My All Time Favorite Top 10 iPhone Apps

Time has past since I bought my iPhone actually two years this December, and one upgrade later so I thought an all time top 10 app post was over due. Even though some of these apps have been around for a while and some are pretty new I consider them my all time favorites as I use them all the time.

So let's get to it! The apps are in the order I use them the most being #1 the one I use the most and my all time favorite.

10. Gaggle Social Web Browser - Sounds like Google and it's pretty much the same. It's a search app that uses Google to find the information but with the ability to share the sites by tapping on the Share button. You can share on Facebook or Twitter or bookmark the site on your iPhone. Sharing with Tumblr, Digg and Delicious is coming soon. The app is very handy and it's free.

9. Shazam - Love this app and the fact that it's free is amazing to me. This app recognizes the music currently playing around you and gives you the artist and song name along with information on where you can buy the song and view the available videos.

8. Animoto - is a service that allows you to create free short videos by using your still life pictures. You can also create and download unlimited full-length videos for a minimal yearly fee which is well worth it when you see the professional job this service does with your pictures. You can add music, text, and highlight certain pictures and the services mixes it together to form a masterpiece. You can also access the videos you have created online via the app. Cost of the app, FREE.

7. CheckPlease - Tip Calculator - Ever been at a group dinner party and have to split the bill and no one has a calculator? This nifty app will add the bill amount plus tip, and then split it between the number of people you choose. You can also opt to not tip on taxes, apply a discount or coupon amount, round up or down on tip and total and best of all you can post the amount of the bill directly to PocketMoney. I have the paid version of the app which is $0.99 but they also offer a lite version for free.

6. PhotoArtist - The name implies it all Photo Art. You can select any of the photos in your library or take a new one and then apply any of the following six filters: cartoon, watercolor, illustration, halftone, mono, and pen and your photo is turned into art. It's not a photo editor likePhotogene, it converts your photo's into artwork as the name indicates and it does a great job at it. It's only $1.99 and I think it's well worth it.

5. Photofunia - There are lots of app that let you place your picture into a frame or even into a character but most of the work is done manually by you. With Photofunia all you do is select the photo from your camera roll or take a new one, select one of the 100 effects and this nifty free app recognizes the face in the photo and places the face where it goes. It's very neat, and the results look very professional.

4. Instapaper - This app let's you save articles and web sites for offline reading. You can categorize your articles by folders, star rate them, and share them on Twitter and Tumblr and if you have Echofon Pro it integrates with it. You can also browser the app's directory for more reading material or subscribe to some one's starred items and let them recommend more articles. I have the paid version which is $4.99 but they also have a free version available.

3. Facebook - After version 3.0 this app became amazing. Now you can see pretty much everything that goes on Facebook. The app is free and the only downside is that the videos do not play on the iPhone.

2. Echofon Pro - This app use to be TwitterFon Pro, a Twitter app and it goes for $4.99. You can manage multiple Twitter accounts, it has instapaper integration, push notification for mentions, Twitter search and trends, photo and video upload and so many other features. There is also a free version available.

1. Photogene - With Photogene you can crop, apply filters, color adjustment, exposure, and saturation. You can also enhance your photos with effects, captions, frames, borders, and even rotate the image. You have the option to edit photos from your library or taking a new one. Photogene brings photo editing to another level and it's just so simple to use. The app is $2.99 but it's well worth it. Some people prefer the new PhotoShop app but to me that app doesn't do half of the things Photogene does so I'll stick to this one for now.

Now of course these are only 10 out of 110 apps I have but these are the ones that make my life just a little easier.

What about you? What apps are your all time favorites?

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What is Google Wave?

You've probably heard about Google Wave and how everyone is trying to get an invite to try it out but do you really know what it is?

This video gives you the simple round down on Google Wave in a very unique way.

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How to create screen captures with highlighted areas on the iPhone

I've been asked the following question by my readers several times "How do you get screen captures from the iPhone and highlight some areas? So instead of just answering my readers individually I decided to write a post with the steps I take to accomplish it. This way everyone wins.

First of all, I have the Photogene app which is a really good photo editor. This app has a lot of really great editing tools, it's like having a mini version of PhotoShop on your iPhone. You can download it here.

After you download the app you need to get all the photos you want to use as screen captures. If you're writing about the iPhone and you need some screen captures, you can press the Home and sleep/wake button at the same time (see image to right). This takes a photo of your current screen and the photos are saved automatically in your Camera Roll.

OK, so now you have all the photos you need so let's get down to business.

1. Access the Photogene app.

2. Tap Edit new photo and then select the photo from your Camera Roll.

3. Tap the crop tool (scissors) and resize the box to cover the portion of the photo you want to keep and tap Crop. This will trim the photo to your liking.

