Straighten up with Instagram

Version 4.1 of Instagram for iPhone (and iPod Touch, iPad) came out on 7 August and now you're able to straighten photos. It's a handy wee feature and one I'm pleased to see has come out along with the ability to upload videos you've already taken from your Camera Roll.

If you're adding a photo from the Camera Roll, straightening is a manual process, however, if you use the Instagram camera to take the photo, tapping the straighten button will result in an automatic attempt at straightening. The belt photos on the top demonstrate manual straightening; whilst the lamp was done using the automatic function.

Instagram

Lifehacker's best of Android 2013

Lifehacker have released their list of the best Android apps for 2013. Scrolling through what's there, I'm pleased to see quite a number are actually multiplatform, such as Any.Do, Instagram and Snapseed.

If you run a 'droid smartphone or tablet, be sure to check out this year's list. Lifehacker Pack for Android: Our List of the Essential Android Apps

Lifehacker's best of iPhone 2013

This year's Lifehacker pack for iPhone includes applications for productivity, entertainment, location-services, media and utilities.

Check it out: Lifehacker Pack for iPhone: Our List of the Essential iPhone Apps

AudioNote is on Android

Those of you who have been working with me recently will know that my colleague, Ness, and I have been enthusiastically, productively and efficiently using our iPads for recording and notating meetings. Whilst Ness has more extensive need for it with her contracts, I too have been impressed with AudioNote: a note-taking application with sound-recording function.

What sets AudioNote apart from other note-taking applications is its audio to highlighted text synchronisation capability, making minute-taking and reviewing so much quicker and easier.

I’ve got it on my list to complete a full review but in the meanwhile, I’m excited to say that AudioNote is now available on Android in both free lite and full paid version. The Android version still doesn’t have the pen drawing function but at least there’s now an app with voice and note sync!

The lite version, as it is on iOS, is limited to 5 minutes of audio but that’s long enough for those of you with ‘droid phones and tablets to give it a whirl.

This alleviates my concerns around plans I have to enhance the company workshop and project kits with cheap, dedicated tablets for fulfilling this purpose as I hadn’t found an Android equivalent. I think the price point of iPads for so specific a purpose is a little over-the-top. Pending a test on the Iconia, I’m seeing this becoming an essential tool in how my projects are run in the future and what advice I can give clients interested in productivity gains using technology.

AudioNote Lite for iOS:
AudioNote Lite - Notepad and Voice Recorder

AudioNote Lite for Android:
AudioNote LITE - Android Apps on Google Play

Note: I use AudioNote as part of my toolkit, it’s not my primary store of notes. For that, I email the notes and recordings to Evernote where I compile all the files, emails and journal items (regardless of source device, OS or application) related to projects and other things I want to group and archive. I also use NotesPlus where I have a lot of diagrams with my notes because the auto-shape detection is very useful. And no, Notes Plus is still not available on Android.