Guardian Travel's year in Instagram: 2015

January We started the year with @ventureforthphoto doing a takeover for us at the annual Bishwa Itjema religious festival, "which draws millions of attendees to the northern Dhaka suburb of Tongi, many of them arriving and departing on heavily loaded trains, which are truly an astounding sight". A good six months before the US and Cuba restored diplomatic relations, @signorilefabio decided to see Havana before it all changed. "Havana appears suspended in the 1950s – you see all these iconic vintage American cars cruising along the Malecon." February The Jaisalmer Desert Festival takes place in Rajasthan every February. @drusillita posted shots from the event, which celebrates the culture and heritage of the region in camel races, music, art and dance. Venice carnival was also in full flow in February – quite literally this year as there was widespread flooding. Local Instagrammer @neumarc posted photos of the costumes and masks. March By March, we were desperate for some sun, and local photographer @katwesterman took us on a tour of the southern California beach scene, including "Muscle Beach" – an outdoor weightlifting area legendary among body builders. This year marked the 50th annversary of Singapore's independence. Photographer @aikbengchia offered to show us around his city, and at 2.15am on the first day, he met Mr Hamid, one of the many cyclists in Singapore who transform their bicycles into a kaleidoscope of colour with a multitude of LED lights and stickers. More than 120,000 photgraphs have so far been shared with us by adding #guardiantravelsnaps – and this one was sent in by @joideverve, a Sydney-based photographer who was touring Japan by train. April One of our featured Instagrammers of the week in April was American photographer @kdkuiper, who travelled all over Egypt, starting in Cairo where he took a ride out to the pyramids: "A trip of a lifetime, and despite all the negative stories that you hear about Egypt, I never once felt unsafe." May In May, we headed to China with @alessors – an Italian photographer documenting how fast the country is changing. "This cigar seller set up his stand in the Kuantan-Zhai pedestrianised area of Chengdu in Sichaun province, with renovated Qiang dynasty hutongs – alleys lined with houses built around courtyards." June We celebrated the start of summer with this shot by @nashker at Plage de Saint-Malo, taken when he travelled 23,000 miles from Asia to the US without using a plane. North Korea was constantly in the headlines this year, and in June announced that it was blocking access to Instagram. Singapore-based photographer Mindy Tan posted photographs from her recent visit on @mindyshoots and blog.mindytan.com. This shot shows a traffic cop on her way to work in Pyongyang. Also in June, Californian pro-climber @chris_sharma took his passion for climbing trees to dizzying new heights, scaling a huge redwood tree for a project called Red Bull's Giant Ascent. He climbed the 77-metre tree in Eureka, northern California, without ropes, getting 50 metres up the bark before reaching the first branches. Photograph by @ladzinski. Five years after the earthquake of 2010 devastated Haiti, Guardian travel correspondent @kevinrushby visited the island to see how it was recovering. July July was all about Greece. With all the economic uncertainty following the debt crisis and the "no" vote in the austerity referendum, we wanted to encourage people to continue to holiday there. This shot by @21_pp shows a little girl playing along with the soldiers in Athens. August "Bright days" lie ahead for Iran's tourism industry following the nuclear agreement struck in Vienna in July. This shot by @mansoreh.motamedi shows an Iranian Muslim family using a selfie stick to take a group photograph on a beach by the Caspian sea, northern Iran @matteocartaphoto, a teacher, traveller and photographer based in China, shared a rare insight into the Naadam festival in Mongolia, a major holiday featuring the three sporting passions of Mongolians: horse racing, wrestling and archery. September In September, Melbourne-based photojournalist @francescovicenzi was in Pokhra, Nepal to witness new constitution celebrations. "The newly signed constitution was seven years in the making and follows months of political unrest. While celebrated in major towns, it has left some minority groups unhappy." October October is all about the beer in Bavaria. @katia_mi_ shared this shot from Oktoberfest: the largest beer festival and funfair in the world, held in Munich since 1810. November November saw Myanmar's first national vote since a nominally civilian government was introduced in 2011, ending nearly 50 years of military rule. @paulratje, an American photojournalist based in Taiwan, captured the historic events. "This shot was taken in Mandalay and shows a group of nuns crammed aboard a bus, seemingly joking around. Nuns in Myanmar are usually quite solemn as they do their alms rounds, but this scene offers a glimpse of their character." December In December, we travelled to the coldest populated region in the world – Yakutia, the heart of Siberia, in north-east Russia – with @maxavdeev, a freelance photojournalist from Moscow. "This shot shows a woman in Gagarin Park just after finishing the 10km run in the park. The extreme cold doesn't deter joggers, even though in temperatures below -30C, any sweat and moisture immediately turn to ice." We rounded the year off in Berlin at the Gendarmenmarkt with @katia_mi_. "This is one of the most popular Christmas markets in Berlin during the festive season. Framed by the Französischer Dom, the Konzerthaus and the Deutscher Dom, a small tent city with more than 1,000 strings of light appears like magic each year in this centrally-located square."
Source: Guardian Travel's year in Instagram: 2015

Apple's in-store workshops offer art and photography tips

If you're looking to get some photography tips for that shiny new iPhone you got for Christmas, Apple is offering just that. The company will host mobile photography and art workshops at its retail locations next month. For iPhone photographers, the workshop will focus on techniques and accessories for improving the overall quality of images, including tips for long exposure and time lapse. If you're more of the artsy type, another tutoring session will show you how to use the iPad as a tool for sketching, drawing and painting.

The free hour-long events are part of an initiative Apple calls "Start Something New," highlighting the work artists and photographers create with the iPhone, iPad and Apple Watch. Rather than just showing off the abilities of its gear, the company hopes you'll use its gadgets to get more creative with those New Year's resolutions. And it wants to show you how do it.

[Image credit: ChinaFotoPress/ChinaFotoPress via Getty Images]

Source: Apple's in-store workshops offer art and photography tips

AppAdvice's top 10 free iPhone apps of 2015

While 2015 brought us many new products from Apple, such as the Apple Watch, iPad Pro, and Apple TV, there is still the reigning champion of mobile devices, and that is the iPhone, which many of you may have received over the holidays. And with iOS 9, many improvements were made under the hood that make the experience even better than ever before. But the thing that breathes life into the iPhone are the apps that developers make for it. So let's take a dive into what we consider to be some of the best free apps you can download on the iPhone App Store!

The AppAdvice Free iPhone App of 2015

Spark – Like your email again, released May 29, iPhone and Apple Watch only

While Apple comes with a built-in email app on your iPhone, it is lacking in some departments and there are third party solutions to fill the void. One of the best ones that came out this year was Spark, the email client from Readdle.

Spark features a unique design that focuses on making email management easier than ever. With the Smart Inbox, your unified inbox is separated into different "cards" for each account, as well as Notification and Newsletter type emails, and you can do selective batches or just archive or delete everything at once. There is also the ability to snooze messages if you want to deal with them later, swipe to pin (also a card in the Smart Inbox for easy access), calendar management, access to attachments from all email accounts, HTML signatures, smart notifications (get notifications only for the emails that matter), quick replies, and much more.

And for those who like to use their Apple Watch for everything, Spark has a slick Apple Watch companion app that lets you check your email from your wrist, and even send off quick replies without ever pulling out your phone.

Readdle has outdone themselves with Spark, making it a great alternative for iPhone email. Don't hesitate — get Spark on your iPhone now.

Runner-Up

Evernote Scannable, released Jan. 8, iPhone/iPod touch and iPad only

With such powerful cameras equipped on our iPhones nowadays, it makes a great alternative for document scanning for those who don't want to deal with big, clunky scanners and printers. Which is why Evernote Scannable is another must-have app for your device.

Evernote Scannable launches directly into the camera mode, so you can start scanning immediately. The best thing about Scannable is the fact that it will automatically detect documents, receipts, business cards, or whiteboards, so you don't have to do anything other than point your camera at it, since it works quickly. If you just scanned a business card, Scannable will instantly pull LinkedIn information, profile photos, and save the scanned information to your Contacts. There is also support for multiple pages, and you can save every scan as a PDF or JPG in your Evernote account or store them in other apps, and share with others through email or text.

