IchatTheater
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Getting in shape with iChat Theater
Whether it's because you're at school or work all day, finding the time and energy to workout is difficult. So, why not make it easier on yourself and find a partner to workout with via iChat Theater? When iChat went Leopard, it included a series of features and enhancements. One of these enhancements was iChat Theater. iChat Theater allows you to share documents, photos and videos with your buddies in an easy and oh-so-Apple elegant way. With Snow Leopard, iChat Theater gained the capability of displaying content at a higher resolution: up to 640 by 480 pixels. While photos and presentations translate well over iChat Theater, I've found that sharing videos is not without its hiccups unless you have an extremely fast and consistent Internet connection with robust upload speed. I've found both video and audio quality to be unacceptable for watching movies or TV shows. But this doesn't really matter when you're working out. Sure, there may be some lip syncing (audio delay) and the video quality may not be the greatest, but hey, you're working out: you've won the biggest battle already. And, you're not alone: your buddy on the other side of the iChat will push you along as well. To start iChat Theater, click on "File" and then select "Share a File with iChat Theater." After selecting your file, you will be asked to start a video chat. You'll then need to highlight the buddy you'd like to invite, and the click on "Buddies" and then selecting "Invite to Video Chat." Alternatively, you could start a video chat with a buddy and then initiate iChat Theater. My sister recently purchased the P90X workout program for me as a gift, and an intense workout regimen it certainly is. After I opened up the box set, I immediately created an iPhone formatted version of it (HandBrake), which I take with me when I workout at the gym or the park with a friend of mine. On days when I'm working out at home (after a long day's work, of course), the workout sessions are done over iChat Theater. So while iChat Theater can't do all the heavy lifting for you, it certainly finds alternative ways for you to motivate yourself to do it.
CamCamX: Spice up your video chats and get more out of them
For those who want to spice up their video conferences and would like to use their iSight (or other webcam) with more than one application simultaneously, CamCamX might just be the app for you. Offering an old-school UI for mixing movies and images into your video conferences, CamCamX allows you to play digital broadcaster with most of the webcam-enabled apps for Mac OS X. In addition to mix-master-iSight with your video and media, CamCamX also allows you to use more than one webcam app at once, allowing you to, for example, hop into a video chat while also providing a live webstream or recording yourself with QuickTime (though, for some strange reason, you apparently need to purchase iChatUSBCam if you want iChat to fit into your CamCamX workflow). While the UI isn't the most beautiful thing this side of the HIG, it's a powerful concept that mimics Apple's upcoming iChat Theater in Leopard, but seems to open a few more doors since it works with apps like Yahoo! Messenger, Skype and even Flash.A watermarked demo of CamCamX is avaialble from VJ Software, while a license costs $29.00, with 3-year and lifetime upgrade memberships available for $59 and $99, respectively.
Leopard's iChat Theater could change the way we do... well, everything
It's things like the iChat Theater page at Apple's Developer site that make me just fine with the delay of Mac OS X Leopard. They say 'good things come to those who wait,' but from what I'm reading at the iChat Theater page, that phrase is more like 'fantastic, amazing and mind-blowing things come to those who wait' when applied to the new technologies coming in Leopard. While most of that page is geared towards developers, offering things like code snippets to get them excited and motivated to build their apps to work with Leopard's iChat, the first two paragraphs are enough for 'the rest of us' to get a mouth-watering glimpse of just how much the new iChat could change the way we work and play once Leopard does arrive.In short, iChat Theater is a new feature that will allow the broadcast of, and collaboration on, just about anything we do on our Mac. Of course, a developer will have to design their app specifically to incorporate these new features (hint: submitting feedback and feature requests is a good thing), but just consider the possibilities: instead of having to jam pack all your tech support calls into that once-or-twice-a-year family holiday trip, you can fire up Leopard's iChat and show mom and dad how to make a slideshow in iPhoto over the web, with both video and audio of yourself and iPhoto. Now expand a little: is your job on the verge of granting you telecommuting privileges? Or perhaps you're a teacher or a technology scout for an educational organization? This new Leopard feature opens doors much larger than the one for mom and pop; with iChat Theater, teachers and businessmen alike will be able to work their magic in entirely new ways, and not just with the tools Apple provides. The beauty of iChat Theater is that it's an open platform, so to speak; want to brainstorm in OmniGraffle with a colleague on the opposite side of the country? Need to teach a last-minute digital art class in Lineform for a friend halfway across the world? No sweat. Although I have no idea whether The Omni Group or Freeverse have already hopped on the iChat Theater bandwagon, plenty of comments and requests from their users could probably ensure they do.iChat Theater is gonna be a big'un boys and girls, and I already have a couple handfuls of reasons as to why I can wait for Apple to take their time and (hopefully) get it right.
Steve reveals 10 features of Leopard for Spring 2007 release
If you're waiting for Leopard, you'll have to cool your heels until Spring 2007, when Apple officially promises the release. To wet your appetite, Apple previewed 10 Leopard features at WWDC today: Time Machine - a new built-in backup system that will back up your entire system and allow you to restore the whole thing or just selected files. Enhancements to iChat -- including a tabbed interface, custom still or video backdrops for your video iChat, iChat Theater (which lets you show iPhoto pics or a Keynote presentation during an iChat), and Photo Booth effects to make yourself look silly during a chat. Other iChat enhancements that were mentioned but not demoed include video recording (yes!), invisible mode, and animated buddy icons. The Apple site also shows the ability to share your desktop during an iChat. Now just let me figure out how to use these features to do screen recordings and machinima -- hmmm. Two dashboard additions -- Web Clip, which allows you to build dynamically updating widgets from any Web page (examples -- a cartoon or bestseller list that updates every day); and DashCode for widget development, complete with modifiable widget templates (for RSS, podcasts, and more), and a library of parts to pop into your widget. Additions to Mail.app -- a To-Do list made automatically from emails and that ties into iCal and other apps; Stationery (rich HTML email templates); and Notes (to replace those reminder emails you've been sending yourself). Universal Access features - natural sounding voiceover, closed captioning in QuickTime, and braille support. Core Animation - with features like keyframing and tweening to help developers create animations. Spotlight enhancement - Spotlight will be able to search other machines on your network, do Boolean search, and will launch your applications for you. Virtual desktop Spaces - letting you combine task-based applications into separate logical desktop configurations. That means you can have one group of apps running for Web design, another for print production, and yet another for podcast creation and editing. You'll be able to drag items between Spaces. Complete package - of built-in apps, including Boot Camp, Front Row, and PhotoBooth. 64 bit processing. There's some mouthwatering stuff here. Now I wonder what those other top secret items are that Steve said he's still keeping under wraps?
