Guide to Mac, iPod, iPad and iPhone news and reviews
Hitman: Sniper was announced shortly before E3 2014, and we were obviously eager to give it a shot, so to speak. The brutally efficient assassination game perches players outside of a target’s home, which is usually swarming with security staff. You e…
Image-editing software maker MacPhun is now featuring a limited-capacity bundle offer on three of its top Mac-only photo manipulation programs, along with a premium membership to the ViewBug photo contest site and a complimentary copy of its next photo…
The folks at Popcap were at E3 2014 giving us a sneak peek at the next update for Plants Vs Zombies 2. The mushrooms you know and love from the original game are back, offering a unique way to gather sunshine points at nighttime. Now the free mushroom…
The iPhone Photography Awards celebrate excellence in iPhoneography — the best shots taken with the best camera we all have with us. The 2014 winning photographs have been announced, and they include amazing work from Julio Lucas of Florida, Jose Luis Barcia Fernandez of Madrid, and Jill Missner of Connecticut. The winner, Lucas, said of his work:
I enjoy taken photos with my iPhone due its portability and ease of use while on the move. iPhone’s naturally tend to saturate colors in the captured image. Which depending on the enviromental lighting, the saturation of colors normally allows for a bold beautiful image. I generally try to stay away from using filters in my iPhone pictures. I want my photos to take on a more traditional form and grant the capture moment to tell the story rather then a manipulation of the moment by use of to many filters.
Categories included animals, architecture, children, flowers, food, landscape, lifestyle, nature, news and events, panorama, seasons, still life, sunset, travel, trees, and more. Entrants came from Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Mexico, Russia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Taiwan, United Kingdom, United States. So, huge scope, huge participation, and huge results.
And it’s not just because the winning photos all look beautiful and inspiring — they absolutely do — but that they weren’t taken with full frames or huge glass or mountains of film. They were taken with the iPhone and the apps we have in our pocket. With technology that’s readily and easily available to all of us.
The winners all have fantastic eyes for light and composition, and terrific senses of timing and space, for certain. But unlike generations past, we have access to the very same equipment they do, and we enjoy the same potential they’ve so successfully realized.
Check out all the photos and let me know your favorites. Then check out our photography tips, go take some of your own photos and share them with us!
Source: IPPAWARDS
Construction at Apple’s Spaceship campus continues, with the circular building beginning to take shape according to an image posted to Twitter by KCBS news and traffic reporter Ron Cervi (via 9to5Mac).
In the most recent shot, a wall has been built around the perimeter of the building, outlining where the foundation will be poured. A different tweet by @DawnMortensen notes that Pruneridge Avenue, a road that runs through the campus itself, has been permanently closed.
Street-level photographs back in December revealed several buildings still standing, but another aerial photo from February suggested a large portion of the demolition work had been completed. During construction, Apple has closed off sidewalks and built a large green privacy fence to keep the area hidden.
Progress on #ApplesNewHQ, a small wall around the foundation of the spaceship has sprouted. #sky1hightechtour pic.twitter.com/iM3JrIQUBH
— Ron (@Sky1Ron) June 10, 2014
Cervi has been posting a number of images of the campus over the past few months, tracking the progress of construction. Campus 2 is expected to open in 2016.
With Father’s Day right around the corner, it is not too soon or too late to start shopping for the big guy. Dads are getting tired of the same old tie and shirt routine. This Father’s Day, why not get him some fun games to keep him busy while you avoid mowing the lawn. We’ve […]
Ringly, a new iPhone-connected smart ring designed for women, uses Bluetooth LE to connect to a phone, lighting up and buzzing to alert users of calls, messages, emails, and other app notifications.
Billed as the first connected ring, Ringly aims to allow users to continue to receive notifications even while a phone is put away in a bag or otherwise unavailable. The ring, which lasts for up to three days on a single charge, connects to an accompanying iPhone app to deliver notifications.
