voila
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Voila screen recorder for OS X
OS X has a number of handy screen capture tools built in. There are standard keyboard shortcuts for capturing still images and QuickTime Player can capture basic screen recordings. However, sometimes you need a little more from your capture tools and, if that's the case for you, then check out the latest version of Voila, which is our Daily Mac App. Voila has just celebrated its fifth anniversary and developer Global Delight has released version 3.7 in honor of that. Among the updated features of the new version are a number of much-requested additions including the ability to record video in 60 frames per second, tighter social media sharing integration (Facebook, Twitter, and Vimeo have been added), and a number of features related to OS X 10.9 Mavericks including Messages and AirDrop sharing and improved tagging functionality. Another nice improvement is for those with Retina MacBooks: Voila 3.7 allows users to scale down Retina display images by up to a factor of two. This is incredibly handy as it reduces file sizes and also ensures that your screen captures will look good on non-Retina displays. The main benefit of Voila is not the new features, but the continued improvement of existing features. For starters, Voila has an excellent content management system built in. Under its Organizer tab you can quickly sort your captures via images, videos, or even files you have trashed. Voila also has a number of Smart folders set up or you can create you own, all of which makes finding your captured media quick and easy. Voila also offers a ton of tools and effects to use on your captures. One of my favorites is the rubber stamp tool, which allows you to make it appear as if you've stamped a screen capture with, for example, a "PAID" stamp or an "APPROVED" stamp, among others. Another really nice features is that screen captures aren't just limited to fullscreen, a single window, or a cropped area of the screen. You can capture multiple windows at once and even have non-standard shape captures, such as circles and free-form shapes. When you're done capturing, Voila makes it a snap to import your captures to iPhoto, email them, print them, or share them via Messages, AirDrop, Twitter, Facebook, and more. Voila is US$29.99 in the Mac App Store.
Friday Favorite: Voila captures your screen with ease, on sale now
Given the issues with my former screen-capture app-of-choice Skitch, I recently went on the hunt for a replacement that can grab screenshots and handle video capture. I've finally landed on Voila. While it isn't perfect, Voila offers plenty of functionality and does almost everything I need. As is pretty standard for a screen-capture app, Voila lets you grab whatever is on your screen however you need it, either in a full-screen grab, from a specific window or from a drag-and-drop selection. You can grab videos in almost any configuration. I mostly use it for snapping rectangular pictures, but you can grab circular or polygonal pics as well. Voila even has an in-app browser and a connection to your webcam, for even more options. Once the picture has been captured, you can add annotations, blur or adjust it as you like and then export the file using an in-depth "Save As...". Unfortunately, this process isn't as simple as I'd like. You must hunt to find some functions, and while hotkeys can be set up, the Re-size function doesn't have a clear one. There's a re-size option on the save screen, so even when Voila doesn't have exactly what I'm looking for, it does have some fairly smart shortcuts. There are a few bugs in the app as well. One bug I'm getting recently has my pictures being saved as just a white screen rather than whatever I captured, but the support team has been more than ready to help with any problems or concerns. As for video capture, I think that's where Voila really shines. It's got a very powerful and steady video-capture functionality. You can select a window or draw a selection on the screen, and you can choose to use an external mic for audio, grab your computer's audio or use your Mac's internal mic as needed. Again, there are some small issues: The included YouTube connection won't accept videos if you've used a strange ratio when drawing a selection on the screen. But that's only a minor issue. I've still been able to just drag the videos out of the app, and then upload separately to YouTube. Voila isn't without its problems, but an app like this is designed for so many different use cases that it's not surprising there are a few hiccups. Plus, Voila is right in the middle of an awesome sale. It's only US$4.99 on the Mac App Store. If, like me, you were looking for a Skitch replacement with a little more functionality, Voila might be just what you need.
MacLegion 2011 fall bundle now available
MacLegion has announced their fall bundle for 2011. This year's bundle features 10 Mac apps worth US$639 for the low price of $49.95. The apps in this year's bundle are: Corel Painter Essentials 4 RapidWeaver 5 BannerZest Pro 3 Postbox 2.5 DEVONthink Pro 2.2 Swift Publisher +Extras 2.3 Disk Drill Pro 1.4 CheckUp 3 Voila 3.1 Fumy 1.5 The sale runs until September 28, and the first 9,000 customers who buy the bundle also get a copy of CleanMyMac (a $29.95 value) for free. The MacLegion bundles also entitle buyers to full after-sales support as well as valid upgrade paths for software releases, just as if you had bought each app individually from the developers.