With such powerful mobile tools at our disposal, there's no reason to not go paperless these days. Evernote Scannable is a free app that will help you achieve that effortlessly.

Finalists

Darkroom – Photo Editor, released Feb. 12, iPhone only

Ever since the iPhone came out and the App Store was introduced, mobile photography has exploded in popularity. That's because it has never been easier to snap your photos and then edit them directly on your mobile device before sharing it with others. Darkroom is a fine app to add to your mobile photography toolkit.

Unlike other photo editing apps, Darkroom skips the tedious import process, so users can get straight to editing in a simple, out-of-the-way interface. Once an image is selected from your library, you'll be able to crop it, apply a beautiful filter or customize it and make it your own, adjust individual setting levels with sliders, and access your full history of edits. The History is great as it allows you to jump back to a particular change and resume your editing from that point onward.

Darkroom's real magic comes from the Curves tool, where you can change the entire RGB channel, or choose R, G, or B individually to change the overall appearance of the image through five sections: blacks, shadows, midtones, highlights, and whites. So while many photo editors have curve tools, Darkroom's is different since it lets you fine tune every aspect of the photo. The only thing about the Curves tool is the fact that it is only available through an in-app purchase of $3.99, but it is well worth it. There are also more filter packs through IAP as well.

Darkroom is a powerful photo editor even without the Curves tool, and should be considered for your mobile photography needs.

Google Calendar, released Mar. 10, iPhone only

If you're a Google Calendar user, then you should rejoice at the fact that you can get the official app on your iPhone. But don't be fooled — you don't have to be using Google Calendars to use this app, as it works with Exchange, iCloud, and locally stored calendars on your iPhone.

The Google Calendar app goes along with Google's Material design, but it looks fairly sleek on iOS. There are three different views for your schedule, and everything is organized into color-coded blocks for easy recognition. There are even visual elements like contact photos and maps so you don't miss a thing.

Adding new events is a breeze, as Google Calendar has its own kind of natural language input. As you type in event details, it will suggest titles, people, and even places, pulling in photos of businesses, contacts, and maps. And for Gmail users, there is the Events from Gmail feature, which automatically adds information to your calendar for flights, hotel reservations, concerts, restaurant reservations, and more.

If you're looking for better calendar management on your iPhone, make sure to give Google Calendar a try.

Periscope, released Mar. 26, iPhone only

Is your life filled with interesting moments that you just want to share with others as they happen? Then you should be looking into the mobile live streaming scene, and Periscope is one of the better apps for the job.

With Periscope and a Twitter account, users can browse a world map to see people who are live streaming right now. This is a fantastic and interesting new viewpoint on the world, and lets you join in on some interesting moments. There is also the ability to comment and send the streamer "hearts" (equivalent to likes) as they stream. If you never want to miss a moment of a user, then make sure to follow them for notifications when they go live.

When you feel like streaming yourself, just tap on the button for a new stream. You can choose to share your stream with all of your Twitter followers, or go Private and invite certain people only. There are also Replays that you can store for 24 hours, which lets you relive the experience of the broadcast complete with comments and hearts. This applies to other user's replays as well, if they choose to save it.

Periscope has made a dent in the mobile live streaming world, and it's a fun way to share your life with others.

Alphabear: World Puzzle Game, released July 9, iPhone/iPod touch and iPad only

Do you love word games and cute bears? Then Alphabear is a match made in heaven.

Alphabear has been a real delight this year due to the adorable visual style and challenging puzzles. The gameplay involves spelling words by tapping letters on a grid. However, while you can select any letter on the grid, it is key to get as many adjacent ones as possible because each tile turns into a bear. When the letters are next to each other, that means the bear gets bigger, which means more points at the end of the puzzle. The game will end once the board is filled up with bears or leftover letters from which no more words can be formed.

The fun with Alphabear is trying to meet the target goals for each stage, as it will unlock more chapters and give you better rewards, which can be coins or a new bear (sometimes rare or legendary) to add to your collection. Before each game, you can also pick up to three bears to take with you, and they have special abilities like making certain letters worth more points, having more of a specific letter appear, giving you more time, and more. It's in your best interest to pick the best bears for the stage.

Seriously, if you like cute and fun word games, then Alphabear is a must.

Sage Solitaire, released Aug. 26, iPhone/iPod touch and iPad only

Do you love Solitaire but wish it had a modern twist to it? Then you should give Sage Solitaire a try.

Sage Solitaire has simple and clean graphics that are perfect for your iPhone. The game contains many different types of backgrounds and card backs to choose from if you go with the full game unlock, which costs $2.99, and also comes with more game modes and stats.

In the initial free download, players have access to the Single Deck mode. The goal in this is to clear out all of the cards in the deck by making hands. The hands can be something simple like a Pair, but if you get something like a Flush or Straight (time to brush up on those poker skills), then you'll earn more points. The big catch in the game is the fact that you must use cards from at least two rows. If no more hands can be made, then it's game over. There are also bonus suits that net you double points, or a card that has been dealt out of the game. For the times when you get stuck, just trash a card if you have them available (earn more by making hands).

If you go for the in-app purchase, you'll get more game modes, including risk-it-all ones like Vegas, where you won't be able to play it again if you lose. There are also Double, Fifteens, and Grit modes, more wallpapers and card backs, and full statistics. Go on, give Sage Solitaire a try — you'll be hooked, and it's well worth the in-app purchase.

Paper – Notes, Photo, Annotation, and Sketches by FiftyThree, released Sep. 9, iPhone/iPod touch and iPad only

While Paper is not an entirely new app, it was initially only available on the iPad until a few months ago, as the developers released an update making it a universal app. And it was well worth the wait.

Previously, Paper was purely a sketching app, where users used digital tools to draw or write, like pen and paper. With the universal update, Paper now allows for basic text notes and even photo annotation on the iPhone, along with the same drawing features. Users can create as many "spaces" as necessary, and customize each one with a color, design, icon, or even a photo cover.

When you add a new sheet to a space, the default mode will be a text note, but you can change it to sketching or import a photo by tapping a button. Text notes can be changed to a to-do or bulleted list with the swipe-to-style feature, and you can also use headers. You can import a photo or get a new capture from within the app, which you can then annotate with the drawing tools. Anything in Paper can be exported as a PDF file, or even a Keynote or Powerpoint presentation.

We've been fans of Paper for a long time now, so it's nice to see that it is finally available on the iPhone as well.

Boomerang from Instagram, released Oct. 22, iPhone/iPod touch and iPad only

Love Instagram, but tired of still photos or just regular videos? Then Boomerang could be the answer you've been looking for.

Boomerang from Instagram is a simple app that allows users to create short animations to post on the social network. This is done by snapping a one-second burst of five photographs, which are then turned into a silent video that plays forward and backward in a continuous loop. The app will automatically save your creations to the Camera Roll, where you can share them with whoever however you'd like. But there are buttons for quick sharing to Instagram, Facebook, and more through the Share Sheet.

Contrary to the name, Boomerang does not require an Instagram account, so anyone can join in on the fun. The app works with both the front and rear-facing cameras, so you can post silly selfies or get fun captures of pets.

If you're looking to spice up your Instagram feed or just make some fun animations, then definitely give Boomerang a try.

Copied – Copy and Paste Everywhere, released Oct. 31, iPhone/iPod touch and iPad only, optional Mac app available

Have you ever struggled with managing your device's clipboard items, especially between multiple iPhones, iPads, and even Macs? Then Copied is the solution to all of your problems.

Copied is a relatively new app that has been making a splash in the iOS world. It has a simple interface that is easy and intuitive, but still sports a robust set of features to make clipboard management easier than ever before. Copied will store anything that you copy on your iPhone, such as text, links, and even images. With all of these clippings from different apps, you can edit and merge them if necessary, so your workflow is streamlined. There is also support for batch copying of multiple items back onto the clipboard to be pasted somewhere else, and there are shortcuts through 3D Touch on the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus.

