Friday 23 February 2018

How To Amp Up Your Phone Photography!

This week for Appy Friday we are teaching you how to amp up your photography when using your phone. Whether you’re trying to get the perfect Instagram image, or just making memories there’s something in here for everyone. From clip-on lenses to give you higher quality images, to simple photo editing apps to help assist you in enhancing your images.



Clip-on lenses
The first way to improve your phone photography is by using clip-on lenses to transform the look and quality of your images. These clip-on lenses range in price massively for £5-£85 so it all depends on how much you are willing to spend on these accessories, for example, one of the cheaper clip-on lenses is the Magniband macro lens for the majority of smartphones which can be bought for just £5.62. A more expensive alternative is the Olloclip 4-in-1 lens for iPhones 4-6s plus. However, this lens is £69.95 but the price reflects the quality of the product and this lens has 4 different capabilities.

Lighting
The lighting is vital for making your photography good when using a phone to capture images. The best lighting for photography on a phone is soft natural lighting. If the image you wish to take is in the dark, then rather than using your phones flash to take the image, use a torch. Either from another phone or a physical torch so that the focal point of the image is photographed in a much nicer way and isn’t too harsh or sharp.

Use the rule of thirds
When creating the set up for your images, try and use the rule of thirds so that you have a better composition for your images. When the rule of thirds isn’t possible try and use symmetry to create the best looking images when using your phone. More information about the rule of thirds can be seen here.

Don’t zoom. Crop afterwards
When photographing something far away, don’t use your zoom as it makes the image quality much poorer. So, when taking an image of a landmark, for example, it may be slightly far away so just take the image from where you are with a good composition. Then, later on, put the image in an editing suite to crop the image to ensure it’s still of the highest quality.

Photo editing apps
There are many photo editing apps available in the app store. One of my personal favourites for filters is VSCO. Some other great photo editing apps are Google Snapseed, Adobe Photoshop Lightspeed and Adobe Photoshop fix. So once you’ve got your perfect image, you can give it some touch ups to enhance your photos.

So, there are our top tips to help you take incredible images without having to carry around a big bulky camera and associated kit. Personally, I love using a clip-on lens and VSCO to take and edit all my photos, so that they are the best they possibly can be. Let us know if you either try some of these tricks or have some more of your own.



Friday 16 February 2018

Top 5 Motivational Apps!

This week we’re giving you our top 5 motivational apps to help get you through this year and be as successful as possible. There are a range of different motivational apps that will help you in all aspects of life to keep you motivated in your day to day tasks, and to keep you motivated to stay on top of your fitness regime.



Way Of Life
Platform: iOS and Android
Cost: FREE
The Way Of Life app is very helpful for either getting rid of a bad habit or making a good new habit. Way of Life uses colour coded systems to track your daily routines. The app also gives you reminders to ensure that you break the bad habits and continue with the good habits. Also within the app, there is a diary feature so that you can write down what triggered the bad habit.

Platform: iOS and Android
Cost: FREE
The iWish app helps you to achieve life goals, there are 1200 inspiring ideas built into the app if you don’t have many goals of your own, but want something to aim for. Once you have set out what your goals are, you can keep track of how you’re doing with those goals.  You can also add in all the accomplishments you’ve made towards your long-term goal. The app also features areas to add in to do lists, priorities, and reminders to help you stay on track.

Platform: iOS and Android
Cost: FREE
This app is great for motivating yourself to go out and get walking with the added element of competition to help motivate you. The app allows you to compete with your friends and be the one with the highest amount of steps, which will help to motivate you if you’re a highly competitive person.

Platform: iOS and Android
Cost: £1.46
The Wonderful Day app is great for helping you add your goals and activities that you want to work on over the following weeks and months. You can also choose what days you want to work on your activity. For example, you can add an activity like ‘go for a run’ every day as a daily reminder or ‘volunteer work’ as a reminder once a week. Then at 8am every morning the app will remind you of the tasks you have to do that day.

Platform: iOS and Android
Cost: FREE
The Coach.me app is great personal coaching app. Within the app, there are 3 main features. The first is that you coach yourself to track your progress and get rewards for it. The second is when you take part in community coaching; Where the Coach.me community will help to answer your questions and you can take part in that community to help better yourself. The third and final feature is that you can hire a private coach to personally help you, however those prices start at £14.99.

So, there we have our top 5 motivational apps to help you throughout the year and stay on top of your goals and aspirations. My personal favourite one of these is the Way Of Life app, this app is so great at helping you crack all those bad habits and stay on top of new habits. Let us know what apps you use to help keep you motivated and on top of your goals.

Friday 9 February 2018

Apple HomePod - All You Need To Know!

