The KickLight is a $180 LED lamp for your iPhone. I hear you. “WHAT?!” you shout, in justifiable ALL CAPS. You even combine a question mark and an exclamation mark to further express your angered confusion. To which I can only say CALM DOWN. It’s actually worth the money.
One question I get asked a lot (well, quite a lot anyway, considering the small size our team) in the Cult of Mac chatroom is "what camera should I get for taking better product shots?"
As reviews editor, this make me happy – of course I want better pictures on our reviews! – but the truth is that the iPhone is more than capable of making amazing product shots, especially as the target is a 640-pixel web-ready JPG.
With that in mind, Photojojo put together a tutorial for Etsy to help its users take better pictures of their home-made wares. The same advice also applies to your Ebay listings, pictures for your insurer or – yes – review shots.
I almost never (except when shooting video) wish that I had a wider angle lens – it would just mean that I have to poke my camera even closer into the face of my subject. But I do often reach for the telephoto lens that isn’t there. After all, apart from a long lens’s ability to squish elements together in a picture, sometimes you just can’t walk any closer to your subject.
At those times, you can now reach for the iPad Telephoto lens for Photojojo.
Photojojo’s Crankerator is a backup battery pack with a twist. Or rather, with a spin. You can charge it via boring old wall outlets, but when the juice finally runs low, you can reanimate it with a few twists of the crank-arm on the side.
Pano Glitches are a the new fake light leaks. Only they’re better. Pano Glitching involves setting your iPhone to shoot a panorama and then dicking with it on purpose. Instead of following the instructions to smoothly sweep the iPhone across the scene in front of you, you can quickly switch views, or just jerk the phone in your hand.
Counter-intuitive though it may seem, taking a light source and putting it right up close to your subject’s face – as close as you can without getting it in frame – makes for softer light. Why? Because it makes the light bigger in relation to the subject. If that subject is a face, a bigger light can “wrap around” its contours and fill in its own shadows.
And the Photojojo Pocket Spotlight is a big light source for your iPhone.
You know those cool old waxed canvas bags which used to keep things dry before miners discovered nylon in a cave in Papua New Guinea1? Now you can make your own! Well, technically you could always make your own. But now Photojojo has provided a guide for you. Spoiler: it’s dead easy.
Question: What’s the only (non-gimmicky) photographic filter that can’t be duplicated in software? That’s right, you smart genius you! It’s the polarizer. A polarizer will do two things for your photography: it’ll increase the saturation of the colors in your pictures, and it’ll cut out unwanted reflections from glass and water. And Photojojo will now sell you one that’ll clip right onto your iPhone.
What if you could go to university and learn the basics of photography for just $5? And what if that university specialized in the camera you actually have: the iPhone? If that prospect gets you jazzed, then welcome to Photojojo University’s Phoneography 101, a course that’ll learn ya to take pictures more better.
If you’ve just realized your iPhone takes better photographs than your dedicated point-and-shoot, but you miss a traditional viewfinder, check out the new iPhone Viewfinder from Photojojo. Using a screw-on suction cup, the Viewfinder sticks to your iPhone’s display and allows you to block out the rest of the world while you’re taking snaps. It sounds crazy, and at $30, that’s exactly what it is.
Believe it or not, Christmas is almost here, and we’ll mark this midwinter festival by getting together with friends and family and continuing to drink and eat far too much.
Meanwhile, we also buy gifts for those same friends and family members, whether they want them or not. Luckily, we’re here to help, and if you follow our festive advice, your gifts just might make it into the “wanted” category.
Today, we’re looking at last-minute stocking stuffers. To be honest, if you still haven’t finished your Christmas shopping, you should really be out hitting the malls today. But seeing as you’re here reading this instead, here are a few ideas.
Believe it or not, Christmas is almost here, and we’ll mark this midwinter festival by getting together with friends and family and continuing to drink and eat far too much.
Meanwhile, we also buy gifts for those same friends and family members, whether they want them or not. Luckily, we’re here to help, and if you follow our festive advice, your gifts just might make it into the “wanted” category.
From now until Christmas, Cult of Mac will be putting together holiday gift guys full of ideas for the special ones in your life, no matter what their interests or your budget. Today, we’re looking at gifts that cost less than $30. Yes, that means you are cheap, and — seeing as you still haven’t bought anything despite it being almost Christmas — lazy.
Believe it or not, Black Friday has already come and gone. Pretty soon the Christmas season will begin, and we’ll mark this midwinter festival by getting together with friends and family and continuing to drink and eat far too much.