To top things off, there is also a Notification Center widget so you can access your clippings quickly, and there is support for built-in templates or custom ones that you create. There is a keyboard included that lets you input any saved text anywhere on your device.

The real magic with Copied, though, comes from the $1.99 in-app purchase. If you opt for the upgrade, you will get iCloud clipboard syncing, so all of your clippings will appear on other iPhones, iPads, and even Macs ($7.99 in the Mac App Store). There is even the ability to organize your clippings by lists through the upgrade.

Copied has proven to be an incredibly useful tool for anyone with an iPhone, iPad, and Mac, and is one that should not be missed on any platform.

This concludes our top 10 free iPhone apps of 2015. Stay tuned the top 10 paid iPhone app list on Dec. 31. For more, check out Best Apple Watch apps of 2015, Best Apple TV apps of 2015, and Top 10 free iPad apps of 2015.

Source: AppAdvice's top 10 free iPhone apps of 2015

DxOMark rates Blackberry Priv as one of the best devices camera-wise

The DxOMark Mobile test has been one of the most authoritative and reliable benchmarking tests when it comes to mobile devices' camera capabilities. And Blackberry's new offering, the high-end smartphone called Priv, is probably extremely grateful to this test because it has ranked it amongst the best device they've tested from Apple, Sony, and Samsung. It refers to it as "mobile photography for the privileged", probably referring to its pretty expensive price, at $750 unlocked.

But if you're looking for a smartphone with quality mobile photography capabilities, then you might consider the Blackberry Priv, based on the DxOMark review. With its 18MP (1440x2560-pixel stills or 2160p@30fps/1080p@60fps for video) resolution and its 1/2.4-inch imaging sensor as well as its 27mm f/2.2 Schneider-Kreuznach lens, you would expect it of course to give quality pictures. Add to it some special features like image stabilization, phase-detection autofocus, dual-LED flash, touch-focus LCD, face detection, HDR, and panorama mode and you have a smartphone that might almost be as good as DSLR camera.

The test showed that the Blackberry Priv is able to capture a large dynamic range, thanks to its "mildly aggressive HDR mode" which lets it capture both the brightest and darkest tones of a scene, even under "challenging" conditions. And even when you're shooting indoors or outdoors, your mobile device can render both strong and pleasant colors, even though white balance is better for indoor shoots. The Priv also proved itself better than its competitors when it comes to low-light detail preservation, due to its 18MP sensor.

In summary, the DxOMark Mobile Photo test gave it a score of 82 for the photo, while giving its video capabilities 81. So if you have the budget to get this smartphone and if you want to enhance your mobile photography game, then better get the Blackberry Priv.

colour_outdoor exposure indoor_detail outdoor_detail

SOURCE: DxOMark

Story Timeline

BlackBerry PRIV unboxing video hits the web

First software update for BlackBerry PRIV now available

Blackberry Priv sold well last quarter, keeps company in hardware business

Tags: smartphone, blackberry, Android, DxOMark, BlackBerry Priv

Source: DxOMark rates Blackberry Priv as one of the best devices camera-wise

China Mobile launching Samsung Galaxy S7, Huawei P9 in March 2016

Even though the OEMs have not confirmed their existence, it's already common knowledge that the next big devices for Samsung and Huawei are the Galaxy S7 and the P9 respectively. This speculation has gotten a huge boost as China Mobile presented its roadmap for 2016, and they showed that these two devices will be launched sometime in March of next year. This more or less confirms that the Galaxy S7 and the Huawei P9 are an actual thing.

China Mobile is the country's leading carrier, and they probably would not announce something that they did not confirm with the respective OEMs, unless they didn't have the clearance from them. But either way, the cat is now out of the bag as the powerpoint used for the event has been screen capped and such. The Galaxy S7 will be released, or at least listed, by March through the carrier and the price range will be around 3,000 yuan or $465, placing it in the high-end range.

Meanwhile, another device that was "confirmed" is the P9 from Huawei, a follow-up to its current flagship, the P8. It is expected to be the same price as the latter, which is around 2888 yuan or $445 when converted. This device is 5.2-inches with a 1080p screen and will run on a unicorn 950 processor with 4GB of memory. It will have a horizontal parallel dual camera design and a laser focusing system, so this may be a good new phone for mobile photography enthusiasts.

We'll have to wait and see though if Samsung and Huawei officially come out with the announcement of their new devices. And since CES is just a few weeks away, we can expect that sooner rather than later.

VIA: My Drivers

Tags: smartphone, leak, Samsung, Huawei, Android, Samsung Galaxy S7

Source: China Mobile launching Samsung Galaxy S7, Huawei P9 in March 2016

The best apps for your new iPhone

Tweet Share Share on Facebook Tweet Share Pin Share

The iPhone 6S has a gorgeous 4.7-inch screen, a super-fast processor, and arguably the best mobile camera on the market. But out of the box, it won't have the apps you can't live without. Finding a good mobile app is like discovering a best-kept secret: they can change how you work, take your email from nightmarish to manageable, and forever transform your mobile photography game. But the good apps are easy to find. It's the great ones you have to seek out.

We've boiled our annual list down to nine apps every iPhone owner should have, excluding mobile games and software that run better on or was designed for an iPad. You'll notice a few favorites — some things, like the best read-it-later or podcast app, never change. And while some apps are free, those that do cost money more than earn their modest price tag by working and looking far better than the rest.

We've rounded up our favorite and most-used apps and utilities for the technology we use every day. Check out our picks for iPhones, Android phones, PCs, Macs, and game consoles. We've also listed our favorite games for iOS and Android from this year.

Outlook

Following Dropbox's decision to shut down its email app Mailbox, Microsoft's Outlook is now the best way to go for an alternative email app. The software marries the creative workflow popularized by Mailbox — swiping to postpone emails, an "inbox zero" approach — to a minimalist design with tabs for files, contacts, and a calendar. Since Microsoft acquired calendar maker Sunrise, Outlook's built-in one is only going to improve over time as it absorbs all of Sunrise's best features.

Download here

Snapchat

This was the year Snapchat grew up. The messaging startup launched Discover, an entertainment and news portal that's grown into a powerful advertising and partnership machine. Snapchat also began tinkering with the fundamental ways people use its app, adding "lenses" that put goofy and often topical filters over selfies and letting users pay to replay snaps. Needless to say, now is the time to download Snapchat and find out what all the fuss is about once and for all.

Download here

Google Photos

The state of the photo app has been in flux for years now, but Google may have finally cracked it. Google Photos automatically backs up your iPhone's camera roll to the cloud, but its real benefit is free unlimited storage — so long as you're willing to let Google reduce the size of your images. The app also has an easy-to-use slider for skipping back in time, and Google's algorithms are great at creating photo albums on your behalf and even putting together GIF-style animations of still shots.

Download here

Periscope

If you're going to use front-facing camera for anything beyond selfies, it's Periscope. The Twitter-owned live-streaming app is a fast-growing place to go for viewing quick and easy video updates or broadcasting your own across the web in real-time. With Apple's substantial front-facing camera upgrade from 1.2 megapixels to 5, you'll look a bit better for the crowd.

Download here

Pocket

Pocket is one of the best article-saving apps out there. It has a no-frills interface and easy-to-use mobile and desktop bookmark tools and browser extensions for saving everything you don't (and maybe never will) have time to read. While Pocket's primary function comes free with the app, a $45 a year subscription to Pocket Premium can transform the software into a permanent library for the web. You can then save articles or webpages for posterity, so if they ever change or disappear you'll have the original.

Download here

Enlight

Enlight is a full-featured photo app that lets you do just about anything to a photo, including transform it into a street art-like sketch or heavily stylize it like a poser made in Photoshop. Unlike iOS photo heavyweights VSCO and Darkroom, Enlight goes to great lengths to help users understand how to use its dizzying number of tools, with tutorial videos for each one and step-by-step guides to recreating shots that resemble its samples. If you're looking for an app that rewards experimentation, Enlight will help you turn an everyday photo into a piece of art.

