to Yahoo, and Outlook in between. Social media choices include Twitter, Facebook, Linked In etc.

Contact Interface

Once everything is compiled, Smartr has a convenient searching tool allowing you to easily retrieve a contact. If you don’t have a lot of contacts, you can manually search by scrolling, like in the native contacts app. Each page will show the contacts image and other compiled information. If the contact has a photo, the source will be shown below the image. If they have a phone number, you can contact straight from the application. There are three tabs at the top, one for profile, another for the history of contact between you both, third is contacts you have in common based on common friends and followers. The history tab gives you a graph of your recent contact, showing when contact has spiked, in a bar graph form.

What I Love

The first thing I love is how free it is. Smartr is one of those free applications that really do work well. However, great free applications come with advertisements, except for Smartr, that’s one thing that threw me by surprise. I also enjoy how I can see the updates from contacts, instead of having to activate another app or Safari. Having in app updates allows for a more productive application.

What I Could Live Without

Well I guess it isn’t something I can live without, but it is something overwhelming, and it’s the amount of features Smartr has. This means not everyone will gravitate on Smartr. However, another thing that seemed a little iffy about Smartr was how everyone’s information is with Smartr, it being internet based as well. This can make many feel a bit cautious. Aside from the set up process being a bit long, Smartr is great for the price.

Review: Moviegram for iPhone

I was out with friends watching Chronicle this weekend, a movie I recommend all of our readers to see, however before watching, we had a big dilemma. We weren’t sure what to see, we balanced what movies we already saw with ones that were considered good to watch based on trailers. This involved searching online and looking at the recommendations of the Rotten Tomatoes. However, this seemed tedious and we wondered if there was an easier way of finding out what great movies were out. Moviegram is the application that will make things a lot easier when we go for our next outings. Is it worth the download though? Let’s take a look and find out.

Interface

Moviegram’s interface and simple and easy to navigate. It has a classic while still modern feel to the interface. When opening the app, all of the latest movies are laid out on a 3×4 grid, 12 movies are shown. The top region of the application allows you to see your recently viewed movies as well as your application information. There is also a search feature at the top as well. The very bottom is a place for ads, the way this free app makes its money. However, you can opt to have it removed by purchasing “Ad Removal”. This is another revenue system for Moviegram.

Features

Once you click on the movie of choice, you are presented with the movie’s cover(which can be larger when clicked), the title, genre, date of release, and a short introduction to the movie. Below, you have a place to watch the trailer, and even more information on the movie (the runtime, release date, rating, director, writers, and actors.At the very bottom, but above the ad, you can see Moviegram’s rating, IMDb’s rating, Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoe’s ratings. This gives you a selection of reputable ratings, all in one place. Most ratings are out of either 10 points or 100%. At the title portion, you have the ability to go back (by clicking the arrow) or sharing the respective movie on Twitter, Facebook, or by email.

Strengths and Faults

Moviegram is meant for fast information on a movie. You can view the box office favorites on the main screen, while the search is saved for the future releases. The search feature showed releases for some movies that won’t even be available until 2014, so if theres a movie you want more information on, Moviegram is almost certain to have it in its database. Even the classics, like Titanic (not the 3D version) were found in Moviegram. I also enjoy how all movies I’ve viewed in the app are kept in the Recently Viewed folder. This is great for later retrieval. However, if you ever are with friends and wondering what movie Keanu Reeves played in, you won’t know with Moviegram because it only goes by movie titles, not actors. Television shows are also not shown either, the reason it’s called Moviegram. However, all in all, Moviegram is good for the user wanting a quick reference. But there are many other applications available on the app store, that are free and offer many more features.

Moviegram for iOS - Free

Your Guide to Pinterest: The Social Network and App

I was exposed to Pinterest about two weeks ago when a friend of mine talked endlessly about her new obsession. As a guy, it seemed like Pinterest didn’t have a place for me, especially since a little under 60% of its users are in fact women. But I had to put this aside when taking a look at the application for what it is. So what in fact is Pinterest? Think of it as your collection board in a room, where you collect the cool things you find and have memories about and place them on your board. Pinterest is the same thing. You are presented with tons of topics and categories, and when you find something cool, pin it! It’s akin to Tumblr’s reposting feature, but with a couple of more features. What exactly are they? Let’s look closer at this website/app.

How Does it Work?

Pinterest works by clicking the top where you have different categories. From food to music, technology to photography, there is an interest for everyone on the site. Now that you’ve found your interest, you are now presented with some multimedia. It ranges from .gifs to videos to pictures and more. When you find an interesting media, simply pin it to your board. When signing up, you are asked to make a board. You can have some of your food boards, another for maybe clothes and so on. But there is way more that you can make use of from Pinterest, and we will look at those possibilities now.