Meanwhile, we also buy gifts for those same friends and family members, whether they want them or not. Luckily, we’re here to help, and if you follow our festive advice, your gifts just might make it into the “wanted” category.
From now until Christmas, Cult of Mac will be putting together holiday gift guys full of ideas for the special ones in your life, no matter what their interests or your budget. Today, we’re looking at gifts for people who have an unnatural love for their iPhones. Freaks.
Imagine, if you will, a world where cellphone cameras and SLRs get along. A world where one was never teased by the other. Imagine a world where Canon and Nikon lenses can be used as easily on an iPhone as they can on their own bodies.
Now open your eyes and look around. How do you feel? Does anything look any different? It should, because the whole world just changed. Behold! The iPhone SLR Mount.
I can’t be the only person who took a look at the new iPods’ wrist straps and thought, “I want that for my iPhone.” I’m forever pulling my iPhone 5 from my pocket to snap something for Instagram, and it’d be totally neat if I could just keep the thing in my hand instead, and never have to worry about dropping it.
Happily, the fine folks at Photojojo also felt the persistent pull of gravity and did something about it. Presenting: The iPhone Wrist Strap.
Sometimes, you really need to make an important Skype call when you’re on the go. Or you want to use your bike as a giant (and slightly unwieldy) “tripod” for your camera. At these times, what you need is Photojojo’s Bikepod
We’re used to cheap software mimicking expensive hardware, and nowhere has that been truer than with tilt-shift photography. What was once an effect needing super-expensive and unwieldy architectural camera gear is now a free filter in many free apps.
But the trend sometimes goes the other way. Here’s the Tilt Shift camera from Photojojo, an actual physical digital camera with a tilt-shift lens. For $150.
The iPad Mini is here, and it is lying naked and vulnerable on your desk/bed/lap/passenger seat. And that’s ok, because today is all about tweaking and configuring your settings, installing apps and seeing which of your pants have back pockets big enough to carry it (don’t sit down!)
But what of tomorrow? Soon you’ll start searching for cases, speakers, docks and other accessories for the latest tiny addition to your family, and that’s where we come in. Yes, you can use most of your iPad and iPhone accessories with the new Mini, but here are some add-ons which work particularly well with Apple’s littlest tablet.
Man-bag. Murse. He-purse. Call it what you like, but you need one. Finally men in the U.S are following the European example and carrying their day-to-day gear in a bag instead of stuffing it all into a wallet, and then jamming that into a back pocket.
Cameras, iPads, iPhones, chargers, e-books and — yes — even wallets need a place to go, and what follows is our roundup of the best bags to put them in.
And who knows? Maybe one day your adult males will stop wearing baseball caps and shorts and start dressing like grown-ups instead?
The thing I like best about the Chromonaut camera bag isn’t the price (it’s a ridiculous $215), or the fantastic retro styling. Nor is it the name, which makes me think of 1970s pulp sci-fi magazines. Nope. The best part of this cool camera carrier is the removable padded inserts, which mean that the bag doubles as, well, a regular bag. An expensive regular bag, sure, but at least it won’t get left at home when you go to the beach.
Camalapse is short for “camel prolapse,” although oddly it has nothing to do with either ungulate mammals or slipping organs. Instead, the Camalapse is a clockwork stand for your camera which takes 360˚ time-lapse sequences.
Yes, this is yet another iPhone tripod thingy, but this one is a little different. First, it’s not a Kickstarter project, so you can order it right now should you choose to. And second, it fits onto your keyring, so you will always have it with you when you need it – handy, because nobody every pats there pockets as they leave the house and thinks “You know, I really should take that iPhone photo stand out with me today. Y’know – just in case.”
I don’t own a necktie, and I haven’t been clean-shaven since sometime in the mid-to-late 1990s. But that doesn’t mean I can’t brush up nice and get all dressed up from time to time. Which is why I’m seriously considering one of Photojojo’s smart-looking Camera Strap Neckties.
Want to take your iPhone to the beach? Fancy taking it with you for a swim and snapping some sweet underwater snaps? Or are you just a friendless loser who is so repulsive that they can’t even find somebody to look after their stuff while they go for a quick dip?
If any of these apply to you, then you might like to take a look at Photojojo’s new iPhone Scuba Suit. And if the last applies to you, then go ahead and buy this waterproof case, but just stay away if you see me by the ocean, OK?
Best Of Photo Accessories [Best Of]
We have noticed a big crossover between Apple users and camera geeks. And while the iPhone’s own camera continues to get better and better, your old SLR still has some life in it yet. And whatever you shoot with, there are accessories that can perk up your interest or let you catch an otherwise-impossible shot. These are the best of them.