Download here

Workflow

Workflow lets you create sets of shortcuts that carry out a wide variety of mobile tasks. It's similar to If This Then That (FTTT), but Workflow isn't restricted to two-step actions. You can create seemingly endless strings of instructions, from getting directions to the nearest coffee shop to sending a message with the last screenshot you took. It's a mobile power user's fantasy toolset. But even the most casual of iPhone owners should find Workflow's simpler pre-made sets, like getting directions and calculating a tip, useful in everyday situations.

Download here

Overcast

Serial is back, and that means every iPhone owner needs a podcast app that's actually pleasant to use. Overcast, which developer Marco Arment revamped in October, is the best-looking and most powerful podcast app out there. Overcast's Smart Speed feature cuts out dead air and moments of silence in podcasts to reduce overall playing time. The app can also speed up podcasts while retaining a natural sound and balance the volume across podcasts with varying production values. Plus, it's great for finding new shows to listen to.

Download here

Dark Sky

Dark Sky is the weather app that doesn't just forecast the upcoming week or day — it goes minute by minute. The software uses a proprietary forecasting system to perform highly precise predictions, and the app will ping you with a notification like "heavy rain starting in 10 minutes" to help you stay dry. It also has a gorgeous interface and full-screen weather maps.

Download here

More from The Verge

Mossberg: The next big thing didn't show up this year

I bought an iPhone because I'm not as sad as I used to be

The Force Awakens: all the unanswered questions and mysteries

Why Google and Ford could be teaming up

SpaceX releases close-up photos of Falcon 9's successful launch and landing

Google is testing a way for users to log in without a password

SNL's best sketch this week never aired

The best of Verge Video Moto 360 vs. Moto 360 Sport Watch Star Wars: The Force Awakens reactions Every time Chewbacca speaks in Star Wars Star Wars: History of movie trailers The Star Wars BB-8 droid can now patrol your home

Moto 360 vs. Moto 360 Sport Watch

Star Wars: The Force Awakens reactions

Every time Chewbacca speaks in Star Wars

Star Wars: History of movie trailers

The Star Wars BB-8 droid can now patrol your home

Discuss at Verge Video See more videos [% var len = Math.min(data.comments.length, data.settings.autoUpdateAlertMaxShown) %] [% for (var i = 0; i [%= comment.user.display_name %] [% if (comment.parent) { %] replied to [%= comment.parent.user.display_name %] [% } else { %] posted a new comment [% } %] [% } %]
Source: The best apps for your new iPhone

How to Print Photos from iPhone and iPad

Trying to figure out how to print photos from iPhone and iPad this holiday season? Read on as we show you how to print your holiday memories, your Instagram feeds, and how to send them as gifts, straight from your phone.

The iPhone has become the world's most popular camera, and as we head into the holidays, it seems obvious we'll fill our phones with cherished memories of loved ones, Christmas presents, and holiday meals. Despite the rise in sharing on social media, it's still nice to have a physical print – it keeps our walls from feeling barren, and they can be a wonderful gift to people we may not have connections with on Facebook and Instagram.

When the first iPhone shipped, getting your pictures from phone to printed page was a trying process. The best processes involved emailing them to yourself, downloaded the emailed image to your computer, and printing it out from there (or taking it further by copying to a memory card and trudging over to one of the now-omnipresent photo kiosks).

Things have gotten better in the last eight years, but the process is store more complicated than it really needs to be. These days, Apple supports a systemwide standard known Airprint – whether you're editing a photo or document, if you have an Airprint-enabled printer, you can print straight from your phone.

If you're the type who lives to take photos on your phone (or edit them on your phone or iPad) and loves to print them out, you probably want to print them out locally, on a printer that you own. Hopefully, your printer supports Apple's Airprint protocol, but even if it doesn't, you might not be out of luck.

How to print photos to your Airprint-enabled printer

Find the app you're trying to print from. The easiest way to make sure this works for pictures is to just use the iOS Photos app, which is built in to your iPhone or iPad. If you want to print a photo that you've edited or saved in another app, the directions should be the same – if you run into any trouble, just save or export the photo to your Photos app and try it again.

Open your Photos app and tap on the picture that you wish to print. Once it's on your screen, tap the Share button in the lower left-hand corner – it looks like a little box with an arrow pointing up out of it. There will be a little row of icons along the bottom; somewhere among the first few will be one that's labelled 'Print'. Tap on it.

This takes you to the Printer Options screen for iOS. You'll see your picture centered below, and some options up above. If you haven't printed from your printer before, or if you have multiple printers, you can tap on the 'Printer' line and select your printer from a list. If you're at home, chances are very good you'll only have the one option. Select the number of copies you want, and tap Print in the upper right-hand corner. Hurray!

What if my printer doesn't appear in the list of printers on the iOS screen?

There are a couple of reasons that this might happen. If you're sure you have an Airprint-compatible printer, try resetting your printer and your router (physically power them down, then power them back up). Sometimes there can be hiccoughs in your network and two devices connected to the same wi-fi might not see each other. If that doesn't work, you could try rebooting your iPhone, too – press the power button until the power down screen appears and slide the button to power down your phone. Once it's off, hold the power button to start it back up.

If all of that doesn't work, you might not actually have an Airprint-enabled printer. Look for the model number of your printer and type it + Airprint into Google – the first few results should let you know whether your printer is compatible with the standard. A good warning sign is whether your printer is directly plugged into a computer – if that's the only way to print to it, it might not work with Airprint. If it is connected over your network – over wi-fi or plugged into your router – you may have better luck.

Should your printer be on the network, but it doesn't work with Airprint, you might be able to find an app in the iOS App Store that will work. Go to the App Store on your iPhone or iPad, and search for the manufacturer name of the company that made your printer. There may be one or two options, depending on the model; here are links to some of the bigger companies: Canon iPhone app, Epson iPhone app, HP iPhone app, Brother iPhone app.

If none of those options work, and you still want to print on your home printer, you'll need to get your computer involved.

How to print iPhone and iPad photos from your computer

First, like above, you'll want to make sure the photo you want to print is saved to your Photos app. This won't work with pictures saved in other apps, like social media or photo editing apps. From here, you have a couple of options for getting your photos from your phone onto the computer. The simplest and easiest option is to take advantage of iCloud, Apple's cloud storage service – think of it as a giant hard drive out on the internet that stores all the important files from your iPhone, iPad, and Mac devices.

If you haven't used it before, chances are pretty good that it was turned on when you set up your new iPhone. But just to be sure, you might want to read through our ultimate guide on How to Use iCloud. With your photos saved in the Photos app, open your computer's web browser and go to Apple's iCloud website: http://www.icloud.com.

Sign in with the Apple ID that you use on your iPhone – if this is the first time you've done it, or the first time in a while, Apple will probably send you an email to let you know that someone signed into your iCloud account with your Apple ID – don't worry, this was you! You'll see a grid of icons appear that look like your iPhone or iPad home screen. One of them will be labelled Photos, just like on your mobile device.

Click on it, and you'll see a similar timeline of photos unroll, with everything grouped by dates and/or locations. Find the image you want to print and click on it; it'll fill your web browser. You'll see a row of icons at the top. One of them looks like a cloud with a downward-pointing arrow in it. Click on that, and it'll download the original picture. From there, you can print it straight from your computer like with any other photo.

Best photo printing apps for iPhone and iPad

Easily the best part of the iPhone and iPad are the App Stores, and this holds true when it comes to printing photos straight from your mobile device. Companies have sprung up that offer really useful and easy-to-use services – upload your photos in the app, and they'll send a package straight to your house with all the pictures you wanted. It's a great way of getting pictures off of your devices without worrying about buying and maintaining your own printer.

Where these apps really come in useful is when it comes to sending gifts to loved ones. You can put your friend's address into one of these apps, pay the couple of bucks, and they can get anything from a photo printed on glass or wood to a picture book of your adventures together.

