Iphone | Zoe Corkhill

Posts Tagged ‘iphone’

Air Video Review (iPhone & iPad)

Saturday, May 15th, 2010

About a week or so ago, I was lying in bed with a bad headache, feeling pretty wretched and incredibly bored. Lying in the dark not being able to get up¹gets quite tedious at times! Luckily, I can sometimes cope with my iPhone on low brightness and low volume, so I often read books in night mode with Stanza (iTunes link) to help distract me from the pain etc.

On this particular occasion I had finished my book, but didn’t want to start another one. I found myself wishing that I had a video to watch quietly on my iPhone until I remembered that “there’s an app for that”². I did a search on the net & found Air Video (iTunes link) – it is reasonably priced at £1.79 and I read a few good reviews before going ahead and downloading it onto my iPhone. I used the VNC capability of the brilliant iSSH app (iTunes link) to install the accompanying server app onto our hackintosh media server, added some folders & I was off!

Air Video is an iPhone/iPad app that allows you to watch video files that are on other computers in your wifi network. It works with both PC & Macs, and you can have more than one server set up to choose from. The iPhone app is very easy to use, with intuitive menu structures and a decent design. The best feature for me is live conversion of your files, so you don’t need to worry about what format the original video is in – we have quite a lot of DVD rips in avi format on our shuttle, so now they are only a few taps away on my iPhone when I’m at home³… I only have 16GB of storage on my 3GS, but the hackintosh has 1.5TB so it’s much more convenient to keep my video files there instead!

Performance wise, I haven’t had any issues with the app at all; the on the fly video conversion works extremely well, even jumping to another point in the file only takes a second or two to start playing again. The quality is brilliant, and from the looks of the iPad screenshots the videos look great on the bigger screen as well.

And of course, it is a universal app, meaning you get two apps for your money – one for iPhone/iPod Touch and one for the iPad. I do have a birthday coming up…

my headaches & painkillers make me very nauseous and dizzy, I have trouble staying upright/keeping my breakfast down – not fun! [↩]
sorry, couldn’t resist! [↩]
there is experimental over the internet access as well, but I haven’t tried that yet. [↩]

Tags: geekiness, iPad, iphone
Posted in Reviews | No Comments »

Simplenote: my ‘must have’ iPhone app

Friday, February 12th, 2010

I started using Simplenote a month or so ago, and it has rapidly become my most used app on my iPhone. It’s a great notes app, which looks a million times better than the built in notes app¹, and it is really easy & intuitive to use. The biggest improvement over the built in notes app is the over the air syncing, which is incredibly well executed.

I use Simplenote for all manner of things – draft blog posts, lists, random titbits of information I need to remember, which songs I want from the SingStore, etc.

I have tried a lot of notes apps from the app store, but this is easily my favourite from all of the ones I have tried. A lot of the other apps that I tried were overcomplicated, difficult to use & had annoying methods of syncing/backing up your notes. Simplenote syncs with their own servers which means you can access your notes in various different ways.

In their own words…

Why Simplenote?
Simplenote is a free replacement for the Notes app on your iPhone or iPod touch. It has a great interface, awesome web syncing, and it works with a growing number of desktop apps.

Everything you need, nothing you don’t
Don’t let unnecessary features get between you and your notes. Simplenote’s interface is designed specifically for text notes. It gives you fast, clean, synchronized access to your thoughts, dreams, musings, and masterpieces.

Syncing without thinking
The Simplenote app works together with our free web app and a variety of third-party apps to keep your notes in perpetual sync. No cables, no hassles, no fiddling. Automatic, over-the-air, and fast.

As well as being a super easy app to use, there are some really great extras for you to download. My particular favourite is JustNotes which allows you to read, add & edit notes from your OS X taskbar.

There is also a fantasic webapp to allow to access your notes from your browser – this is great if you just need to check something while at work, or if you don’t have your iPhone with you while you are at a friend’s house, etc.

