Seattle Stickies Updated
Today version 1.0.4 of Seattle Stickies was released. This release adds three new stickers to the collection bringing the total to twenty-two stickers. Seattle Stickies is a collection of Messages stickers celebrating the landmarks and culture of Seattle and the greater Puget Sound.
Seattle Stickie stickers are made in the distinctive canvas art style. With twenty-two stickers to choose Stickies owners have sporting stickers, Mt Rainer, Seattle Ferries, 9/11 Memorial, hand blown glass, local eateries, wildlife, and other landmarks.
For everyone who is not familiar with Messages Stickers here is the explanation directly from Wikipedia.
A sticker is a detailed illustration of a character that represents an emotion or action that is a mix of cartoons and Japanese smiley-like “emojis“. They have more variety than emoticons and have a basis from internet “reaction face” culture due to their ability to portray body language with a facial reaction. Stickers are elaborate, character-driven emoticons and give people a lightweight means to communicate through kooky animations.
Stickers are commonly downloadable for free, while online stores provide wider alternatives for a price. Sets may be devoted to specific themes, characters, as well as popular brands and media franchises such as Hello Kitty, Psy, and the Minions of Despicable Me.
Note: Seattle Stickies has a description in the app store stating it is free. While it was free for a period of time it is currently sold for 0.99usd. This error will be corrected at the next update.
You can download a copy of Seattle Stickies at the link below.
Augmented Reality Brings New Dimension to Photography Apps
Seattle,WA – April 3, 2018 – Ron Boyd Design today announced new augmented reality features in three of his photography related applications. With the introduction of Apple’s version 11.3 mobile operating system comes the ability to virtually place objects on vertical surfaces like walls. The new technology allows users to view art and photographs in a variety of sizes and frames mounted on their own walls before going to the great expense of printing and purchasing products. With the Wildlife and Nature Pictures application owners that are considering a purchase of a digital download of an image can preview what the image looks like as a framed print in their own home or office. Image editors Get It Straight and Canvas Art allow users to see their own masterpieces with AR. When viewing images with AR, users have the option of three frame styles, light colored oak, cherry wood, or dark walnut, with the choice of no frame, thin, regular, and thick frame styles. Users can also choose from five different overall picture sizes to get an accurate feel for what large prints would look like mounted on a wall.
You can download a copy of the apps at the link below.
Get it Straight App bug
I just want to mention that I have been seeing a few crashes in the Get it Straight application when users are trying to save their edited images to the Photos Library. I want to let everyone know that I have identified the problem and it has been fixed for the next update. The next update will come out when iOS 11.3 is publicly available which should be in about a week. Until then anyone who wants to save their edited masterpiece to the Photos Library can do that by using the Photo Editing extension right in the Photos app. Just hit the edit button then the circle with three dots inside it and you will see the Get it Straight icon where you can perform the same tasks and it will be saved to the Photos Library.
Thanks for your patience.
You can download a copy of Get it Straight at the link below.
Augmented Reality Update
A quick note to let everyone know that testing is going well for the inclusion of augmented reality for three of my applications. I have a few screenshots to share. Please allow me to apologize in advance for the quality. It turns out making the screenshots is more difficult than I had expected. Rest assured that it looks much better on your actual iPhone or iPad.
You can learn more and download my apps at the link below.
Augmented Reality Coming to Photography Apps
Coming soon to the iPhone and iPad augmented reality becomes more powerful and will bring a new dimension to the three photography related applications I sell. Specifically, the next version of the iOS operating system, version 11.3, will include vertical plane detection in it’s ARKit framework. What that means for all you non-nerd folks is that your phone or tablet will soon be able to detect walls and place objects on them like paintings and pictures.
For the free Nature & Wildlife Pictures app, users will be able to use AR to preview the for sale images in a variety of frames and sizes in their own homes, on their own walls before making any purchase. Get it Straight and Canvas Art users will be able to use their edited images to mount in a variety of frames and sizes so they can see what their completed art looks like on the wall before going through the time and expense of printing the image.
Augmented Reality was first introduced to the iPhone and iPad in September of last year. At that time horizontal plane detection was fully functional and placing virtual objects on floors, table tops, and counters was all the rage. I have been testing the vertical experience since it has been available and I can say it works quite well and as soon as the feature is available to the public new versions of my apps will be released. I am anticipating this to be in about 4-6 weeks.
You can download the Nature & Wildlife app or Get it Straight app today.
