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On instant cameras, telegrams and apps [Mercury, The (South Africa)](Mercury, The (South Africa) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) I'VE got two techy tips for you today - but first, a bit more fun for those who have been following my adventures in photography, and then a bit more on that old chestnut: the "paperless office". I love smart phones. Lately I've been playing with various photo apps on a new Apple iPhone 5S. Some of the apps have been around for a while, but didn't grab my attention until I had the right camera to do them justice. Now that I have a shiny new phone to play with, I find myself blithely snapping away at just about anything! Instagram is a popular photo app available exclusively for mobile devices. It's one of the first applications I've reviewed that doesn't have an official version for Windows PCs, although the Windows Phone is supported, as are Apple devices and phones or tablets running the Android operating system. The reason for excluding PCs is simple: Instagram is all about the mobile generation. Its name is a portmanteau of "instant camera" and "telegram", and that's the essence of it. It sends little pictures, instantly. Instagrammers snap, edit and share little square-cropped photos on-the-go - it's the perfect way to share your Times Square "selfie" directly to your jealous mates back home, or publicly to any of the 150 million users who regularly use the app. Instagram's built-in photo filters are its calling cards. When added to a standard photo, these digital layers mimic professional editing techniques with some pleasing results. Some filters enhance the colours in a photo, while some of the most popular filters dull the light to a soft glow and add a border for a vintage pseudo-Polaroid appearance - as found in many a shoebox collection of photos from the 70s. As a social media app, Instagram works with other popular social networks such as Twitter and Facebook. In fact, Facebook owns Instagram, having bought it in a US $1 billion cash and shares deal two years ago. Getting started with Instagram is pretty straightforward. Download the free Instagram app from your device's App Store (on Android, this is called the Google Play Store). The easiest way to find the authentic Instagram app amongst its many imitators is to first browse to www.instagram|.com from your mobile device, and then click the relevant link for Apple or Android to take you to the correct App. The Windows Phone version is only available via its App store. You can sign in to Instagram using a Facebook account if you have one, or create an Instagram account of your own. You'll find beginner's guides to installing and using at www.tinyurl.com/instgr01 and www.tinyurl.com/instgr02. "A picture paints a thousand words" - Instagram harnesses this power, letting you share your story and your photos, simply, immediately and elegantly. It's also pretty damn addictive! My next tech tip is not as pretty as Instagram, but it might just save a forest or two. Adobe's free Reader tool from www.get.adobe.com/reader is the world's leading PDF reader software. Did you know it now also allows you to sign PDFs? Embed a version of your signature into a PDF by simply scanning a picture of it, or - this is neat - use your webcam to snap a picture of your signature directly from the Reader program. Instructions are at www.tinyurl.com/arsign01 and check Reader's top 10 features at www.tinyurl.com/artopten to see some of its new editing and commenting tools. You won't need to print, fill in and re-scan or fax PDFs ever again - do it all paperless! If you're concerned about the validity of an electronic signature, the relevant legalese explaining where they can and can't be used in South Africa can be found at www.tinyurl.com/ESSA01 and www.tinyurl.com/ESSA02 . The Mercury (c) 2014 Independent Newspapers (Pty) Limited. All rights strictly reserved. Provided by SyndiGate Media Inc. (Syndigate.info). |