How Does it Help Me?

Yes, I know it seems like the biggest time waster out there. You are just finding things and saying you like them. How productive can that be, right? But there are so many possibilities with Pinterest. For example, the friend of mine who exposed me to Pinterest mentioned how she has a board for clothes she’s interested in getting, another board for food she wants to cook soon, and a third for just some of her casual finds. The boards is the selling point that makes Pinterest the appealing application. In addition, the ability to share some of your boards through various websites and Twitter makes it great for wish lists as well.

Sharing Your Pins

You have your boards created and found a couple of things you want to share with friends and family for your upcoming birthday or gift giving occasion. From clothes to other things you find, you want to send the boards out to spark the minds of those you are expecting gifts from. To set up sharing through social networks, simply go to settings and select where you want to share your pins. You can also share a link through email and if they are on Pinterest, share with a friend.

Signing Up for Pinterest

Now that you’re interested in Pinterest, you have two ways to sign up. The first way is through the website, by asking for a request. Yes, Pinterest is a private social network, meaning not just anyone can join but only those with invitations. The second way to gain an invite is through a friend already on Pinterest. Various websites who offer Pinterest invites use this second option to give out invitations.

More Info…

Want to learn more about Pinterest or request an invite, check out their website here.

Words with Friends Review for iPhone

I must admit, I’m not the best nerd out there, if I’m even considered one at all. I’m not really a fan of gaming, unless it’s with a Wii or iPhone. So I felt excited to find a fun iPhone game that I can invest my hours into. That game I found was Words with Friends. This application is from the same company that brought you Farmville, a game I still have yet to try out but will soon. Words with Friends is very similar to Scrabble, strikingly similar. However, let’s test this app out to see why it’s so unique.

Interface

 

The interface of Words with Friends is pretty simple to understand. When you start up the application after setup, you are sent to a page allowing you to see active games. When it’s your turn, the game goes under the “Your Move” section, when they must do their turn, it’ll be under the “Their Movie” section. You can start a game with a Facebook user by clicking the Facebook button in the “Your Move” section, want to play with your followers? Simply click “Twitter” to create a status update. On the game board, You are presented with over 220 spaces for words. To place a letter, simply drag the piece from the bottom to the area. How do you play? Let’s get more into that.

Game Play

When playing, you have seven letters to choose from at the bottom to begin spelling a word. Once you use any number of the seven, the word stock replenishes until the number of letters remaining is 0. To find out when that time happens, look below the score board and there will be a place saying “# letters remain”. Each letter has some form of a value affecting points. The “rarer” letters as one of my opponents like to call them worth more. For example, Z has a whopping 10 point value, and letters like O have a 1 point value. On the board, there are colored sections with various letters. Here is a decoding of each box that can also help with garnering more points:

  • TW – Triple Word – 3 times the value of the letter.
  • DL – Double Letter – 2 times the value of the letter.
  • TL – Triple Letter – 3 times the value of the letter.
  • DW – Double Word – 2 times the value of the letter.
When creating your word, you must include a letter already on the board, or you’ll be presented with a “Not a valid tile placement” alert. This also means the letter must conform with the words around it to create acceptable words. It can be a bit annoying to individuals not used to Scrabble.

A Scrabble Copy?

There are many aspects of this game that make it very similar to Scrabble. However, there are a ton of differences between the games. One noticeable difference is how much time you have to play and enjoy. You probably could never image a two day Scrabble game, but i myself have been playing a Words with Friends game with an opponent for the last two and a half days. This is a great advantage in a way because I don’t feel rushed to get a word out, I can think it out to get the most points possible.

I also love how you can have a ton of active games playing. Right now, i’m playing against 22 other people, mostly fellow writers, some twitter followers, friends and family. It doesn’t feel out of place to have so many opponents as well. Being able to answer back at my own times cuts the impatient-ness out. However, there are times when I get a notice saying I have too many active games and must complete one before adding more. Usually that’s the point when i know my Words with Friends obsession has gone a tad bit too far!

What we Love About It

I was never really a Scrabble type of guy before Words with Friends. The type of games I enjoyed were action and racing games. However, Words with Friends is the perfect time waster that builds vocabulary and allows me to be create with my letters. The ability to balance more than one game is nice. However, I don’t like not being able to cancel a game if it’s not my turn. For example, if an opponent is taking too long, like a couple of days, I can’t just go in and instantly resign, I must wait. Which sometimes means I can’t add more opponents.

