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First look: New IUGO iPad games
The video you see here was in my inbox this morning and I really liked what what I saw. IUGO, a long time player in the mobile entertainment arena, is in the process of releasing four new games for the iPad platform. What made these games stand out for me was how well they leveraged the iPad hardware realities for both cooperative and competitive game play. Several of these games highlight multi-handed multi-player interaction on the same device. That's a feature that's specific to the iPad. The iPhone's size doesn't allow that kind of two player interaction, except through online game play with virtual opponents. What IUGO's games are doing is expanding play from an iPhone-style one user at a time paradigm into a two-users-at-once iPad experience. Read on for an exclusive discussion with IUGO Mobile Entertainment.
More iPad video torture: 64GB iPad 3G gets microwaved
It didn't take long for the iPad to get tortured, blended, and now, microwaved. Yes, in this YouTube video, a brand spankin' new 64GB iPad 3G is lovingly unwrapped, registered, and loaded with data, then popped into the Amir9000 for a journey into flaming oblivion. Just sad. And we're crying about it not just for you broke American friends who haven't gotten one yet, but for many of our international friends, who would pay a king's ransom just for a device like this. These purveyors of microwave-inflicted iPad violence will apparently be selling the cremains of the iPad on eBay soon, likely in an attempt to recover a bit of their investment. [via Crunchgear]
Found Footage: Jon Stewart scolds Apple over the Gizmodo stolen iPhone fracas
Leave it to Jon Stewart to put things into perspective. In this segment from The Daily Show, Jon satirically cops to being an Apple user since the 80s and takes Apple to task for stealing the evil empire crown from Microsoft in their handling of the Gizmodo lost iPhone incident. After Giz gave back the iPhone, the cops busted down its editor, Jason Chen's door. "Don't they know there's an app for that?" Say what you will, I think Jon nailed it. Watch the full clip after the break. [via iPhone Savior]
Found Footage: iPad output to TV with iPhone control
Dave at Magic Jungle Software wanted to turn the iPad into a video game console. So he got on his thinking cap and did a little bit of development to turn his idea into a reality. The video you see here shows an iPad running a demo of his game, Chopper 2 (currently in development), while connected to a 42" TV via Apple's component cable. Even better, David notes that he used all public APIs to accomplish this feat. As of the 3.2 SDK, Apple now offers App Store-safe ways to send video out through a VGA connector or through a component video or composite video adapter cable. You can get an idea of some of the details behind this technology in the slides from this 10-minute impromptu talk given by Erica Sadun over the weekend at the Voices that Matter conference. But wait! There's more! The super fun part is that he's controlling the game with is iPhone via Bluetooth. He's using a GameKit two-device connection, effectively turning the iPhone into a wireless controller for the iPad. It's very cool, and the first we've seen an iPhone controlling an iPad game in this way. Connecting it to a TV was the cherry on top. This isn't the first time this kind of gaming on the TV using an iPhone has been done. Freeverse engineer created a proof-of-concept system using private APIs to achieve video out with an iPhone back in 2008. You can watch the video they created, using routines that Erica published over at Ars Technica. Magic Jungle isn't using any private calls, however. Their software is publishable, which means unlike that early demo, the chances of this ending up in your hands so you can try it out on your actual device are pretty high. All in all, this is pretty neat. Games often suffer from your hands being in the way (I'm looking at you, Resident Evil). On-screen smudges can diminish a real immersion experience. You simply don't experience those issues when the device itself is merely a controller. Here's hoping we seem more of this. I can't wait to play.
Found Footage: Twitter on an Apple IIe (kind of)
Here's a great video from technabob that shows an Apple IIe displaying archived Tweets from a 5.25-inch floppy disk, complete with lo-res graphics. Here's how it works. Modder Yergacheffe uses a PC for interacting with Twitter. He hacked together a PC-to-Apple IIe interface for moving data to the Apple from the PC's USB port. Next, he wrote some custom 6502-assembler code that displays Tweets on the Apple IIe and also converts users' Twitter avatars into those gorgeous, chunky lo-res graphics. Finally, tweets are saved to the floppy for later playback. Too busy to attend to Twitter? Capture the action and play it back later, retro-style. We love it.