If you are like me, and get frustrated with the looks & inconvinient syncing of the built in notes app, then this is the perfect app for you.

ITunes Link

Yay, helvetica! No more Marker Felt [↩]

Tags: geekiness, iphone
Posted in Reviews | 2 Comments »

Project 365

Monday, August 17th, 2009

As part of my 101 in 1001 project, I decided to take part in Project 365, a well known photography project. Now that I have my iPhone 3GS, which has an improved camera on it, I have decided to make a start.

Project 365 started at photojojo.com, who suggested that their readers take a photo every day for a year, as a way of documenting their lives.

Your year-long photo album will be an amazing way to document your travels and accomplishments, your haircuts and relationships. Time moves surprisingly fast. – Project 365 homepage

I love the idea of recording something every day, as a way of remembering a year in my life. I started taking photos on Saturday 15th August, here are my first few photos:

You can keep up to date with my Project 365 at my flickr set. I will endeavour to provide interesting descriptions to the photos, to let you know what’s going on!

Tags: iphone, photography, project365
Posted in 101 in 1001, Journal | No Comments »

7 Useful iPhone Photography Apps

Tuesday, June 23rd, 2009

With the arrival of the iPhone 3GS, and my jealousy of the improved camera & processing power, I have taken a day or so to try out several new photography apps on my iPhone 3G – I have come to the conclusion that I can’t afford to get one until my current contract is eligible for upgrading in December, so I may as well make the best of what I’ve got! So here is a review of the new apps I’ve tried, along with some stalwart favourites I already use regularly.

I will be reviewing 7 apps – and they are all apps that I would recommend to anyone who takes a lot of photos with their iPhone, as I do. The apps I am reviewing are: AutoStitch, Photogene, NightCamera, Mobile Fotos, Flickit, ShakeItPhoto, and HP iPrint.

iPhone Photography Apps

I already have a fairly good point and click camera – the Sony Cyber-shot DSC-T77 which was a wedding present to James & myself. However, I don’t always have this with me, and if I do it is no doubt sitting at the bottom of my bag. More often than not, I will find myself pulling out my iPhone from my pocket to take the quick snaps of everyday life – the blink & you’ll miss it ‘kodak moments’. As a result, about half of my photos are probably taken with my iPhone.

Warning! This post is very image heavy. (more…)

Tags: iphone, recommendations
Posted in Reviews | No Comments »

Twitter – what it is & why I love it!

Friday, May 8th, 2009

There are a lot of my friends who don’t see the point of twitter; they sign up for accounts, but they don’t start to follow anyone apart from the odd celebrity & maybe one friend who probably never even updates anyway. Oh, and me – cos I’m the one that nagged at them to come and join the fun in the first place!

What you have to understand about Twitter is that it’s not really just a series of meaningless updates. The thing I hear most often is “why would I care what so-and-so had for breakfast anyway?” – the funny thing is about this is you then get the very same people having conversations about diets, recipes, all time favourite breakfast cereals.. when they are talking about breakfast in person. The fact that my coworkers spend at least 5 minutes a day discussing what they had for dinner the night before proves that you do care about what your friends are eating! Twitter is a conversation too, you just have to join in.

If your friend has coco pops for breakfast then give them props for admitting to love a childish breakfast cereal, and admit you love it to! If they send a tweet saying that they’re having muesli then give them your opinion on the foul stuff, and commend them for being healthy. And that’s just breakfast! Conversations I’ve had on Twitter in the last few weeks include: my favourite mac/iPhone software, pets, cross stitch, Counting Crows (I actually had a mini convo with the lead singer of my fav band!), my wedding, men’s flaws, and my favourite tv shows!

(more…)

Tags: geekiness, iphone, recommendations, twitnote, twitter
Posted in Journal | 1 Comment »

Posts Tagged ‘iphone’

Air Video Review (iPhone & iPad)

Simplenote: my ‘must have’ iPhone app

Project 365

7 Useful iPhone Photography Apps

Twitter – what it is & why I love it!

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