Photo Apps 4: Family-Fun Apps; My Kids' Verdict

Action Movie    $2     Mac iPad

This app was my family's winner!  Using the iPad to point and record, my kids have the ability to blow up EVERYTHING in a number of different ways!

1.  Missile Attack: Zeroes in on something to land on and blow-up!

2.  Car Smash: It may just be a minivan, but it has been knocked pretty hard to do the damage it does when filmed correctly

3.  Demolition Rock:  If you have ever wanted to drop a rock on something, you have the perfect spherical chance to do so using this app!

4.  Rough Terrain: Rubble flies to the screen, and almost in your lap! This one causes the most debris

The negatives?  It only has the four effects.  There are; however, several two-pack $1 bundles available.  I ended up buying:

5.  Electro-Strike
Afraid of getting hit by lightening? Want to see yourself get hit? That's the basis for the electro-strike app.

6. Meteorite
Meteorites fall at an angle from the sky.  I'd like to see more smoke and damage; it looks weird that something hit by a meteorite survive unscathed.  Overall, I still think the app is perfect for my kids.

7.  Flash-Flood
This might be a little less life-like, but it covers whatever it has taken in its wake, so the collateral damage remains under water.

8.  Ground-Suckers
It might be better if there was an effect that makes it look like whatever got sucked into the ground actually went down, but it hovers magically above the hole.  It's definitely better to make holes where someone MIGHT step, or where a car MAY drive etc.

Overall, my kids love all of the Action Movie Apps.  They even SHARE the iPad to play with this app, which is enough to take the ground out from under my feet.

Comic Book     $2     Mac iPad

I've played around with Comic Book, but my kids have yet to master it.  The images are limited unless you buy more stickers.  It's more fun used in conjunction with photographs that have been altered using other apps.  Overall, it is fun, but more work needs to be done to make it more user-friendly for children who are inexperienced with photo-augmentation.

Old Booth    $2     Mac iPad

This app was our least favorite.  There is a minimal amount of cartoon-like period outfits per girl/boy and at that -it only came in one color.  A snapshot of their head goes in bobble-sized using the point and shoot method.  The app provided them with about ten minutes of entertainment that quickly lead to frustration to the point of my need to take the iPad away.

Comment     Free     This Website
If you've had success (or failure) with family-friendly photography applications, please comment and let me know about it or feel free to drop me an email or tweet! My twitter handle is @mandiklim.  Just mention the Photo-apps and I'll know what it's in conjunction with.  Happy photograph making!

The Swift and The Falls (Arethusa)

Bluegrass Hobo Parade

Yankee Doodle on a Bike

"Georgia on my Mind" Pastel on Cardboard 2010

Photo Apps 3: Cost and Resources

Although I've only spent about $30 on applications, I wanted to list the apps, the necessary hardware, and some other favorites I've come to love.

Major Cost Item

        $300         iPad 2, refurbished from Smalldog Electronics  

                         http://www.smalldog.com

        $5-$25      Stylus (pen)

      

Applications (Mac)          http://www.apple.com/osx/apps/app-store.html

        $15           iPhoto (Standard with Mac)   

        $10           Photo Effects (lite)              

        $7             Analog (in-store)

Fun Apps for (Big) Kids

        $2             Action Movie 

        $2             Comics

        $2             Old Booth

Photo Apps 2: Finding the Apps

As many of you know, I am an Apple enthusiast to the end.  It is only this year that I fully began to re-invest myself into my photography.  Although I've been taking pictures all along, it was only recently that the "dark-room" has become reanimated for me.  

I've been reading about several photography applications in i-Life magazine.  Immediately I knew that I had to have them; they looked like a lot of fun and were cost-effective.

I am in NO way affiliated to any of the products listed, only happy share information that is helping me to fall back into my love for photography.  

  

Finding the Apps

Most of the information I find starts with reading I-Life magazine.  I scribble down bits of information on whatever I can (receipts and bills included) and use it as a starting point for my search.  

I'll usually play with the apps using photos I already have on iPhoto (free with a mac/$15 as a download) and use the different effects to generate a photograph for various purposes.  I've mostly overcome my snobbery about digital enhancement bastardizing pure image, and am learning to have... well, fun.  

Photo Apps 1: Introduction

In college, I would spend more time in the dark-room than I would doing anything else.  Graduating was a painful removal from my mad-scientist lab of creative bliss.  Along with this transition came the painful switch from developing my own film and the process of creating beautiful images to an impotent digital point-and-click guillotine.  I felt like the creative process was gone.  I couldn't play with the f-stop, shutter-speed, and was alienated from my final composition.

Then something wonderful happened.  It was like a peace treaty between artists and engineers, resulting in amazing and cost-effective applications that allow for the photographer to create once again.  The dark-room mechanized, and the chemicals became screen-shots.  The creative process was re-born; it was different, but I could finally enhance my photographs the way I wanted to, instead of just seeing the clicked image.

Tree Veins

How do I download Adobe Lightroom to my blog? I've edited my first photo (halfway-decently).