Found Footage: Flight of the Bumblebee in concert on an iPad
Chinese pianist Lang Lang headlined a concert at San Francisco's Davies Symphony Hall on April 19th. For the first of three encores, he played The Flight of the Bumblebee on an iPad. To accomplish this, he used the Magic Piano iPad app. This is just one example of how amazing apps can allow people to do amazing things, and the party has just started. [To clarify, the Magic Piano app does do a lot of the work in playing a piece like that; it drops down indicators for the correct notes, so the pianist has to get 'pretty close' and have the rhythm correct. Still impressive. –Ed.] [via 9to5Mac]
Found Footage: flying iPhone crashes into lamppost, survives
Those iPhones! They take a licking and usually come up ticking. In this case, Swedish radio-controlled airplane enthusiast Robehome decided it would be fun to capture some video from his plane as it flew over Löberöd in the south of Sweden. The solution? He stuck his iPhone into the airplane and let the video roll while going through a set of maneuvers. The video is fun, particularly when he crashes the aircraft into a lamppost. Don't worry -- it appears that the iPhone survived, although the plane was completely totaled. In case you've ever wondered what it would be like to smack into something while flying and crash to the ground, there's now a video for that, thanks to an iPhone. If you want to watch the long version, click here. [via Allt om Mac, thanks Peter]
Found Footage: How to write a screenplay on the iPad
Nate and Biagio over at jokeandbiagio.com have come up with a Pages hack for writing screenplays on the iPad. At this time, there are a few iPhone apps for writing screenplays, but none of them exist in an iPad version... yet. As you can see in the video above, the solution that these two Hollywood hotshots have come up with is not perfect -- they gripe about the lack of the toolbar in landscape mode in Pages for iPad as much as I do -- but it proves that screenwriting on the iPad can be done. Nate came up with a template in the Mac version of Pages '09 that includes a bunch of screenplay styles, such as CH for character, PA for parenthetical, SL for slug, AC for action, TR for transition, etc... You can download the template here -- note that if you're reading this on your iPad and have Pages for iPad installed, you can open the template directly in Pages and get started on that Oscar-winning screenplay today.
Found Footage: self-unboxing iPad
This is -- for me, personally -- one of the greatest unboxing videos I've ever seen. Not to oversell it, but the sheer simplicity of a self-unboxing iPad is beautiful. The complete lack of commentary (or even a human) makes it short enough that even my attention span, frazzled by years of short songs and too much sugar, can consider it a pleasure to sit all the way through. In case you're wondering (and don't feel like watching, for whatever reason), it's a stop-motion animation, complete with a hovering X-ACTO blade, created by Brian Stark. Playtime with his new iPad was delayed for over an hour as he created this piece; he's suffered for his art, and for that, we commend him. Read on and watch the video to see for yourself! [Direct Vimeo link for iPhone/iPad users]
Cell-Mate headset provides hands-free calling, removes dignity
When it comes to testing out new and exotic technologies, nobody holds a candle to Team Engadget. Good thing, too, because that candle, held too close to the Cell-Mate headset, might set your hair on fire while you talk on the phone -- and nobody wants that. Yes, for $14.99 you too can own the iPhone accessory demoed at CTIA that some describe as "Velcro, a curved wire and a plastic pad," and make handsfree calls at will. Bluetooth, shmootooth -- those little chatty thingamabobs are hard to pair, battery life is a joke, and they make you look like a crazy person when you're talking on them. The Cell-Mate doesn't make you look crazy; it makes you look like MacGyver's not-so-bright nephew. The video is embedded in the continuation of the post. Once you see it, I think you'll agree that the Cell-Mate is, in fact, Velcro, curved wire and a plastic pad... plus a little thing we like to call "comedy gold." Thanks to Paul & Sean at Engadget for taking one for the team.
Found Footage: MIDI wind instrument controlled with the iPod touch's accelerometer
Onyx Ashanti is an American musician living in Berlin. He specializes in "beatjazz," which he describes as being built on "live looping, sound design, and jazz improvisation." Using a Yamaha MIDI wind controller (that looks like an electronic clarinet) and an iPod touch running the TouchOSC app (US$4.99), Ashanti has been able to create some pretty incredible sounds. In the above video, Ashanti has the iPod touch strapped to his right hand, and he's able to use the accelerometer in the touch to translate his hand motions into control inputs for PureData audio processing. You may not necessarily like beatjazz, but you've got to admit it's cool that musicians like Ashanti are pushing the edge with Apple technology. [via Engadget]
Found Footage: David Barnard of AppCubby talks about KaleidoVid
While roaming the floor at Macworld Expo 2010 in February, I had the opportunity to talk with David Barnard of AppCubby about several of their iPhone apps, including GasCubby and TripCubby. David also told me about a project that they had in the works at the time, which has recently been released -- a US$0.99 iPhone kaleidoscope called KaleidoVid. TUAW's Dave Caolo provided you with details about the app in an earlier post, but we thought you might enjoy this short interview with David where he talks about the app, his reason for developing it, and gives us a short demo of KaleidoVid in action.
Found Footage: Grandma gets an iPad
After spending years trying, failing and trying again to teach a number of mature Apple users how to use various Apple products, I got a kick out of this video. It's funny because it's true, and it also shows that there are some less than optimum uses for an iPad. This iPad parody was made as a school project for a Comm 340 class. I think you'll get a chuckle out of it on this late Friday afternoon. Thanks Justin for sending it in.
