Apple

Thank you, Steve Jobs. Here's to the crazy ones… Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. Think Different.

I had come home from a wake of a long time friend of mine. His death was sudden and unexpected. I was in disbelief that we lost him so quickly. It wasn't long after I checked Google+ to see what was going on while I was away and to distract my attention from the loss of a friend. To my surprise, there it was... people posting story after story about Steve Jobs. Just returning from my good friend's wake and knowing Steve Jobs' health had been declining for some years now, I feared the worst.

Wednesday saw the passing of a visionary. However you might feel about Steve Jobs, there's no denying that he has changed our world.

My original plans for tonight (Wednesday night) was indeed to write about Apple, it was going to be my take from Tuesday's Apple announcements. So many people have been asking me about the announcements that Apple made at the event, I wanted to put down my thoughts here to share.

Although I have many, one iOS app not yet in my photography tool box is Filterstorm (App Store link). It has been highly recommended (especially in the Instagram community) by others and it has been on my 'want list' for some time now. Well, if you needed an excuse to buy it now (perhaps such as myself), it is has recently been upgraded to 3.0. The upgrade features a new interface along with some new features. It will be interesting to see how this app compares with other full featured photography post processing apps on the iOS such as PhotoForge2 and Photo fx (App Store links) among many others of course. It looks to be more similar to the former than the latter. Despite its name, I don't believe it is what we would call a photo filter app on iOS today. To my understanding it considers adjustments to exposure, color correction, sharpening, etc. as filters (as opposed to more artistic filters such as those in Instagram and others). It is now on sale in the App Store for half off (currently $1.99 from $3.99) for June 23-24, 2011.

Apple has released Final Cut Pro X to the Mac App Store (store link: Final Cut Pro - Apple®) today. The long awaited upgrade for this professional movie editor software has been rewritten from the ground up. The big news when it was announced a few months ago was that it would be coming to the Mac App Store with a new price of only $299 (previously FCP itself was $999). Other companion apps that had been included in Final Cut Pro Studio suite such as Motion and Compressor are sold separately also in the Mac Store for $49 each. It doesn't look like Soundtrack Pro has made the cut though, at least not yet.

Often I am asked which apps I use to do produce the images I do using just an iPhone. I decided to collect some of the apps I go to most for my iPhone photography at this time and list them here with some comments on each.

So you just got a new iPhone and you want to learn all the ins and outs of it? Or perhaps, you had an iPhone for some time, but you still feel like a newbie? Even for long time users, sometimes it is easy to forget the basics or not keep up with changes that each new iOS brings when it is upgraded.

Now you can have iPhone lessons right in your pocket... right on your iPhone. Your instructor is Worth Godwin. The app is the Video Training Course for iPhone (App Store link).

Being an avid Instagram user, I was excited to learn that there is a new client app for the social photo sharing service on the Mac. A third party app, called InstaDesk (App Store link).

Since Instagram opened their API to the public, there have been several new options for third party Instagram clients or web interfaces. For example, on the iPad there is Instagallery (App Store link) and Flipboard (App Store link) which will allow you to access your Instagram account. There are several web interfaces available as well, my favorite has to be Webstagram.

With the exception of posting photos and applying filters, you can basically do everything you can do on the official Instagram app (currently only available for the iOS) and more using Instagram API. Again, the best example of implementing the API is probably Webstagram that I have seen so far. As good as Webstagram may be though, it is still a website, not an application.

The popular 3rd party camera app for the iOS, Camera+ (App Store link) has been updated. Among some of the updated enhancements is a new feature called, 'Clarity.' While it seems like it is being trumped as a one button fix-all for all your bad photos, I would not be so quick to use it blindly. Like with any other post-processing feature for your images, you will want to compare the results you get from using it first. It is possible that while it may add 'clarity' to a photo, it may also affect the contrast and shadow elements as well.

The GetGlue app (from AdaptiveBlue) for iPhone and iPod touch has been updated and with it, it has a newly enhanced user interface and more. (See my previous article, Get Glued on GetGlue for more details on GetGlue). In addition to the user interface refresh, which is a quite welcomed refresh, it also now allows you to check into "sports" in addition to the previous categories already available such as television, movies, books, music, wine, etc. Also it now offers Foursquare location check-in integration as well (unfortunately, Gowalla is not also offered as an option as well).

It was X years ago today that Apple released Mac OS X, changing the face of the desktop OS forever.

While it may be okay to use the digital zoom in the iPhone 4 in an emergency situation, we all know that optical zoom works best with cameras. In the case with the iPhone or other mobile phones or cameras without any optical zoom, you may do better not touching the digital zoom and just crop the image later and/or enlarge the area of the photo you want to zoom into later on using photo editing software (be it on your desktop or your mobile device).

In December 2010, I had the privilege of witnessing of the rare occurrence of a winter solstice lunar eclipse. I had documented it live over the net via my DSLR camera and iPhone. Since that time there have been several requests for copies or prints of the images, especially the montage images showing the progression of the eclipse.

You can now commemorate the winter solstice lunar eclipse of 2010 on various items from prints, to journals, mugs, tote bags, shirts, etc. They are all available for purchase here at the Winter Solstice Lunar Eclipse 2010 Shop.

What has become somewhat of a tradition for me here, I am posting about a couple of iPhone (iOS) apps currently on sale in the App Store that might be of interest to iPhone photographers.

I haven't tried them as yet at the time of this writing, so obviously I this is not meant to be a review or recommendation. I hope to try them out soon though.

Both are similar in respects that they apply filters and/or textures to your photos to alter their look and/or mood.

After being pulled from the App Store by Apple for violating its interface standards for apps (by including a hidden function that changed the volume controls into a shutter button for this camera app to use), the Camera+​ - tap tap tap has returned.

Just a quick heads up on some price drops of Star Wars iOS apps. I don't know if these are merely sales or permanent price changes. That said, I would assume they are on sale for a limited time instead of risk it and see the prices jump back up.

Star Wars: Trench Run - THQ Wireless Inc.
(See a previous article I posted on this title: Stay On Target - Trench Run Upgraded) Now 99¢ (was $2.99)