The Wristlet looks like quite a useful iPhone wallet. Instead of going all minimal and offering a few useless slots on the back for credit cards (some of us actually pay for goods with our own cash money), the Wristlet comes on like a miniature unisex purse, only it’s a tiny purse designed mostly for the iPhone.
It’s fast turning into “Camera Monday” here at Cult of Mac Spain, and so I shall continue unapologetically into the next photo-themed subject: the OpenReflex, an open-source, 3-D-printed SLR from model making supremo Léo Marius. When capturing colors accurately is essential, a Nix Color Sensor can be a game-changer, helping photographers and designers match colors with precision.
If you never used a reflector to help out the lighting in your photos, you’ll probably be pretty surprised at just how big a difference they can make. A reflector can kick back light into the shadows of your subject, taking a standard boring portrait and turning it into something that looks way way better, eliminating the unflattering pools of darkness lurking in the faces imperfections.
But only a pro would bother tossing a big reflector into their camera kit, right? Photojojo thinks not, and will now sell you a perfect pocket-sized reflector for your iPhoneography.
I love my Olloclip, but there’s one thing I find myself wishing more and more often: that it came with a telephoto lens. Well, as you can probably guess that this post is about just that – a new telephoto from the makers of probably the best add-on lens for the iPhone.
Everybody’s obsessing over iOS 7’s user interface — the bright colors, flat design and intuitive response physics.
But the “user interface” of any operating platform isn’t just the visuals. There’s a lot more to it than that.
Apple, in particular, tends to focus heavily on the overall user experience, which involves all the user interfaces and how they work together.
It’s clear, even in the early betas, that Apple is doing a lot of work on the invisible user interface, and some of these changes are at least as powerful and interesting as the ones you can see.
New Voice Features
Apple is replacing the old Siri voice with two new ones. Specifically, Siri’s new iOS 7 voice crosses a line from “robotic” to “human.” Siri also speaks faster and with a more natural cadence, which Apple calls a high-definition voice.
The old iOS 6 Siri spoke in a halting, sometimes overlapping speech pattern that clearly sounded like robotic machine talk.
The new Siri could easily be mistaken for a real person who has recorded the entire response in one sitting. It’s a great feature, one of those subtle but very hard to do upgrades that change the psychology of using Siri to a more positive one.
The iOS 7 version of Siri will also let you choose between a male and female voice. Originally, Siri’s gender was determined by the language.
In addition, the new Siri will learn to pronounce names correctly with a new command. Just say: “That’s not how you pronounced Melvin” (or whatever the name in question is), and Siri will offer you alternative pronunciation options, from which you can select, and the change is permanent.
Another invisible interface improvement takes place with the new AutoCorrect. It now looks at an entire sentence to figure out which words to correct. As a result, AutoCorrect is much better, more accurate and more capable. (This is a user interface element, in my opinion, because it is intelligence that helps the user make decisions about which word to choose and intervenes between the user and the app in the goal of assisting the user.)
New Haptic Features?
Apple announced at WWDC a new game controller API that will enable third-party companies to make gaming hardware for iPhones and iPads. That could enable peripheral makers to build sophisticated haptics into the controller (like an Xbox controller) that buzz and shake and rattle and explode.
The game controller API isn’t a user interface, but it is an open door for other companies to create interfaces. In fact, that’s its entire purpose. In addition to joysticks and game pads, I’m sure we’ll see creative and unexpected haptic feedback add-ons coming out after the release of iOS 7.
It also could enable a haptic case for everyday use. For example, you could imagine a special case for the iPad for visual artists where the “high definition” haptics hardware makes just running your stylus across the screen feel like chalk, pencil, acrylic paint brush, watercolor paint brush and so on.
New Motion Detection Features
A new option called Head Control allows you to select user-defined actions based on a turn of your head to the left or right. The front-facing camera detects the motion.
As with many of the coolest features of iOS 7, this one is in the Accessibility section under Switch Control.
The fact is that most people won’t use this option. However, it’s a totally new interface category for the iOS platform — an extremely rudimentary foray into the same categorical space as Xbox Kinect.
This is how Apple does things. They dip their toe in the water with a very rudimentary version of something that is nevertheless very solid. Then, over time, they add capabilities to the general approach.
I think it’s kind of a big deal that Apple is building in-the-air gestures into the iOS user interface. The next step after that may be hand-waving to go forward or back in a song or movie, a fist gesture to pause or stop and other in-the-air gestures.
Apple’s Invisible Interface Strategy is Clear
Invisible user interface elements are chronically undervalued and underappreciated by pundits, commentators, bloggers and journalists. But for that total user experience Apple is always trying to improve upon, they’re the central component.