Also, there are some legal cheats available through Words with Friends for a price. I can truly say I haven’t tried any of them out, partially because it’s just wrong, but also because they are highly priced. This gives your opponent the upper hand in some cases if they do buy a cheat, so keep this in mind. Other than that, Words with Friends is really fun, and yes all of you FarmVille fanatics, I will give it a try over the weekend!

 

Application Name: Words with Friends

Compatibility: iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad with iOS 3.0 or later

Developer: Zynga Inc.

Price: $0.99 (Free Option Available)

Rating: 4/5

Magisto for iPhone Review: Finalist for CES Mobile Apps Contest

As a video blogger, one thing I could live without is the editing process. The processing, the audio matching, the color correcting, it involves a lot of work to make the video presentable for the web. However, how would you feel if the video you recorded could be edited, with effects and all, without you  having to do much of anything at all? That is done with Magisto, an automated video editing software that was debuted at CES today. Does it really create good video? We decided to dig into this application to see if it’s worth the download.

Download and Interface

To get started with Magisto, simply search for the application in the App Store or go to their website. After downloading the nine megabyte application, you will be prompted to add your location and whether or not you would like to receive push notifications. Both are well recommended, well, actually one is required by Magisto. The application requires you to allow use of location, to this day I don’t necessarily know why they need it for the application. After making an account, you’ll be taken to the page to shoot a video or choose from your camera roll.

When shooting a video, you have the ability to choose whether or not to use flash, or to use your front or rear facing camera. You can also click the left bottom corner to exit the application, the center red button to record, and the bottom right to finish your video. As you finish recording your video(s), they go into the queue on the right side. After choosing music, you have an area of summarizing your video by making a title. The video will prepare and “upload” (more on this later in the article).

A Masterpiece in the Making?

Let’s go more into the process of making the video. When you are taken to the home screen of Magisto, you have the ability to choose which video you want to use from two options, from directly shooting it on your phone or from the camera roll. During our testing, we used the direct record option and found no hiccups in this process. We used the landscape option when recording and found this to fit in well with the finished product because that’s how the final product will be oriented, regardless of which orientation you use. When recording, there was an option for tap to focus, but there isn’t a box or anything showing this, so you should take our word on it or see it yourself. During recording, there wasn’t any noticeable degradation of the video quality, this changes later on and we’ll go more into this when discussing the cons.

After recording, the recorded product is added to the camera roll, but not the finished project. Sadly, you can’t save it on your iPhone or your computer. When choosing music, you have various options, from “birthday” to “love”, “Dance & Electro” to “Hip Hop”. Don’t find any of the options appealing to you? No worries, Magisto allows you to choose some tunes from you iTunes library on your iDevice. When clicking a genre, you can click on each song to get a five second preview. When making the final movie, it took a little longer than I thought. I didn’t make a technical jot down of the total loading time, but it was well over five minutes for a one minute product, something my Final Cut Pro X would have taken care of in about a minute or so. Once finished, i received a push notification saying my project is ready. After viewing, I also got the option to share by email, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.

The Best and The Worst

For what it’s worth, Magisto is a nice application for casual photos between family and friends. But sadly, that’s the only good thing i have to say about Magisto, aside from its ease to use. Magisto is an application I don’t really like too much. There seems to be a large decrease in the video quality, looking something on the lines of 240p or at most 360p than the 1080p that the iPhone 4S I used recorded. In addition, if you’re in a rush, don’t expect Magisto to give you any comfort in knowing when it’ll be done. I expected it to be a couple of seconds, not five minutes. The video also isn’t saved on your camera roll, making me make the assumption that the ease of use comes at a cost. In addition, the use of the word Magisto at the end of the video made it seem like I was promoting their company rather than sharing my product.

Final Verdict

Magisto just doesn’t ring as a good video application to me. The over lack of control makes me feel like I’m in a Goldilocks situation. One software leaves me with no assistance, another offers too much control, I mean assistance, where is the software that is just right? Magisto hoped to be that application, but it seems to be the one with too much control. I gave the application a three out of five rating because the application does have potential. If you could possibly add text, or add more stuff after the product is edited by Magisto would be nice. In addition, it would be nice if the application could save the finished video to camera roll to allow more control over sharing and enjoyment. All in all, if Magisto covers even some of those issues, it’ll at least be a more viable application. As of now, I won’t be visiting it anytime soon.

Application Name: Magisto

Compatibility: iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad with iOS 4.0 or later

Developer: Sightera Technologies Ltd.

Price: Free

Rating: 3/5