Marcolina Design announced the Summer Solstice Sale: all their educational interactive apps on iPhoneography will be available for three days in the App Store at the special price of $.99, an offer ranging from 85% to 66% off.
The apps on sale are the following: Continue reading “Summer Solstice Sale For AppAlchemy & More”
To celebrate the LA Mobile Arts Festival, the iObsessed Companion for iPad will be free throughout this week. The iObsessed iPad Companion is an interactive guide packed with videos and other informative material for learning to use the iPhone and a variety of apps as effective creative tools. You can read our review for the app here.
iObsessed’s creator Dan Marcolina will give a talk at this year’s festival (08/24) and on this occasion he will uncover his new 100-page book app, AppAlchemy. AppAlchemy will be out in September, but if you are curious and want to have a taste of it before the release, you can watch the app’s teaser video below. Continue reading “Free iObsessed & AppAlchemy Teaser”
Dan Marcolina’s interactive ebook for iPad has a new lower price. The iObsessed iPad Companion is now $3.99/€2.99/£2.49 in the App Store — it was previously $4.99.
Marcolina’s iPad Companion is an expansion to his iPhone Obsessed book, published by Peachpit Press and available here. The original book counts over 150 visual experiments explained, with tips and formulas to recreate their effects. The iPad companion is actually something more than a simple interactive ebook, as it is rich in extra materials, such as the extensive video tutorials and other resources. Like the book, the app comes with detailed analysis of several visual experiments carried out on the iPhone by Marcolina. It also contains a compendium for all the app used in the various experiments and an appendix for iPhone photography add-ons. Given not only the amount of information included, but also the thoroughness and the care with which every example is explained, iObsessed is undoubtedly a first-rate guide to get acquainted with the possibilities offered by the iPhone as a means of expression.
If you want to know more on iObsessed, you can read our feature here.
There isn’t such thing as the foolproof formula to perfect creation: don’t let anybody tell you any different. Visual arts, photography included, aren’t really about getting the best equipment; what matters in visual arts is whether the creation is capable to speak to the viewer, either by conveying a strong message or simply by tickling senses and imagination. iPhone photography is not an exception.
Of course, many professionals will affirm that it’s impossible to productively use an iPhone to take valuable photographs; to support their reasoning, these professionals will go through long and tedious lists of specs and technicalities. The creatives though will always think differently, as they know every tool has more than what specifications suggest. By exploring and experimenting, creative artists accept disadvantages and flaws in the medium and turn them into unique features.
iObsessed is the brainchild of Dan Marcolina, designer and photographer with a passion for iPhone image processing. The iPad Companion counts sixteen chapters. In every chapter, Marcolina analyzes techniques and recipes he has devised to produce peculiar effects to process photos on the iPhone. Commentary and links offer in-depth overview on how the given results can be accomplished; original shots are presented for comparison and all processed photos come with their app formula. By rotating the iPad from horizontal to vertical position, it’s possible to access the app compendium, which contains information on the apps used in each chapter. Extensive video materials (around 90 minutes in all) complete the book, guiding the reader to understanding the workflow from original shot to processed image. An appendix includes several extras, like links to iPhone camera add-ons, photo gallery, and a brief note on the author.
The iPad companion is actually an extension to the iPhone Obsessed book by the same author, published by Peachpit Press, which contains more examples and information on how to use the iPhone creatively. Dan Marcolina’s interactive book doesn’t claim to be the ultimate “how-to” manual to iPhone photography. iObsessed rather presents tips and ideas that uncover the hidden potential of images and go beyond limits inherent to the medium. As such, it can be a great source of inspiration and a reference guide to rewardingly learn to combine possibilities offered by different applications and also, occasionally, by external resources.
iObsessed is available from the App Store for $4.99/€3.99/£2.99.