Found Footage: VMware gets schooled by Parallels in MacTech benchmarks
Many Mac owners who install Windows do so for gaming. Those uninterested in Boot Camp can try out virtualization software, which lets you run Windows in a virtual environment on a Mac. The two most popular are VMWare Fusion and Parallels. Before making a purchase decision, wouldn't it be great to see how they handle graphics side-by-side? You drive a car before you buy it, right? The folks at MacTech thought so, and set up identical machines for testing purposes. In the video above you'll see two MacBook Pros running Windows XP over Mac OS 10.6.2 via VMWare Fusion 3 (on the left) and Parallels Desktop 5 (on the right). They were put through several graphics-intensive tests simultaneously with dramatic results. We don't want to spoil the surprise, but suffice to say that Fusion got spanked. You can get all of the details on the test, setups and results here.
Found Footage: Deconstructing the iPad Ad
Neil Curtis, the guy behind the adjective-filled iPad mashup video we presented last month, has taken the iPad commercial shown on the Oscar broadcast and clarified it. Our own Sang Tang did a graphical breakdown of the ad's focus earlier today, so this is a nice companion piece. In his version, he slowed down the ad to 15% speed, which gives you a much better idea of what's really going on. He also comments on a few 'Emperor's New Clothes' moments like switching models in mid-stream and how a graphic dragged into text continues to move without any user intervention. Take a look at this iPad video and see what else you can find.
revMobile: write iPhone and iPad apps without knowing Objective C
One of the biggest barriers to entry for people who want to develop their own iPhone apps is the requirement to actually know how to program in Objective C. Runtime Revolution (AKA RunRev) has been developing and marketing a HyperCard-like development environment since 1997. To quote the company's site, "Rev uses plain-English words and phrases for most of its operations, eliminating the obscure symbols and complicated structures required of other programming languages. Rev is easy to learn and use, requires 90% less code, and can deliver a 10-fold increase in productivity over traditional languages." What does this have to do with developing for iPhone and iPad? The answer is simple -- the company is stretching the development environment to the mobile computing market with a new product, currently in pre-alpha, called revMobile. For developers who want to market their products to the widest possible range of mobile devices, revMobile not only supports the iPhone and iPad world, but Nokia's Maemo platform and Windows Mobile 7 as well. Since apps can also run on Mac OS X, Windows, and Linux, this represents a very robust development environment. The video at the top of this post shows a simple game being conceptualized, designed, and written in a little over 3 hours. RunRev has always been compiled at runtime, but for the purposes of getting RunRev apps into the App Store, revMobile apps are going to be compiled at build time so that a single executable is available for submission. You can find out more about revMobile, including pricing and availability, at the RunRev website.
Found Footage: Dalek controlled by iPhone accelerometer
Self-respecting science fiction fans will remember the Daleks. They're the mutant alien villains from the Doctor Who television series with armored casing, warbling voices and a penchant for extermination. Steve at BotBuilder is a fellow fan who combined his love of sci-fi and bots into the iPhone-controlled Dalek you see above. In what he calls "a cool and ultimately pointless experiment," Steve uses the iPhone to send messages to the board in the Dalek over Wi-Fi which, in turn, operate servos and lights up LEDs. The cool part is that he can move the bot about using the iPhone's accelerometer. This isn't the first iPhone-powered remote control device we've seen of course (The Parrot AR.Drone was clearly our favorite), but it delights us as Dr. Who fans. Well done, Steve! [Via Cult Of Mac]
Found Footage: Charlie Rose hosts iPad chat club
In case you missed it last week, PBS top gab guy Charlie Rose (no relation) hosted a roundtable discussion about the latest product from Steve & co. on his show, featuring the NYT's David Carr, 'Uncle' Walt Mossberg of the Wall Street Journal, and TechCrunch founder/would-be tablet impresario Michael Arrington. The segment is about 23 minutes long, but it's a good conversation. Mossberg described the iPad as "wicked fast" and praised the software's grace notes and sophistication, while noting that nobody has really succeeded at making a tablet that the market embraced wholeheartedly. Arrington said "Personally, I think people are going to love this." David Carr (who strongly evokes the actor Austin Pendleton for some reason) also compared the Apple tablet to the Kindle, with the Amazon device coming out unfavorably: "Mr. Jobs did say we stand on the shoulders of Amazon, and he was very professional and gracious about that, but he left that picture of the Kindle up there for two minutes... it looked like something Mennonites made 150 years ago." Ow. [via iPhoneSavior & TechCrunch]
Found Footage: Steve Ballmer signs student's Mac
Earlier this week, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer gave the keynote address to the Nashville Technology Council, which was held at Trevecca Nazarene University (TNU) in Nashville, TN. Steve, who is on a multi-city tour to promote Microsoft, joined other prominent technology professionals like Abbie Lundberg, editor-in-chief of CIO Magazine. After the speeches were done, Steve did a meet-and-greet with TNU Students to answer brief questions, sign autographs and so on. One student asked for Steve's autograph -- on a MacBook Pro. To his credit, Steve handled the awkward moment well (as another student's camera rolled), writing "Need a new one? Steve Ballmer" smack-dab over the laptop's logo. Kudos to Steve for his cool-headed response (we can't imagine what Steve Jobs would do if asked to sign a Dell) and for that student with the nerve to pull such a stunt. You can see close ups of the signature here. [Via MacDailyNews]