Ringly creates jewelry and accessories that connect to your phone and notify you about the things that matter most. Put your phone away and enjoy the moment.
Ringly is designed to light up or vibrate when a notification is received, and it is entirely customizable by the end user. It features four vibration patterns and five colors that can be assigned to different notifications. Incoming Twitter notifications might buzz in a certain way, for example, while a phone call might light up. The ring is also able to sync with reminders, letting users know when a meeting or appointment is coming up.
Ringly is available in three sizes (6,7, and 8) with four different designs that feature precious and semi-precious stones in 18K matte gold settings. Three of the rings can be pre-ordered for $145, while a fourth ring sells for $180. The rings will retail for considerably more, starting at $195. The first 1,000 rings sold are also advertised as having a real diamond in the side.
Looking to make the most of your time at the gym? From weights to workout challenges, these are the best gym apps for iPhone!
Are you looking for the best iPhone apps to help you track weights and monitor your activity at the gym? Whether you’re training for a specific activity, trying to drop weight, or just tone up, there are lots of gym apps that can help you track your progress and add some variety to your workouts. No matter what your goals are, the App Store has something for everyone, and we think these are the very best:
Fitocracy turns tracking your workouts into a competition with others. You can track things either as you do them at the gym or once you’re done. Along with adding exercises you already know, Fitocracy is a great way to learn new ones. There are lots of premade workouts as well that can add a lot of variety into your workout. You can also build and save your own.
If you need some motivation to give your workout your all and need some help mixing it up, Fitocracy is a great choice.
Strong is a workout tracking app that lets you quickly and easily enter information about your workout. Like Fitocracy, you’ll unlock and collect achievements when you reach certain fitness milestones. Add routines and then easily add them to new workouts whenever you need to. One of my favorite features of Strong is the warmup calculator that helps you pick what weights you should use to get warmed up before each workout.
If you want a simple way to track your workouts and watch your progress, give Strong a try.
30 Day Fitness Challenges lets you choose a fitness challenge to commit to. You can then set up reminders and perform it and track your progress each day. When you start a challenge, 30 Day Fitness Challenge walks you through each part of the workout and doesn’t move on until you’ve said you are done. Currently you can choose challenges that work arms, core, legs, and overall general strength.
If you want to mix up your gym workouts and need something new, get 30 Day Fitness Challenges.
GymBook is another workout tracker but focuses more on strength training than anything else. You can easily create new routines and workouts, browse and see beautifully animated GIFs of each type of exercise, and more. If you’re using weight resistance on any exercise, simply enter the amount in pounds or kilos and the amount of reps. One of my favorite features of GymBook is that you can see data next to a specific exercise containing the last few times you performed it and how many reps and for how long. This keeps you aware of your progress in just a single glance.
If strength training is your main goal and you want a flexible and powerful way to track things, you want GymBook.
JEFIT Pro may not have as nice of a design as some of the other apps in this list but it more than makes up for it with its huge catalog of exercises. JEFIT Pro is crammed with lots of useful stats and information from 1RM and total volume charts to cardio tracking. JEFIT Pro gives you a great overall picture of the state of your body and what you should be focusing on to improve it.
For the largest database of exercises and the best overall picture of your body, give JEFIT Pro a try.
If you frequent your local gym — or even work out at home — what apps do you depend on to track your progress, help you strength train, and make the most of your workout? Vote in our poll and we’ll highlight your favorite picks later this week! If you use something different than what’s listed, be sure to let us know in the comments!
