I downloaded the Cinemagram app from the app on iPhone last week and have been having some fun with it around the office. The app allows you to create animated GIFs from a short video you capture with your phone’s camera. You can then add Instagram-esque filters.
The way it works is, you take a short video, mask an area that you would like to animate and the rest of the image remains static.
Here is a few I had fun with last week…
I still get asked this question a lot by people. Luckily I stumbled upon this video by ILUVUXDESIGN, which explains it quite beautifully. Spread the word. Spread the love!
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Recently I’ve been on the hunt for a heart rate monitor to assist with my training. I should clarify that I’m no athlete. I try and get a couple of short runs in every week, hit the gym and pay attention to what I eat. I’d heard good things about Polar and Suunto, and was heading in that direction until I stumbled upon Nike’s new Nike+ FuelBand.
The Nike+ FuelBand
The Nike+ FuelBand & App
Now, this isn’t a heart rate monitor. It doesn’t synch with a capsule in your shoe either. It measures your movement, time and calories. That information is run through an algorithm and is measured in Nike+ Fuel points. This is then used as an indication of how active you’ve been throughout your day.
For more serious athletes, this may seem like a bit of a gimmick. However, for myself or the average person who is looking to leed a healthy and active lifestyle, Nike+ Fuel points provide a set of goals which you can track by syncing the device with you iPhone or PC. Having used the Nike+ SportBand in the past, I was a little disappointed with the overall experience. The wristband itself has a great design, but the Nike+ online user interface really let it down. The other downside was that you had to have the capsule in your shoe and I don’t always run in the same shoes.
The Nike+ FuelBand seems to be in direct competition to the Jawbone UP; a device released by Jawbone last year which hasn’t seemed to catch on. I’ve not seen them being sold anywhere in Sydney anyway; which is a shame because I’m a big fan of Jawbone. Both are designed to be worn throughout the day.
As with the Nike+ SportBand, I’m impressed by the design and overall concept. Nike don’t seem to have any comprehensive view of the app or desktop interface, so I’m interested to see what they’ve come up with.
Read MoreRdio is a subscription based, digital streaming music service founded by one of the creators of Skype, Janus Friis. Based out of San Francisco, the service is available to folks in the US, Canada, Brazil, Germany, New Zealand and as of January 19th available to Australians.
The Rdio Dashboard
These sort of subscription based music services have been quite successful overseas, but this is the first of such services available to Australian users. Rdio will be followed by Spotify which will be launching in Australia soon.
I got turned onto Rdio by fellow tech geek, Peter Petrovski and I’m currently using the 7 day trial and really liking it. The interface is really slick and consistent through the Rdio website, mobile app and Mac app. There have been a couple of tracks that I wasn’t able to add to my collection because they’re not yet available in our region, but apart from that adding music to your collection and playlists is really quick and simple. You can also ask Rdio to match the tracks in your iTunes library. No files are copied or duplicated onto your hardrive, it’s all streamed from the cloud.
The slick Rdio interface across web and apps
There’s obvious benefits to having unlimited access to as much music as you like for a flat monthly fee, but the main question in my mind is whether or not I prefer to have an entirely cloud based music collection as opposed to a locally stored collection which I can access remotely. I refer here to iTunes and the iTunes Match service. The downside with a locally stored collection is storage space of coarse.
I’m undecided at this point, but I’ve really enjoyed Rdio over last couple of days. I’ve signed up to be one of the first to use Spotify in Australia as well, so I’m looking forward to having a play with it when it’s released.
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