Changes in the invisible iOS user interfaces not only tell us a lot about what iOS 7 will be like to use, but also about where Apple is going with invisible user interfaces.
I’m really looking forward to not seeing where all this ends up.
Over the last few weeks you’ve probably heard all about iOS 7. How different it looks. How beautiful the new UI is. How it’s the biggest change to the iPhone since Steve Jobs unveiled the original back in 2007.
All of that is true, but iOS 7 is much more than just a shiny new UI and some flat icons. Along with the new UI, there are tons of new software feature that will make using your iPhone easier and faster than ever before. Here are the 10 iOS 7 features that will make you never want to go back to iOS 6.
Let’s face it: print documents are not outdated, as much as the “paperless movement” is gaining steam. But there is no question the method of obtaining print materials by messing with local print publishers is an unnecessary inconvenience. iStudio Publisher allows you to create professional looking documents from the comfort of your home or office.
And at $14.99 through Cult of Mac Deals, this software is well worth it…even if you only use it once.
Douglas Engelbart died this week. But his most iconic idea lives on.
The venerable computer mouse, originally prototyped as a pine box with three buttons and metal wheels, was dreamed up by Englebart fifty years ago.
The mouse has been upgraded and re-envisioned — for example, they don’t use wheels or even trackballs anymore. Some have scroll wheels on top, or side buttons.
But the basic idea of moving a thing over here (to control a mouse pointer over there) lives on. Entire generations have grown up using this funky contraption.
We now suddenly find ourselves in a world of superior alternatives — multi-touch user interfaces (of which Android is the leading brand), voice control and dictation and others.
Yet habit and inertia keep us using Englebart’s brilliant but now-obsolete invention.
It’s time to bury the mouse.
iOS 7 is chock full of new things to discover and explore. We’ve been spending some time with it on our iPhones and iPads, and have found a bunch of surprises hidden within–features and new ways of doing things that are new, different, and just plain interesting.
Here, then, are six of those surprising tips and tricks, ready for you to try out on your own iOS 7 beta-enabled iOS device.
Samsung is a great company that makes great products. But its over-the-top Apple obsession and weird marketing ideas are really starting to creep me out.
This time on a very patriotic CultCast: Apple starts trademarking “iWatch”; the back to school sale is back; Mac upgrades that are worth the money; Vine Vs. Instagram; PRISM takes Alex; we wish you a happy 4th; and sooo much more!
Have a few laughs and get caught up on this week’s best Apple stories. Stream or download new and past episodes of The CultCast now on your Mac or iDevice by subscribing on iTunes, or hit play below and let the audio adventure begin.
Show notes up next.
If you believe the rumors, Apple has been working on a cheaper, ‘budget’ iPhone for quite some time. Reports have started picking up momentum in recent months, as Apple is expected to announce the new device by early as this fall.
Just a few days ago we saw some of the first leaked images of the rear casing in a variety of bright colors. Now a collection of photos give us the closest look at the budget iPhone we’ve seen yet.
Have you ever thought about becoming an app developer? If so you’re probably familiar with the following statistic:
“Mobile phone apps are expected to generate $25 billion in worldwide sales in 2013, up 62% from last year.” – Gartner, Inc.
So if you’re serious about learning the finer points of app development, Cult of Mac Deals has an offer right now that will be right up your alley. With this course, you’ll learn how to create fully functioning iOS apps – with no experience required. And you can do it for only $49.99.
Here’s what you’ll get with this course:
Whenever you’re able to load up your Mac with a slew of useful apps, it’s something you should take advantage of – and this Cult of Mac Deals offer is no exception.
Right now you can get $517 worth of Mac apps for just $29.99 with The iStack Mac Bundle 3.0. That’s 9 powerful Mac apps to add to your digital toolbox for a fraction of what it would cost to be them on their own.
You know what the world needs? More free energy sources. Also? We need more games with monkeys in.
Luckily, Gun Monkeys, the new platformer-shooter from Size Five Games, has both.
Lovingly narrated by British actor Kevin Eldon, Gun Monkeys involves a plot wherein you’ll need to send a bunch of monkeys to the distant future where things are super dangerous yet also incredibly full of free energy. To get the energy, you’ll need to send the monkeys. It’s that simple.
Iceland is so cool. Or weird. Or both.
The land that brought us Bjork and her oddly compelling musical artistry has a new commercial for the Samsung Galaxy S4 that–quite literally–takes a bite out of Apple.