Seattle Stickies
Seattle Stickies is now available on the iOS app store. They are available as a free download to all iPad and iPhone owners for a limited time.
It is a collection of Messages stickers celebrating the landmarks and culture of Seattle and the Puget Sound. Great for residents and travelers. These stickers are made in the distinctive canvas art style. Help celebrate the art and culture of all Washington by using these free stickers today.
Get a High Resolution Copy of This Image For Free
Version 3.1 of Nature & Wildlife Pictures is now available with many new images and performance improvements. NWP is a free download with most of the 60 downloadable images available at no additional cost including the one at the top of this post. There are also additional images available for sale.
Among the other improvements the app now allows image purchases on both the phone and iPad and the entire process is more robust and informative to the user. Previously purchased images are now shaded in green on both the phone and iPad and allows users to easily restore purchases they have already paid. This version is also translated into Spanish and shows local currency rates for all countries.
Nature & Wildlife Pictures is a free download for all users so if you enjoy the pictures you see on this blog you will love the application.
Get It Straight
Do you know what camera makes the most pictures in the world? It’s not a Cannon or Nikon, the camera that makes the most images around the world is the camera built into the Apple iPhone. But you probably knew that already. The thing is, good cameras on good phones are a great way to make images. Granted there will be no great bird photography on a smart phone in the foreseeable future, but because high end smart phones have so much computing power it is very possible to take high resolution images, edit them, and store or share them all from the same device with quality comparable to expensive DSLR cameras.
The last couple of years I have made a lot of pictures with my iPhones and often they are just fine after the edits I can make right in the Apple Photos application. But, there are times when I make a panorama or architectural photo and there is the lens distortion we see on most wide angle shots. You know what I am talking about, trees that are at an angle or windows that are not straight. It is common and easily fixed in Lightroom or Photoshop but I became really bothered that I needed to send images to the evil Adobe to make just one edit. I set out to build a better way to fix that distortion right on the phone and even better right in the app where the photo is stored. That led to the birth of Get It Straight tagged as The missing link to mobile photo editing. That’s because I really do believe it provides the one editing feature the native application does not have.
The standalone application offers users the ability to import images from many sources, adjust the horizon, adjust the perspective, set a crop, export and share the edited image. As a Photos Editing Extension users are able to jump into the extension while editing the image and adjust the horizon and perspective while making all the other light and color edits the application offers.
Get It Straight is available for a one time price of $1.99USD on the app store for iPhone and iPad. You can download it here.
Defining Moments
Photo by Chris Gardner
Back in the day, on a job long since gone I was told to lie to customers. Not a one time thing to get out of a jam but as a matter of policy. A matter of policy when some extra effort on behalf of other workers would have eliminated the temptation to lie in the first place. That was a defining moment for me, they way the order so easily left the senders mouth, no hesitation, no level of discomfort or angst. I knew that I no longer wanted to be associated with that business or the person running it. For better or worse it is the moment that put me on the path to where I am today.
Another defining moment, one for bird photographers, is the day one puts down the money to own a top-notch lens. Back in the day that was pretty clearly defined, a top-notch lens was simply considered to be the longest lens the camera manufacturer makes with only a few exceptions, but today that is different. With skyrocketing prices and a flood of third party lenses that suspiciously all get rave reviews that step forward gets cloudy. Stay thirsty my friends, in the end the moment is clear-cut and a well defined moment, all be it a very expensive one.
I have a friend that I met a Bosque del apache a few years ago. He recently made the decision to plunk down the funds for a new Nikon 500mm lens and then put the effort into learning the lens and his photos have never looked better. Today I present for the first time a photograph from another photographer, the hard to find Green Jay from Chris Gardner. Thank You Chris!
You Don’t Say’s
I’m not the kind of guy that keeps track of all the different birds I encounter. I’m not that guy even though apps like iBird Pro make it very easy to keep track of sightings. After a while though, you just don’t see many new species of bird without making plans to do so with a trip to a new place. I doubt that it is a bird I have not seen before as it is rather common but it is a bird I have not noticed or specifically photographed and that is kind of cool. With a moderate amount of rainfall here in Southern California everything is once again turning green, something we have not seen in a very long time.It made for a fun afternoon shooting and discovering the new bird.
You can’t tell from the image above but the bird I am writing about is the Say’s Phoebe an unremarkable and common bird that just happened to stand out in the fields of green, but still something new is fun to see.