Here are some of the more popular photo printing apps for your iPhone and iPad:

Walgreens (iTunes link)Wait a second…Walgreens!? That's right. The hybrid pharmacy / convenience store has really stepped up their digital game. Their latest iPhone app lets users check on prescriptions and clip coupons for use in person at their stores, as well as check on what's on sale in the latest ads. For our interests, though, it also taps into the network of photo printing services that the company has offered since, well, forever.

You can upload pictures straight from your phone, or import them from Google Photos, Dropbox, or Flickr. Choose the form factor you want – traditional prints on photo paper in sizes like 4×6 or 8×10, large-format poster prints or even pictures printed on pressed wood panels, then upload your images. If you let the app know where you are, it'll suggest stores, or you can enter a zip code or city and state. A list of stores will pop up, and your photos are sent to that store, ready for pick up – even the wood panels – in as little as an hour. It's a phenomenal experience and a great way for one-hour photo and Walgreens photo printing, more generally, to stay relevant. Prices are competitive with other apps.

Snapfish (iTunes Link) and Snapfish Cards (iTunes Link)Snapfish was one of the earliest internet photo printing services, founded all the way back in 1999. It was later bought and sold by HP, and has managed to weather the dot com booms and busts – for good reason. It's always managed to offer a convenient, competitive service that allows you to order prints from your PJs, coming straight to your house a few days later.

The service has of course evolved since then, offering your photos printed on such various things as mugs, iPhone cases, canvas, pillows, blankets, ornaments, tote bags, magnets, and even jewelry. Oh, and on photo paper, of course. Even when you order a complicated project, like a magnet or 50×60-inch (127x152cm) fleece blanket, you can expect to get your order in just about a week or two.

Their new Snapfish Cards app lets you order holiday – or any – kinds of cards in larger batches. Unlike the regular app, which you can send to any address, the Cards app only lets you send your picture cards to your house, which you can then sign and mail out to your friends and family.

Shutterfly (iTunes Link)

Shutterfly is another internet success story, founded around the same time as Snapfish and continuing on through today. They partnered with Kodak early on and were successful enough a few years later to buy the division of Kodak with whom they'd originally partnered. Shutterfly offers many of the same services and printed objects as competing services, but offer some fun additions, like iPad cases, laptop sleeves, wallets, keepsake boxes, coasters, and even decks of playing cards.

They also offer some pretty competitive pricing on their printed photo products, and a website that lets you store photos for printing either online or through the app itself. Shutterfly is one of the few photo printing apps to offer a reasonably priced panorama option; 8×32 inches at just $12.99 – but you'll need to have a pre-existing panorama to use, as you can't take multiple images and print them out on the format. Fortunately, the iPhone's panorama option is one of its shining strengths.

LALALAB. (iTunes Link)

You're probably getting tired of all the lists of products you can order through these photo sharing apps, so let's stick to what everyone does best. Unlike some of the other options, LALALAB. scores really well in reviews in the App Store – the app is one of the easiest to use, which makes the entire process easier. We really liked some of the 'funner' options that the app provides: you can choose a collage of either 24 or 35 photos – they even offer to frame it in solid limewood for you, glass included – the collage especially presents a great gift idea that lets you share more than a few special memories with a loved one.

Another fun option that LALALAB. does is printed postcards. The outside of the postcard is your photo, while the inside of the postcard gets printed with the recipient's name and address, and a personalized printed message from yours truly. While most of these apps let you send groups of prints or printed objects to someone else, LALALAB.'s postcard option is one of the few that really lets you send a personal message alongside – and for just $1.49, that's not a bad deal.

Free Prints (iTunes Link)

Free Prints is one of those apps that really sounds like a scam. Free pictures, okay…what's the catch? Well, there doesn't seem to be one. You do pay for shipping, as well as any 4×6 you want more than a single copy of, and for any image size beyond 4×6. You're also limited to 85 free photos a month, with a yearly cap of 1000 (for those wondering, 85*12 is 1020). Apart from that, go hog wild and print photos to your heart's content.

This service is another app that scores astoundingly well in the App Store, leading us to believe that they do what they pretty much claim to do – but the free offer is really only good for ordering single prints for your personal use – if you're going to be sending out images, chances are high you'll want to send a picture to more than one person at a time. You do seem to get what you pay for, however, with a few reviews complaining about slow shipping and color differences from their original photo. Still, if you're on a budget, it's a great option.

Best mobile photo printers for printing photos from your iPhone on the go

So we've covered printing from your iPhone to printers in your house, printing photos from your iPhone on the computer, and ordering prints and printed objects through some of the best apps on the iPhone – that should cover it, right? Well, not quite – there's one more option to discuss, and that's the idea of the mobile photo printer.

Until very recently, mobile printers were only mobile through some creative interpretations of the word. Not so anymore, thanks to innovations like embedding the ink for your pictures in the paper itself, which means all you need is your phone, your printer, and some paper, and you're good to go. For the most part, these printers deliver perfectly acceptable image quality, but there are a couple of downsides to go going this route. Firstly is the cost – the printers are not exactly super cheap, and while most come with a stack of paper for you to work your way through, extra paper will cost up to fifty cents a page – that's much more expensive than some of the app printing services.

Secondly, and this may or may not detract from the option, depending on your goals, is that the printers are small. That's great for portability and whipping them out at your friend's party, but it also means that the pictures they print are correspondingly tiny – you're not going to be getting 5×7 images out of these devices.

Polaroid ZIP

That's right, baby, Polaroid is back! Well, the company that owns the Polaroid brand is back, anyway, and they've introduced the ZIP printer – one of those mobile printers that uses the special paper we discussed a couple of paragraphs above. You can connect wirelessly with your iPhone or iPad, and print out any image you've got saved. Available in black, white, red, and blue, the ZIP works in conjunction with the Polaroid ZIP app.

Connect the device, open up the Polaroid app, and a few seconds later, you're printing out 2×3-inch pictures, smudge free, with sticky backs that let you put them on walls, in scrapbooks, or on the back of your laptop's display – it's a really fun feature. One negative point is that after charging it up for an hour and a half, you're only going to be able to print out 25 images – that's either way more than enough, or not nearly, depending on who you ask. You can pick up a Polaroid ZIP for $130.

Fujifilm INSTAX SHARE SP-1

Speaking of Polaroid, while the ZIP carries the original brand, the INSTAX SP-1 takes advantage of the original technology – that's right, it uses the old instant film that made Polaroid cameras so famous. Running on 800 speed instant film – and it takes the same INSTAX mini film that Fuji's other cameras use – the SP-1 connects wireless to your iPhone just like the other options.

You have to use Fuji's app, but it lets you print / develop these images with details about the picture, such as time or location, if you want. While the ease of use for this printer is great, it unfortunately doesn't offer rechargeable batteries. Instead, it uses two CR2 lithium batteries good for around 100 prints per set – which is way more at a time than the Polaroid offers. Amazon offers the INSTAX SHARE SP-1 for around $140.

Source: How to Print Photos from iPhone and iPad

Here are the 4 most downloaded Android and iOS apps of 2015

The release of iOS 9 and Marshmallow helped make 2015 a great year for iPhone and Android users.

New apps for the operating systems ranged from photography apps that will make your pictures look professional to travel apps that help you make better decisions about when to book a flight.

Apple published its annual Best of 2015 apps from the App Store, naming Twitter-owned Periscope as the No. 1 App of the Year, while "Tomb Raider" spinoff "Lara Croft GO" landed on the top spot for Game of the Year.

Enlight and free stock trading app Robinhood were chosen as runner-ups for App of the Year.

Check out some of the other most downloaded iOS and Android apps that were released in 2015:

Periscope (iOS, Android)

The popular live video platform has surpassed 10 million installs for both Android and iOS as of August 2015, and has been named App of the Year on iTunes.

"We wanted to build a teleportation device," Periscope co-founder and CEO Kayvon Beykpour told USA Today.

"We wanted you to see the natural wonders of the world from the comfort of your couch. We want you to feel like you're there."

