Published: May 11, 2009 03:54 pm      

Cool iPhone and iMac apps

A lot of things have happened technology-wise since I last wrote in Community Life. I was blessed, along with many of my co-workers, with a beautiful iMac. It takes the place of the outdated eMacs that barely functioned.

I always preferred Apples over any other computers, although I have never been able to afford anything other than an HP or Dell. So I always enjoyed being able to work on one while doing the newspaper, magazine and whatever other special sections we put together.

The shear capabilities of this computer amaze me. There is a world of options available to the consumer concerning this product.

My personal favorite feature is the Photo Booth. Using the built-in webcam, you can have exactly what it says, your own photo booth. With a simple click of the button, you can select different designs such as color pencil or comic book. There are also several distortions such as squeeze, bent or twirl. My favorite, however, are the backgrounds, which range from a roller coaster to clouds. Now you really can have your head in the clouds. You can also shoot video.

Another cool feature of the program is what really makes it a like a photo booth. Select the quick pictures button for four pictures taken one right after the other. This is one of the most fun things to do with Photo Booth.

With GarageBand, you can create an entire music composition while sitting in front of the computer. While I am not in a band myself, I can see how this program would be very useful for someone who wants to test sounds before handing them over to their drummer or guitarist.

The absolute best thing about the iMac is the ability to completely sync it with my new cell phone, an iPhone. Yes, you heard right, I have abandoned Blackberry world and became one of “those” people who loves the iPhone. The phone is amazing. Along with the phone is the unending list on amazing applications that go with it. Here are a few of my favorites:

» iMob Online is my favorite game. I check it several times throughout the day. You can add mob members, make money from missions, fights and properties and advance in levels as your mob grows and you become stronger. It is also a free game.

» UNO, ArcadeBowl and Word Party are three games I have paid minimally for but thoroughly enjoy. UNO is the traditional card game and costs $4.99. ArcadeBowl I purchased for a mere $1.99. It is a version of Skeeball. Word Party is $2.99 and has provided hours of fun for my friends, family and me. It is kind of like Catch Phrase, and you try to get your team to guess the word you are describing.

» Shazam is one of the most advertised applications for the iPhone. With it you can tag a song playing and within seconds receive a biography of the singer, links to buy the song on iTunes, lyrics of the song and much more, depending on how much of that information is on the Internet.

» A program much like Shazam is SnapTell. Using SnapTell, you can take a picture of any book, movie or CD cover and instantly be linked to online reviews and places where you can buy the book. I use Shazam and SnapTell to tag items I want to remember to purchase later. Both of them are free programs.

» FacePhone is an amazing program that I purchased for $2.99. It syncs all of your contacts with your Facebook friends, downloading the pictures from their Facebook to be used in your address book. Now whenever I receive I call from my brother I also see a lovely picture of him and his girlfriend from Valentine’s Day because that is his Facebook picture at the moment. There are free programs like FacePhone that offer the same type of thing, but I was not happy with the way they ran.

» One disadvantage of the iPhone is that it does not allow you to send picture text messages. Pictures have to be sent through e-mail. I solved this problem by using MMS, a simple program that allows you to send picture text messages.

» Cheap Gas! is a great program that uses the Web site www.gasbuddy.com to collect information about gas prices in the surrounding area. Users submit the prices they see at stations on Gas Buddy, and they are posted on the program. Looking at it right now I see that the cheapest gas reported in Cleburne at the moment is $1.75 at the Mobil station. The program is free, but for the $1.99 version you can update prices straight from the app itself.

» Fizz Weather is an awesome program that costs $5.99. It offers much more than the basic weather program that comes on the iPhone. My favorite feature is the live radar, showing where storms are predicted to be.

» i.TV is the ultimate — free — television guide for the iPhone. Simply pick your provider, and you have the TV listings right on your phone. If you’re like me, that’s not much for the five over-the-air channels you receive.

» Slacker is my radio listening program of choice. I used this program on the BlackBerry and was happy to discover an iPhone version that runs even better than the BB one. Pick your genre and listen to live music anytime, anywhere.

As you can tell the list is endless. This is just the bare minimum of the applications I have on my phone. Not to mention it’s an iPod, and you can listen to hundreds of songs on the go!