Apple has finally entered the smart speaker industry and is releasing it’s very own ‘HomePod’. So, this week we’re giving you a rundown on everything you need to know about Apples smart speaker with its release date being today. This rundown will give you all the information you need from the prices to what the specs of the device are.


Release Date
The Apple HomePod was available for pre-order from Friday 26th of January and is actually released on the Friday 9th February (yes, today!). The HomePod will be available first in the US, UK and Australia with France and Germany getting it in spring.


Price
The HomePod will be on sale for £319 in the UK and $349 in the US. You will be able to buy the HomePod from Apple’s online store as well as their high street stores. Also, the new Apple HomePod can be purchased from places such as John Lewis and other Apple stockists.

With the new Apple HomePod being so expensive in comparison to other smart speakers on the market today, for example, the one smart speaker seen as most similar to this one is the Amazon Echo which is priced at £149.99 with the smaller Echo Dot selling for £49.99.

P.S. If you're interested, read our MD, Richard Eaton's initial review of the Amazon Echo on his personal blog here https://medium.com/@richardjeaton/amazon-echo-an-initial-review-e02a1dd06cdd


What To Expect From The Apple HomePod?

The Apple HomePod is mainly a music speaker, with high-quality audio that is comparable to the Sonos wireless speakers. However, since this comparison was made between the HomePod and Sonos wireless speakers, Sonos have announced they are in the process of creating their own smart speaker. The HomePod has the ability to still hear your voice over the top of loud music that is playing from the speaker, but not only does it respond to sound but also touch. Various tap sequences instruct the HomePod to do various different things like pause, play, skip or activate Siri. The HomePod not only has high-quality audio but also answers all your questions with Siri and sends messages and makes calls.

The HomePod has an A8 chip which allows spacial awareness capabilities so that the HomePod is able to analyse the room which gives it the ability to provide the best audio for its surroundings. Apple has said that the HomePod brings together Apple Music and Siri in order to learn your music taste. The HomePod has a very simplistic minimalistic design as it is covered in a seamless mesh fabric, it comes in two different colours white and space grey and is only 18 centimetres tall.

So, there’s everything you need to know. Personally, I think the HomePod is a good investment if you enjoy playing high-quality music throughout your house. However, if you’re just looking for a smart speaker which you can ask questions and get the answers quickly then I think there are better, cheaper alternatives for that use. Let us know what you think about this new release from Apple and whether or not you’ll be buying one.

Friday 2 February 2018

Top 5 Health And Fitness Apps!

For this weeks Appy Friday, we’re giving you our top 5 health and fitness apps to help you reach your health and fitness goals. There are a range of different apps here which are suited to a range of different people and their needs, from healthy eating apps to apps to help you with your workouts, whether that’s in a gym or from the comfort of your own home.


MyFitnessPal
Cost: FREE
Platform: iOS, Android
This app helps you to track your calories and everything you eat without it being a massive hassle as they have more than 3 million branded food products included. As well as this, it allows you to keep on top of a healthy diet with a lot more ease. There are
 also sections in which you can track your weight weekly.

Nike Training Club
Cost: FREE
Platform: iOS, Android
The Nike Training Club is a great app which is preloaded with a range of workouts that have different ranges of ability while also targetting specific areas of the body. As well as this, if you workout on the Nike Training Club app from a range of 15 minutes- 45 minutes, it will unlock different recipes, regimes and fitness tips to help enhance your health and fitness journey.

Pocket Yoga
Cost: £1.99
Platform: iOS, Android
This Pocket Yoga app helps you to build up your strengths in yoga without having to face an actual yoga class. This yoga app uses visual and audio guidance to help you through the 27 routines built into the app with different difficulties so there is something for everyone's abilities. As well as this there are over 200 positions which the app will guide you through.

Strava Cycling
Cost: FREE
Platform: iOS, Android
This app is a GPS for your cycling journeys and it allows you to track not only your speed but also the distance and elevation. Another that this app is good for is analysing your overall performance and you can also engage with friends by riding with friends in order to unlock achievements.

DietBet
Cost: FREE
Platform: iOS, Android
This app is quite unique in that it puts your money at stake by allowing users to add a financial incentive to their dieting. The DietBet app allows users to buy into a ‘money pot’ along with many other people, then when they hit their weight loss targets then they share the winnings. The money that could be won isn’t massively life-changing, however, it is still an incentive.

So, there are the top 5 health fitness apps we think can help you. The one that I personally use regularly is the MyFitnessPal app and the Nike Training Club app as they are easy to follow and stick to. Especially with the push notifications form MyFitnessPal alerting you to add in your meals of that day. Don’t forget to let us know what your favourite app is and whether or not you’re going to try one of these apps!