Released on March 26, 2015, Periscope saw over 40 years of video watched per day, according to the app's Time Watched graph — the combined amount of time users spend watching live broadcasts on iOS and Android.

Enlight (iOS, Android)

Enlight sold over 1.5 million units — most downloads costing around $3.99 each — since it launched last March, a Lightricks spokesperson told the Daily News.

The all-in-one mobile photography app has a 4.5 average user rating both in the U.S. and internationally.

Enlight has reached the top of the charts at No. 1 overall paid rank (not in the photo and video category) of over 120 different countries — including the U.K., Canada, Australia, Greece, France, Japan and China.

Hopper (iOS, Android)

The airfare prediction app surpassed 1.5 million downloads since it was released on the App Store last January.

The Android version of Hopper has over 230,000 downloads since it was launched on Google Play, a company spokesperson told the News.

It has a 4.5 out of 5 star rating from 1,835 user reviews on iTunes.

Hopper has consistently been in the top 20 apps in the travel category.

It's currently ranked No. 17 in travel, but has made it as high up as No. 5 putting it among the ranks of Uber, Lyft, and Airbnb, according to the spokesperson.

Z Camera (Android)

This photography app by Chinese company Zero Team reached more than 8.5 million installs since it was released on the Google Play store in February.

Z Camera has been dubbed as the best photography app of 2015 on Google Play in 75 countries, with a rating of 4.5 out of 5 stars from nearly 130,000 users.

Notable features include switching between photo and video with just one swipe, real-time filter and a photo editor complete with emojis, doodles and text that you can share on social media.

CLICK HERE TO FOLLOW US ON FACEBOOK

CLICK HERE TO FOLLOW US ON TWITTER

kcasino@nydailynews.com

Tags: lists , news break , technology , apple , samsung
Source: Here are the 4 most downloaded Android and iOS apps of 2015

China Mobile launching Samsung Galaxy S7, Huawei P9 in March 2016

Even though the OEMs have not confirmed their existence, it's already common knowledge that the next big devices for Samsung and Huawei are the Galaxy S7 and the P9 respectively. This speculation has gotten a huge boost as China Mobile presented its roadmap for 2016, and they showed that these two devices will be launched sometime in March of next year. This more or less confirms that the Galaxy S7 and the Huawei P9 are an actual thing.

China Mobile is the country's leading carrier, and they probably would not announce something that they did not confirm with the respective OEMs, unless they didn't have the clearance from them. But either way, the cat is now out of the bag as the powerpoint used for the event has been screen capped and such. The Galaxy S7 will be released, or at least listed, by March through the carrier and the price range will be around 3,000 yuan or $465, placing it in the high-end range.

Meanwhile, another device that was "confirmed" is the P9 from Huawei, a follow-up to its current flagship, the P8. It is expected to be the same price as the latter, which is around 2888 yuan or $445 when converted. This device is 5.2-inches with a 1080p screen and will run on a unicorn 950 processor with 4GB of memory. It will have a horizontal parallel dual camera design and a laser focusing system, so this may be a good new phone for mobile photography enthusiasts.

We'll have to wait and see though if Samsung and Huawei officially come out with the announcement of their new devices. And since CES is just a few weeks away, we can expect that sooner rather than later.

VIA: My Drivers

Tags: smartphone, leak, Samsung, Huawei, Android, Samsung Galaxy S7

Source: China Mobile launching Samsung Galaxy S7, Huawei P9 in March 2016

Flickr Stats Suggest iPhone Is Dominating Mobile Photography

As expected, convenience is trumping quality, and while Flickr is not the sole or definitive photo service, it is populated enough to give you an idea of how popular the iPhone is for photos.

As a reflection of its strong growth, Apple has dominated the top cameras used on Flickr in 2015; different iterations of the iPhone take 8 out of the top 20 spots. The long-lived Canon 5D Mk II hangs on at 7th place and its newer sibling the 5D Mk III is at 10th. Entry-level Canon Rebel T3i is at 9th place. The first Android device, the Samsung Galaxy S4, is at 11th and the first Nikon, the D90 is at 13th place.

Comments

Posted by Tsing 2:12 PM (CST)  
Source: Flickr Stats Suggest iPhone Is Dominating Mobile Photography

Flashback Friday: Photographer George Sifuentes documents L.A.'s Latino community

It's hard to believe when you browse George Sifuentes' portrait-rich Instagram feed that he still has a very difficult time approaching people. But the street photographer, who has only been shooting for a little more than three years, is still terrified of hearing the word, "no".

Thankfully, for his nearly 60K Instagram followers, his desire to capture the colorful characters of Los Angeles is much stronger.

As a photo documentary junkie, Sifuentes says he's always been intrigued by films about visual legends Gordon Parks and Estevan Oriol, but never had the motivation to shoot on his own. However, that all changed in 2012, when he got an iPhone. He quickly learned of the Hipstamatic and VSCO Cam applications and soon began trying to mimic their styles.

The result? A newly discovered passion and purpose at the age of 30.

Trishna Patel sits down with Sifuentes to discuss the challenges of approaching strangers, the pressures that come with social media notoriety, and why he attributes his focus on L.A.'s Latino community to time spent with his grandmother.

How has mobile photography and its social sharing applications, particularly Instagram, played in your journey?

Mobile photography has played the biggest role in my journey for the simple fact that it's how I started and its still how I continue to build my body of work. The beauty of mobile photography is the simplicity and convenience of having the "camera and the darkroom" all in your pocket.

Instagram has been the platform to not only showcase my work, but it has connected me with some of the most artistic eyes from all around the world and I draw major inspiration from all of them.

What compels you to create a portrait of someone? What else do you look for?

My motto is shoot first, think later. While I might be keeping an open eye to everything around me, I can't seem to ignore a sense of character. I am instinctively attracted to people. Once I catch a glimpse of someone who I think would take a beautiful portrait, nothing else exists.

"Character" is all in one's natural expression and is amplified by their attire. I really have a hard time taking compliments on my portraits because in my eyes, all I did was press a button, its the subject who's visual wisdom and beauty that does all the heavy lifting.

Talk about the upsides and challenges to a strong online presence?

I don't feel any pressure to perform or produce better images now that my following has grown. I still hit the streets to find images with the same passion as I did when I had 500 followers. If anything, I pay a bit more attention, dig a little deeper for the s tory and subject.

Social media notoriety helps if you stay true to your content, I've been offered money to shoot outside my "character criteria" and I refuse to do it, especially because I've worked to establish a recognizable style the last few years.

Tell us your favorite things about shooting in Los Angeles? What are you favorite areas and why?

The best thing about shooting in L.A. is the massive variety of people and neighborhoods so close to one another.

Hands down, my favorite place to shoot is on Broadway in downtown. It runs through the historic core where the cities oldest souls and newest inhabitants walk side by side. My second favorite is Boyle Heights/East LA. My Mexican culture is so visually strong in these areas that it's highly unlikely I leave without anything good. Third, Venice Beach; if you look beyond the tourist trail you'll find some of L.A.'s truest characters influenced by art, music and gang culture.

What exactly is it a bout people that you want to capture and portray?

I want to portray truth and originality in my subjects. I want my audience to look at my portraits and understand without even doubting for a second that my subject is the true, beautiful character he or she is.

Tell me about your particular interest in L.A.'s Latino community.

The Latino community is home to me. And growing up with young parents means you spend a lot of time with your grandparents. For me, photographing these streets is nostalgic because I used to walk them while shopping with my grandmother on Cesar Chavez Avenue and Grand Central Market. 

Those memories are a beautiful limbo of familiarity and the unknown. That limbo sparks my curiosity to learn and document more while its familiarity gives me the courage to maneuver with confidence. 

Also more than ever, being Latino in this city means so many different things. We are [one of] the few communities in Los Angeles that can say five or more generations were born and raised in this city. Documenting both the older and younger generations and observing the varying degrees of mainstream influence is very interesting to me.

How do you create a relationship with your subjects?