4. Tap the symbols icon (star) and swipe the bottom toolbar to the left.

5. Drag the square figure onto the photo.

6. Double-tap the square figure to remove text and click Done.

7. Tap the outline tool and select yellow and tap the fill tool and select transparent. (Choose the outline color that will be more visible with the background color of your photo.)

8. Put your finger in the middle of the highlighted square figure and drag it to the area of the photo you want to highlight.

9. Use the circled corners to resize the square to fit the area you want to highlight.

10. Tap the Done icon (check mark) and tap Save.

All your photos will be stored in your Camera Roll. Now follow the same steps with all the photos you want to use as screen captures. At first this might seem to long of a process but it's not. Each step takes a second to do and after you do a couple of screen captures you'll be able to do this in your sleep :O)

By the way, all these screen caps with the exception of first full iPhone photo were taken following these steps. To me this is one of the most productive apps that I have. I recommend you play with it because this is just one of the ways you can use it but it does so much much more.

If you want to be more productive you can paste those photos into an e-mail and use them to write an article in your inbox, send it to Posterous, and your article will be live in no time in all your social media sites.

What other cool things do you do with Photogene or any other photo app?

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The golden ticket is here - Google Wave

As we all know, Google Wave was announced some months ago at the developers conference and I watched the lonnnnngggggg video of their presentation and said to myself I have to get access to this. At this point Google was giving access to a limited amount of people which were actually developers but they were letting anyone request to be invited. So I immediately added my name onto their invitation list with the hopes that I would get access to it very soon. Then another wave :O) of invites when out sometime between late September - early October and nothing arrived in my inbox :O(

Now I'm not an app or gadget developer and I knew Google needed as much developers to get access to this product quickly so they could add more valuable gadgets so I figured I would get my invite with the rest of the normal technology fanatics. No rush here, I knew I would get access some day.

And then came October 14......there it was, my invite. I felt like Charlie Bucket in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory when he found the Golden ticket, I know that sounds a bit pathetic but I know a lot of you felt and will feel the same way. Let's face it, use technology enthusiast are like that. We only need access to a new toy to be happy campers.

I must confess, I jumped for joy when I saw my invitation and automatically signed up which was a quick process btw. Ok so now I'm inside Google Wave and this feeling of WTH do I do now just took over my entire being. I'm usually the kind of person that just figures stuff out and I was feeling like Jim Carrey in Dumb and Dumber. What do I do now? That's all I could hear myself say.

All of sudden I heard a voice say "invite people". What a genius! Why didn't I think of that? Duh, if you're going to collaborate you better start inviting someone and then it should come together, right? You can't collaborate with yourself.

Ok, so now I'm looking for my 8 invites..... where are my invites? I'm thinking to myself that's weird, there is always an invite link or button somewhere on the page and I don't see anything. I called a coworker over and said do you see invite any where? We both searched through the application and nothing. Finally we thought of going to the help section, and we found something like "you'll see the invites when you are entitled to them" or something like that so I figured I would check back later. At all of this I was at my day job.... and at a stressful time may I add so I figured it was almost time to go home so I better finish what I was doing and then later I could access Google Wave when I got home.

Two hours later I logged in, and there it was. A wave with the subject "Invite others to Google Wave", yay!!!!! Now I can start seeing how this works. I invited my brother who btw is another technology enthusiast just like me. Oh but there is still a problem..... the invites are not automatic. Even though you recommend your friend's they don't get instant invites. Google sends them out when they deem appropriate and I understand, this product is on beta and they need to control the amount of people accessing it. Ok so we'll wait.

In the meantime I gave away the other invites amongst my Twitter and Facebook friends.

Anyways, my brother got his invite the next day which is weird because we were under the impression it took about a week but hey it's all good. The faster people get the invites the faster I can start using this, right? No, wrong!

As I mentioned before I'm in the middle of a stressful time at work and my brain cells are non existent so I haven't had the energy to even try to play with it.

Hopefully this weekend I can play around a bit, oh but wait.... my brother is going out of town this weekend so I guess not :O(

I'll just kill the few cells I have left by watching all the videos, reading all the articles about it, and maybe I can add some gadgets. Stay tuned for more.....

What was your first impression?

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iPhone tip: How to forward MMS and SMS on the iPhone

Forwarding MMS and SMS messages on the iPhone is very simple.

1. Tap Edit at the top of your messaging screen.
   
2. Select the MMS or SMS message you want to forward.






3. Tab Forward.


4. Enter the recipient's name or tab the to access your contacts.
   
   


5. Click Send.

As a little bonus, before you click Send you can click the camera and add or take more pictures and add it to your message.

What other tips do you want to share about MMS?

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