The short ad begins with a poor, sad, white guy in a nice warm vest sitting on a mountainside in what I presume to be Iceland. He’s tapping and listening to an apple. Not an Apple, mind you, but an actual apple, as in the fruit.
After some confused facial gestures, the man is shown smiling and using a Samsung Galaxy S4 device.
That’s when it gets weird.
If you’re like many of us in the tech journalist business, you rely on your RSS feeds to keep track of what’s going on in the blogosphere. That makes this transition time after the demise of Google Reader, a fantastic service (not an app!) that had great APIs to work with any third-party RSS reader client.
Now, however, that the search giant’s RSS system is dead and gone, Feedly has jumped into the fray, and basically created the second generation of the Google RSS system by cloning it onto their own servers. It’s a brilliant move, making Feedly a go-to site for all of us who want permanent sets of RSS feeds, but don’t want to have to manage it on a per-app basis.
Unfortunately, if you’ve grabbed the Feedly app for iPad lately, and managed to log yourself out of Feedly (that’s me!), you’ll get the above splash screen, which only looks like an over-capacity issue, but it really isn’t.
Instagram for iPhone has received a minor update in the App Store that brings a long overdue feature. You can finally shoot in landscape mode when taking stills or video. In the past, shooting in anything other than portrait wasn’t supported within the Instagram app. Now the orientation will adapt like the regular iOS Camera. When the iPhone is rotated, Instagram’s camera buttons rotate to match.
Cinema, an image stabilization feature that was introduced alongside video a couple weeks ago, has been added to the iPhone’s front-facing camera. Today’s update also packs bug fixes and other random improvements, so be sure to download it from the App Store.
Source: App Store
I know — if you see another @&#%$ post about a smartphone watch, you’re going to run screaming though the streets tearing out your hair. But bear with me, because this one’s different — and it’s got more tech packed into it than an entire region of Best Buys.
XCOM: Enemy Unknown, inarguably the best turn-based, squad-level strategy game on the Mac, is now available from the Steam store — with some big differences from its Mac Store sibling.
iOS 6 gave us the Compass, which, honestly, I’ve never really used that much.
The new iOS 7 beta, however, has given me some functionality I’m much more likely to need and use. Heck, I even have a third-party app to make sure my handyman projects around the house aren’t crooked.
I’m talking about a level, and there’s a new one built right into iOS 7 beta, within the Compass app on the iPhone. I haven’t found a comparable app on my iPad running iOS 7 beta, but maybe in the future?
Either way, here’s how to find and use the compass and level app.
The Speck HandyShell for iPad and iPad mini is a protective case with an integrated multi-function utility handle that lets you hold it, mount it, stand it, and hang it. It allows you to use your device in new ways in all kinds of situations.
It has a hard plastic back with impact-resistant, “bump-proof” rubber sides that protect the edges of your iPad from dings and drops, and extend around to the front to protect its display. So if your iPad falls flat on its face, the HandyShell will take the brunt of the impact — not your screen.
As you would expect, the HandyShell makes all of your ports, buttons, and cameras easily accessible, and it’s available in a number of colors. But at just under $55, is it a little too expensive?
Have you been looking for unbridled file transfer between any computer and your iOS devices, without the authorization limits imposed by iTunes? Want to be able to do it anywhere and anytime? Now you can…with DiskAid.
DiskAid is iPhone file transfer software for PC and Mac, giving you access to the iOS file system via USB connection or wi-fi. And Cult of Mac Deals has it for just $10 – a savings of 66% – but only for a limited time.
In the ongoing smartphone culture wars, Samsung spent a reported $5 million engaging the latest song stylings of Jay-Z as an exclusive for Galaxy owners.
Owners of that phone contended for a million copies of the impressively-titled album “Magna Carta Holy Grail” launched July 4 in a special app, three days before the rest of us can get it in iTunes. Media saw the promotion as a tactical move by Samsung to gain position on the music front over Apple.
The cachet lasted about as long as a cheap sparkler: there are thousands of torrents of the album available.
As one of the guys who decided to spread the work of Beyoncé’s husband up for everyone put it: “I should clarify it was available to the first million (I think…) Samsung Galaxy owners to chime in with an app for the album. My wife got it but I’m not rocking a Samsung :/”
When you’re galavanting about with your MacBook Air or Pro, it’s important to manage you battery power. It just wouldn’t do to show up for an important meeting or interview with a dead battery, let alone not being able to watch a movie on the airplane, now would it?
Knowing which apps are sucking up the most juice is key to this effort, of course, and OS Mavericks beta makes it severely easy to know which ones are the most power-hungry. That way, you can quit the apps that are using up too much battery in order to leave enough power for the important stuff.
Here’s how it works.