Speaking Spanish is everything when it comes to photographing the Latino community. It establishes a common bond which can lead to trust, plus Latinos (mostly the older ones) want to know why the hell you want a picture of them in the first place. With the elderly, they have no understanding of why I want to photograph them. They could care less of my photographic passion and most of the time they are not aware of their beauty.

I wish you could ask one of my subjects why they allowed me to photograph them.

What is the most challenging aspect about street portraiture?

I have a fear of rejection and the unknown. The hardest part for me is also what comes easiest to me; the approach. It may not come off like I'm n ervous as I approach each person, but my heart is racing.

I make sure to give off a vulnerable, genuine energy but nothing's ever planned out. I have to make sure I'm "quick on my feet" because the unpredictability of the streets can turn a situation in a matter of seconds.

Hearing "no" is still something I struggle with because once they say it there's not much I can do to change their mind. I have to let it go, which eats me alive. But when I get the shot I want, it feels like Christmas.

What has helped legitimize you in the street photographer community?

I think it's my consistency. I consider portraits to be the "road less traveled" of street photography, and I think my audience and my community recognize that it's hard to shoot.

Portraits require interaction, timing, luck, expression, connection and story. Whereas a lot of popular Instagrammers shoot the usual architecture, landscape and sunsets and have been criticized for focusing on style over substance. Every time I hit the streets, however, my goal is to give you both.

This article first published June 1, 2015***

 Follow Trishna Patel on Instagram and Twitter: @trishlistLA

Each week, we're featuring photos of Southern California and California submitted by readers. Share your photos on our Flickr page or tag your photos with #socalmoments or #californiamoments on Instagram and Twitter. Follow us on Twitter or visit latimes.com/socalmoments for more on this photo series.

Source: Flashback Friday: Photographer George Sifuentes documents L.A.'s Latino community

Old School Photography Techniques Are Making a Comeback — on Instagram

There is a revolution happening in Phoenix, and it started in the unlikeliest of places.

For the past decade, analog film photography — the method that involves physically loading a roll of film into a camera and waiting to see the shots until the film is developed — has been dying around the world. Big-name film manufacturing plants have been torn down, prices for remaining photo supplies have gone up, and photo labs have become scarce as digital photography has taken over.

But film is making a comeback in Phoenix.

In the past couple of years, a small group of 20-somethings has started buying up antique cameras off Craigslist and eBay, inserting rolls of film, and shooting away. While most millennial photographers are drooling over how many megapixels the next iPhone camera will have, this group is geeking out over 50-year-old equipment and trading different kinds of film like currency.

They've created a 21st-century photo club, meeting in a friend's studio to pose and photograph each other, or taking their cameras to lunches that turn into impromptu photo shoots.

And how did they find each other? Instagram.

Will Fryar

Brittany Fryar

Flipping through Instagram — the über-popular photo-sharing mobile application that hit the market about five years ago — these photographers started noticing images that looked different. The grain seemed more natural, the tonality in the shadows seemed more tangible than what Instagram's filters can create. They saw these differences in the two-by-two-inch photos on their phone screens, and they wanted them — and have rediscovered film photography as a result. Because of what they saw on a digital application, they've returned to an antiquated art form.

In an age when immediacy is the ultimate technological goal, these photographers prefer to take it slow.

"There is no instant gratification" in film photography, says analog photographer Will Fryar, who led the charge in Phoenix. "But digital photography isn't worth that."

Earlier this year, Andrew Pielage, a Phoenix photographer and New Times contributor, pulled over on the side of a road at sunset and snapped a photo of the desert landscape on his phone. Later, he posted it on Flickr.

"I'm not even sure I got out of my car," Pielage recalls, laughing.

When a photographer posts a photo on Flickr, the device he or she used to take the shot automatically shows up, if it's taken on a digital device. An agency hired by Apple searched through photos on Flickr taken on an iPhone 6 and found the shot Pielage had captured of Arizona's desert flora at sunset.

It was a good shot.

Apple approached Pielage to use that photo in its international #shotoniphone6 campaign. His image has since been plastered on billboards in New York City and Tokyo and in print ads worldwide alongside other stunning shots taken on phones.

Pielage's experience illustrates the acceptance of digital and, specifically, mobile photography. Photos taken with phones are prolific, even crossing over into the fine art world.

In February, the Columbus Art Museum in Ohio opened an exhibition filled with Instagram photos only. Phoenix gallery MonOrchid put out a call for the public to submit Instagram photos for an exhibit in 2014.

But at the same time, there's a trend in the Phoenix photography community toward DIY. The level of just what qualifies as doing it yourself is debatable.

Analog photography involves skill and know-how with regard to almost every one of the many required steps of processing film. Few in Phoenix actually complete this process themselves from beginning to end.

Daniel Kim, a 26-year-old wedding photographer based in Gilbert who's highly regarded among fellow film photographers in the Valley for scanning and editing his own photos, recently began developing his own negatives in his garage.

"It's just chemistry," Kim says. "Anyone could do it."

Photographer Daniel Kim of Gilbert

Evie Carpenter

Will Fryar, a tall, thin 28-year-old with dark-rimmed glasses, agrees.

Fryar shoots artistic film photos but sends his rolls away to a photo lab in Alabama where professionals develop, scan, and edit his negatives based on Fryar's preferences.

Several weeks after the lab receives the negatives, Fryar gets an e-mail with digital copies of the finished stills. Then he chooses which to post on Instagram.

Now, local photographers are hosting Instameets, where anyone within the Instagram community can meet and network with other photographers.

It's become a chain reaction. After Fryar, a filmmaker who emerged as a leader of this growing community of photographers, has posted a film photo on his Instagram, one of his 13,000 followers sees it, questions how he got a certain aesthetic, and begins experimenting with an analog camera to post his or her own film shots on the app.

With photographic technology advancing and photographers in Phoenix and around the country returning to the original forms of the art, it is harder than ever to define what exactly is photography.

And more importantly, just exactly who is a photographer — and who isn't?

Veteran analog photographers Carol Panaro-Smith and James Hajicek still prefer the old-fashioned way, from shooting to printing.

Evie Carpenter

Since photography's beginnings in the early 1800s, when French inventor Nicéphore Niépce and his brother Claude first experimented with capturing images using light-sensitive substances, there has been a question of whether photography is art or science.

Unlike painting, drawing, and sculpting, film photography requires a machine and the mixing of chemicals, which kept other artists from regarding it in the same way as other mediums.

"Because of the chemistry, it took a while for photography to be art," says Betsy Fahlman, a professor of art history at Arizona State University. "People said it diminished the work because it was mechanical."

Photography was regarded as a means of documentation, simply the process of capturing light on receptive surfaces. Except the process was not simple at all, and few had the knowledge and resources required to do it right.

When photography was invented, those using the cameras had to be wealthy, with access to the equipment, and the desire to risk their lives working with chemicals.

Will it ever be possible for professional photographers to make a living with strictly analog photography again?

As technology advanced and cameras became more portable and easier to use, the opportunity to photograph reached more people.

But even in the 1960s and '70s, a hundred years after its invention, photography was not offered in art school classrooms.

"If you wanted to do photography, you had to do graphic design," says James Hajicek, an analog photographer and retired Arizona State University professor of photography.

In comparison to other artistic mediums and even analog photography, digital photography is in its infancy. Sony introduced the first electric still camera, also known as a digital camera, in Japan in 1982, and the first cell phone to sport a camera was released about 20 years later.

With digital photography, the requirement to develop film by hand essentially was eliminated, and the process became completely mechanical, separating the art even further from the traditionally accepted artistic mediums.

Between 2005 and 2010, Canadian photographer Robert Burley documented the death of film. With the sudden growth of digital photography, the film photography industry basically folded in on itself.

Burley traveled the world to photograph the closing and destruction of film manufacturing plants and created Disappearance of Darkness: Photography at the End of the Analog Era in 2012.

"Kodak used to make over 250 kinds of film for film photographers, now I think they have about six," Burley says. "Each year, every few months, there's another product that's discontinued, but it's sort of settled over the past two years."