Going a step further on its fight against fraudulent premium SMS charges, T-Mobile will now start proactively notifying customers of unauthorized billing of premium SMS to their account. Although customers could previously request refunds for any unkn…
The new HomeKit platform in iOS 8 is designed to unify the various smart home products which are in the marketplace. Instead of releasing a product line of iOS connected items, Apple has opted to create a bridge between services that existing manufacturers can use in their designs. When I first saw the announcement about […]
Mac users have relied on a pool of backup utlities for years, with three standouts being Apple’s own Time Machine, Retrospect, and Bombich Software’s Carbon Copy Cloner. All three fit slightly different niches, and serious techs and users have probably…
Apple’s online store currently has a huge inventory of refurbished 27-inch iMacs being sold at bargain prices. The 27-inch iMac with a 2.9GHz Intel quad-core i5 processor, 8GB of RAM and a 1TB hard drive has been reduced by $400 to $1,399. A $300 disco…
Everyone remembers that classic series of “Get a Mac” ads pitting a cool Mac against an uptight PC, but when is the last time Apple had a truly memorable marketing campaign? With any luck, there could be another one on the horizon.
Advertising Age filed an extensive report Monday focusing on how Apple plans to reclaim some of its former marketing glory, starting with bringing some of the creative work in-house.
According to industry insiders, Apple is quietly building up an internal marketing agency said to eventually number 1,000 people, and using those minds as leverage to produce better results from longtime ad agency TBWA/Media Arts Lab while keeping critics at bay who claim the Cupertino company has lost its edge.
The most notable recent misstep with Apple’s marketing came during the 2012 Olympics in a spot focusing on the company’s retail-based Genius Bar employees that vanished nearly as quickly as it debuted.
It’s a definite black eye for a company best known for its iconic “Think Different” campaign, especially in the wake of recent attack ads from rival Samsung touting how “the next big thing is already here.”
In April, the Apple v. Samsung patent dispute shined a spotlight on Apple’s marketing woes, including an email from VP Phil Schiller to CEO Tim Cook calling for “a search for a new agency… we are not getting what we need from them and haven’t been in a while.”
Cook apparently took the advice to heart, as the report noted Apple has gone to great lengths to build up an arsenal of marketing talent, including some poached right from its longtime partners at TBWA/MAL — a move that would have been considered sacrilege during the Steve Jobs era.
For now at least, TBWA/MAL remains in the picture, with sources claiming the agency will continue to provide “service-side duties” for Apple, even as Cupertino continues to ramp up marketing efforts to catch up to the iPhone maker’s runaway success over the last few years.
Follow this article’s author, J.R. Bookwalter on Twitter
(Image courtesy of ViralWriter.com)
At B&H.com this week, save $200 instantly on the 13.3-inch MacBook Air which has been cut from $1,099 down to $899. That discount makes this the lowest price we have seen on this computer by about $30. Also, buyers get a free copy of Parallels Desktop 9 for Mac, or a LoJack for Laptops one-year subscription. The MacBook Air features a 1.3GHz Intel dual-core i5 Haswell processor, 4GB of RAM and 128GB of flash storage. It is backed by a one-year warranty on parts and labor from Apple….
iTunes Radio listeners in the United States can finally tune in to live, 24-hour content from ESPN and National Public Radio.
AppleInsider today reported that iTunes Radio is now serving up ESPN Radio as well as National Public Radio (NPR) content from local affiliates, right from any iOS 7 device or desktop computer with the latest version of iTunes.
First spotted by Twitter user Aaron Ruhlig, Apple appears to have flipped the switch on the new content Tuesday morning. The channels are different from the typical custom-built stations on iTunes Radio, instead matching the same live, 24/7 content heard by traditional radio listeners.
While NPR launched national network content back in March, the provider appears to have lit up local affiliate channels this week, including major markets such as New York and Los Angeles as well as smaller local markets.
iTunes Radio can be found from a dedicated tab in the Music app on devices running iOS 7, as well as iTunes running on a Mac or PC.
Follow this article’s author, J.R. Bookwalter on Twitter
E3 is getting underway and if you are able to attend then you should check out Gamloft’s booth 5522 in the West Hall to see a preview of the up and coming Spider-Man Unlimited. The introduction trailer on YouTube (see below) looks amazing and I personally think this game has the potential to single handedly […]
