The iPhone 5

The iPhone is the most popular smartphone on the market and for good reason. With the first iPhone, Apple essentially reinvented the mobile phone market and has led to many imitators. The touch screen, sliding lock, app store and more are all features that have been replicated by other phone manufacturers. So far there have been five different models of the iPhone:

• iPhone
• iPhone 3G
• iPhone 3GS
• iPhone 4
• iPhone 4S

Rumours are building for the release of the fifth generation of iPhone, even though it hasn't even been confirmed, although it is very obvious that the device is incoming. There are several ‘apparently real’ leaks of what it could look like but I doubt any of them would be real. One of the leaks is a transparent screen which would actually be impossible, unless Apple have managed to create invisible thin microchips and processors. It would make using and answering the phone quite difficult too.

So what do you want from the iPhone 5? Discuss what you want the device to look like below. Have a look at this link for some great prototype mockups for various Apple products.

App Spotlight - Photo Booth

We’re going to be starting a new feature on this blog called ‘app spotlight’. Each post will look at a different app available on any platform and talk about what it has to offer the user and finally give it an overall rating out of ten. The first app we are going to look at is ‘Photo Booth’ for iOS and Mac OSX.

Aesthetics The first thing we notice with any app is what it looks like. Since this is a native Apple app you can be sure that it’s going to it’s going to follow their skeuomorphic design theme meaning it will be styled like a real world item. In this case it of course it is designed to look like a classic, real world photo booth. Both the icon for the application and the app design itself follow this theme and present a very simple and easy to use interface.

Features
We all want our apps to look good but it’s definitely more important that they work well. Photo booth is a fairly simple app but does what it does really well. There are really only two buttons. One takes you to a screen where you can choose between a selection of fun photo filters and the other is the camera button. Once you have selected the filter you want to use and taken your photo it is stored in a film reel at the bottom of the screen and also in your pictures folder or photos app. 

ConclusionYou definitely won’t be getting any work done with this app, quite the opposite in fact. It is just a bit of fun and you will be surprised how long it takes for it to get boring. It’s well designed and easy to use and will provide hours of fun.The only downfall really is that it’s not available on the iPhone at the moment. It seems like an obvious addition since it’s already available on the iPad and although there are some 3rd party alternatives, none of them are quite as good.

7/10