Instagram launched in October 2010, and in the past few years, it has radically changed the way users — all 400 million of them — view and interact with photography.

"I look at what my students are doing on Instagram," says Burley, who teaches photography at Ryerson University in Toronto. "It's often better than what they're doing in class."

The mobile app is all about immediacy. Users either take photos using the app's camera function or upload images to the app, edit the image using virtual tools and colored filters, and then post it for their followers or the public to see. And for the most part, that's it.

"Our trajectory was to be shown in a gallery or museum, but that's not necessarily [Instagram users'] trajectory," says Carol Panaro-Smith, an analog photographer and photography teacher at Alchemy Studio in Phoenix. (She is married to Hajicek.) "They feel fulfilled by doing it virtually."

Instagram offers filters that mimic the coloring and grains of vintage films. Supplemental editing software, including Visual Supply Company (VSCO) and Hipstamatic, even name their filters after film types (Kodak Portra, Fuji 160, Ilford HP5) and offer options to add grain to the digital files.

Despite the rapid growth of the app, little academic research has been done on Instagram, possibly because when it comes to data, images are more difficult to analyze than words.

But a team at Arizona State University led by Subbarao Kambhampati has published several studies, including one on which filters are the best and another on what categories Instagram photos fall into.

The team perused thousands of photos from around the world for its research but hadn't come across a lot of film photos posted. Or any, really.

"Did you get a large number of people doing this?" Kambhampati asked when told of the movement among Phoenix photographers. "I did not know this phenomenon at all."

While the majority of Instagram users are not professional photographers, a fascination with mimicking the aesthetic of vintage film overtook some. Will Fryar, who was mainly a videographer before Christmas 2013 but learned film photography techniques in high school, began questioning why he was putting effort into making his digital photos look like film when he could just use film in the first place and get a more authentic, sincere photograph.

Fryar was not alone.

But despite the differences between a person taking a photo on an original Pentax K1000 camera with Portra 400 film and a person pressing a button on a phone, is the photography itself essentially the same art?

"It has not changed at all," says Ryan Cordwell, a 23-year-old digital photographer and leader within Phoenix's Instagram community. "The equipment and medium has only changed the accessibility."

San Francisco photographer Timothy Archibald has traversed the change from analog to digital photography and says he'll never go back.

Mark Richards

As with any two artistic mediums, it is impossible to definitively say whether film photography is better than digital or vice versa. But that doesn't stop photographers on either side of the debate from trying.

"There's no soul behind digital," Fryar says. "I love the small mistakes that comes from film."

"I've seen what [film photographers] post," says avid Phoenix Instagrammer Donjay. "It doesn't make it any better . . . It just has a different character."

Timothy Archibald, who spent five years in the '90s working as a photographer at New Times, built a darkroom in a spare room of his house where he would process and print his own photos. It was a requirement for his job.

Archibald, now a photographer in San Francisco hired by clients including American Express, Hewlett-Packard, and Rolling Stone, traversed the switch from film to digital, reluctantly at first. He says "nerdy people" latched onto digital first because they liked the technology of it. It wasn't until about 2006 that he fully made the switch because his editorial clients wanted digital.

"I think it was that the tide had turned," Archibald says. "I needed to stay relevant."

He has used both mediums for editorial and fine art purposes and sees the difference. Film, he says, is more seductive, luscious. Digital is sharper.

Archibald shoots exclusively with digital now and says he would never go back to film due to the ease digital provides. He says he wouldn't be able to do his job without digital.

But he gets the draw film has for younger photographers.

"I grew up with [film photography] so there is no sense of discovery for me, but kids these days are just picking up a film camera and didn't have that, so they're discovering it for the first time," Archibald says. "For a 47-year-old, it's pathetic, but for a young 20-something, it's radical."

Analog photographer Panaro-Smith specializes in photogenic drawing and alternative process photography, which generally dates back before the vintage cameras the young photographers use. She appreciates the return to older forms of the art, but doesn't quite get why these young photographers would stop at posting the photos on an app.

"It baffles me why they wouldn't want to print in an analog way, too," she says. "Why do they need this sophistication for a two-inch screen?"

A photograph by Will Fryar.

Will Fryar

On a Saturday in March, about 250 Arizona photographers mingle at Mod, a co-working space in Central Phoenix, sipping local coffee and looking for the next photo to snap. Various backdrops and walls covered in chevrons and paisley stand around the space with studio lights pointed at them, waiting for someone to aim a lens and trigger the shutter or hold up a phone and tap the button.

"I thought this was going to be a competition," says one of the hundreds of photographers gathered in the airy, modern space.

It's not a competition. It's Arizona's portion of the 11th WorldWide InstaMeet. These mega-gatherings of Instagram users happen simultaneously in communities around the world several times a year. Instagram chooses when the WWIM will happen, but leaders within the individual communities plan and coordinate events.

In a royal blue Instagram AZ shirt and balancing a camera bag strap on his shoulder, Will Fryar is practically greeted like a celebrity by the other guests at the InstaMeet, and he is immediately surrounded by a group of other photographers.

Elsewhere in the building, middle-age women with their smartphones in hand move from room to room asking guests for Instagram handles so the women can quickly peruse their feeds.

Professional photographers wield large digital cameras and ask their subjects to move just an inch this way or that way to frame the perfect portrait.

A few younger photographers hold up mobile light meter apps and adjust the settings on their analog cameras.

The digital photographers begin flooding their Instagram feeds with artsy shots featuring the stylish backgrounds around Mod and the hashtag #WWIM11AZ, a way to categorize the photos.

A few weeks after the event, the film photographers post their grainy shots.

The number and variety of attendees is a testament to the growth of the Instagram community and a stark contrast to photography's beginnings.

And the number of young photographers with analog cameras hanging from their shoulders speaks to the impact the digital app has had on this old-fashioned art form.

At the end of this summer, Will Fryar moved to Chicago for a new job, and he's already meeting other film photographers there.

"There is an awesome film shop in Wicker Park," he says.

But the community he contributed to will likely continue to grow in Phoenix.

An example of Daniel Kim's film work.

Daniel Kim

"Photography will never stay the same. It will always grow and morph," Panaro-Smith says.

She and Hajicek say they are hopeful about the future of analog photography. Though the style is changing and the end goal may not be the same as theirs, they admire the efforts of these young photographers.

Panaro-Smith smiles as she browses Fryar's Instagram account for the first time, commenting on his eye for interesting photographs.

"I'm intrigued and excited," she says.

But the two photography veterans say the definition of a photographer will depend on who is behind the camera, whether it be analog, digital, or attached to a mobile application.

"It's the equipment, but it's more about the knowledge," says Kim, the Gilbert wedding photographer, who now shoots, processes, and edits his film himself. "Film is not a magic pill. The basics of photography have to be there."

Hajicek, who prefers to do much of the photographic process himself, says he believes the universe will balance itself.

As the masses move toward the ease and immediacy of digital and technology advances to allow a broader range of photographers to create art, a small but dedicated group of photographers will "keep film alive," as the film photographers like to say and hashtag on Instagram.

"As a species, we will never lose our need and love and desire for handmade objects," Hajicek says. "You just don't want to throw away meat and potatoes because an Ethiopian restaurant opened down the street."

But will it ever be possible for professional photographers to make a living with strictly analog photography again?

"That I would probably doubt," says Dieter Schaefer, owner of Phoenix Photo Lab, one of the few locally owned places that still develops film. But he also doesn't think film photography will ever completely die out.

Until recently, the app allowed only square photos, and a recognizable style of symmetrical photos emerged. Beyond stylistic trends, Instagram has contributed to making photography and photo sharing prolific. The number of the image-based app's users worldwide has officially surpassed that of Twitter.

In the end, though the mediums change and the audience grows, it's still photography, and Hijacek thinks there is room for all of it in this "visual revolution."

"Let's add it to our toolbox but not throw it away," he says. "Let's just buy a bigger toolbox."

Source: Old School Photography Techniques Are Making a Comeback — on Instagram