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Aug 11 2010

Rising Card Magic App for iPhone

A while back, I wrote a story on various magic tricks you can do with your iPhone, iPad or iPod. Shortly after I posted it, someone let me know that I had missed on. Namely, Rising Card by theory11.com.

Today, I set about rectifying the error of omission by recording this mini video with the help of @davesalter84 (on camera) and Loran from MacStation in Abbotsford, BC.

Rising Card is a simple trick to do and is very convincing. You have your participant name any card, it doesn’t matter which. Then bring out your iPhone and hand it to the participant to launch the app themselves. You don’t even have to be in the room as the participant shakes the iPhone and witnesses their chosen card rising magically from the deck on the iPhone screen.

Rising Card sells for $2.99 US and is brought to you by a professional magic effect supplier—theory11.com.

No Flash? No problem—click here!»

By RickMacMerc • apps, Featured, iPhone, MacMerc.TV, Mini Video • Comments Off • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Apr 27 2009

The Ultimate DV Editing Station – Part 1– Setting Up

By: Brian Burnham

It is important to start smart when setting up an editing station. Choices made now will avoid frustration later, so follow closely.

For those of you following along at home, here’s what you will need:

  1. A 867 MHz G4, fresh from Apple $2499
  2. A Matrox RTMac $999
  3. Final Cut Pro 2.0 $999

Optional:

  1. Contour ShuttlePRO $125
  2. Macally 2 button scroll optical mouse (i-optinet) $49

First off, I want to say that this tutorial is a free service. Anything that might happen to you, your Mac or anything you happen to have near it is in no way the fault of MacMerc or me in particular. Just be smart, okay?

Getting it Together

Well, we’ve got all the boxes unpacked and the smell of fresh poly carbonate plastics is making us a little woozy but I’m hoping you managed to put together the basic components of your Mac. We’ll pick up at the installation of the RTMac card. Open the side panel of your G4 and pick a PCI slot. Don’t forget to ground yourself by either touching a big piece of metal or putting on a ground strap. Pop it in and connect it to the desktop breakout box (via cable). Don’t worry about plugging it in to the wall, your Mac powers the box.

Software

Now we are ready to start installing the software that will make this sweet, fast new Mac fly. At this point, if you’re anything like me, you spend several minutes poking and pushing the front panel of the SuperDrive, until you snap out of your stupor and read the directions. As noted in the directions that I read AFTER I had figured things out, there is no "eject" button on the tower of the new G4. You have to use the keyboard eject to get the thing open.

Whew! That was a close one, but don’t worry, we won’t be referring to the directions again. Now that we’re rollin’, we’ll install Final Cut Pro (choosing the RTMac version under the "custom install" option). Enter in your serial numbers (they are in the documentation, on a separate sheet of paper). Now, I realize that you love to see your name in print, but you’ll notice that, in the QuickTime registration panel, you must use "QuickTime Pro" as your name, or the code will not work. After running the two installers, stop by the Apple web site for the Final Cut Pro 2.0.2 update

RT and VM

The temptation to restart your Mac and start playing with your new system is almost unbearable, but stay with me. You see, the RTMac doesn’t work with virtual memory on, and by default, your new Mac has it turned on. So, make a quick pit stop by the Memory control panel. Now is also a good time to note that RAM is at an all time low in cost, and you do need more than the default RAM provided by Apple.

Toys

Now, there are a couple of optional gadgets that will make your life as an editor easier. The two we chose are Macally’s two-button, optical wheel mouse — a must for any professional Mac, and Contour’s ShuttlePRO. This second tool will provide us with a more video-like interface, adding shuttle and jog capabilities to your Mac. After installing the drivers for your Macally mouse (provided on the CD), you will need to download your custom Contour drivers configured to work with Final Cut Pro.

This is as far as we will get in this installment. You now have a viable nonlinear editing station, ready to use. In the following tutorials we’ll look at optimizing, troubleshooting and customizing your workstation!

On to Part 2: Optimizing & Troubleshooting

By admin • Articles, Tutorials • Comments Off • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Apr 27 2009

Special Feature– ThinkFree Office

I hope this doesn’t invalidate all the work I’ve done in the name of free software. This week I’m going to feature a piece of software that is not free. However, I think you’ll find it hard for any freeloader to pass up.

I’d like to note here that I am in no way affiliated with ThinkFree, and my excitement for this software comes purely from the application itself. That out of the way, let’s get down to business.

What could be so good to distract me from my pursuit of free software? Well, picture a full office suite including word processing, spreadsheet and presentation software, all wrapped up nicely in one suite for $49. Now, imagine if it could read and write files in Microsoft Office’s format? That would be ThinkFree Office.

First off, I’d like to say what ThinkFree Office is not. Think free should not be confused with the open-source effort to subvert – er – replace Microsoft Office. This effort currently underway is called Open Office and is an extension of Sun’s free office suite. Also, ThinkFree is not AppleWorks. In my testing experience, ThinkFree at it’s worst is more compatible with Microsoft Office than Appleworks at its best. Not to pick on Apple, but Appleworks is a half-hearted office suite. Not so with ThinkFree. This is full fledged professional software.

thinkfree Special Feature ThinkFree Office

ThinkFree Office is a composite of three main applications, Write, Calc and Show. These work as Word, Excel and PowerPoint respectively. You’ll find much of the interface familiar.


I did mention that ThinkFree handles Microsoft Office files better than AppleWorks. To be more specific, ThinkFree opens, without breaking a sweat, Word, Excel and PowerPoint files. However there are limits to what ThinkFree can handle. These are roughly comparable to the format loss experienced when trading files between different versions of Office (ex: Word 98 to Word X).

word Special Feature ThinkFree Office

Specifically, Macros are lost in Excel, Highlighting and Data Merge formating are lost. But, even in its weakness, ThinkFree has a strength. When you open an Office document and ThinkFree Office encounters formating it can’t convert, it warns you. This way you at least know what you’re missing.

write Special Feature ThinkFree Office

Now, ThinkFree isn’t exclusive to the Mac. Since it is written in 100% Java it is fully compatible with Mac OS 9 as well as Windows. It also has the added ability to manage your files in an online “folder” to be accessed from multiple computers. A nice touch.

And, though this software is $49 (and is worth more), you can download a free 30 day evaluation version from ThinkFree’s website.

And you thought there wouldn’t be anything free today. Shame on you.

Brian

By admin • Articles, Freeloader Friday Download of the Week • Comments Off • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

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