Move over Instagram: Top Photo Apps You're Not Using

Guest post by Emily Green

In the beginning there was Instagram. It has set a pace, there’s no denying it. An app that is dedicated to simplicity is also one that accomplishes photosharing with great efficiency. By engaging in a few simple taps on your Smartphone you can have your photos posted instantly to your social media. But efficient simple ideas can’t help but inspire innovation along the same lines. Consider some of the top photo apps that offer some great advantages along with some competition for old Instagram.

EyeEm

Unlike Instagram, EyeEm is much more than a simple photo sharing app. It is an innovative, out of the box marvel. For starters this app will let you arrange your images by category. No wacky collection of images because the EyeEM comes with a full set of pre-set categories that will cover any and all descriptions.

The more popular categories include:
Black-and-White, Friends, Breakfast, and Self-Portraits. Be adventurous and experiment with the location function and witness the app display of those images taken around you. Manage images for your personal website and then if you’re using T-mobile cell phone plans you can pass images on to some photo sharing website like Snapfish or Mixbook.

Piictu

Piictu is the soul of simplicity with intuitive operations that allow users to communicate using images alone. It wastes no time with bells and whistles. Since it was designed as a photo sharing app for visual communication and nothing else, it purposely excluded any filters. For the truly creative who want to push their photo taking abilities to the next level, this is the app that will help them accomplish that dream.

Pixable

Pixable will do the thankless job that can really help you organize your images. It will review all the images you’ve posted to all your social media, whether it’s Facebook, Flickr, or Twitter, and then sort them by date or some other currently popular hashtag. Briefly put, this little beauty will organize all the images you’ve posted to all your social media sites. You can then save your images to completely different categories – “best of the best,” “top shots of the day,” “recent photos,” etc. That boring, time consuming task of organizing is done for you with Pixable.

Cinemagr.am

Okay, Cinemagram is truly cool. It’s not an app that will make a short movie, but it will create some really creative animated images. But how? How does it work? Good question. Here’s what you do, take a few seconds of video, then take your best moments in the form of a few images then engage this app. Soon your images will be a nifty animated gif image. Nice!

Most popular Facebook check-in landmarks Worldwide

Facebook has released two infographs of the most popular landmarks based on check-ins made Worldwide (actually in 25 cities). It is not surprising that shopping malls and outdoor markets are quite popular.

Check out the infographs:
 


 Read the post on Facebook.

Samsung SIII now available in the UK

In case you haven't heard, the Samsung SIII is available in the UK. You can get the phone without any upfront charges for £34 per month (no upfront charges) on the 3 network (2K UK minutes, 5K texts and unlimited data). The best tariff on O2 was £46 per month (unlimited UK minutes, unlimited texts and 1GB data usage ). It is slightly cheaper at £41 per month on Vodaphone (900 UK minutes, unlimited texts and 2 GB data). On the later two networks, you would have to pay some amount up front if you want lower monthly charges.

It is being called the iPhone killer - Where have we heard that before?

Apparently this has got Apple worried and they have moved to ban the Samsung III, in the US claiming that it infringes certain patents which they own.

I do not think it is going to kill the iPhone but it is an AMAZING phone. Features includes:

• A large 4.8" HD Super AMOLED display 
• Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) Operating System running on a super-fast 1.4 GHz quad-core processor 
• Long lasting 2100mAh battery 
• 1.9 MP front camera with BSI 
• 8 MP low light camera with auto-focus and LED flash 
• Full HD video recording and playback 
• Up to 16GB internal memory 
• The phone just weights 133gms

Just watch this awesome video showing what you can do with the phone:

Nespresso Coffee machines

I am more of a tea drinker rather than a coffee drinker but I am not sure why, outside the house I would always go for a coffee. Anyway, I have always wanted to buy a coffee machine and had the opportunity to unpack and try out an Nespresso machine, thanks to my sis-in-law and her husband. As the name suggests, Nespresso is part of the Nestle group.



They have come up with several types of coffee machines and the one I tried out was the CITIZ TITANIUM (Krups XN7001). It has a retro yet sleek look that's really popular now. The machine is really simple to operate. You have to fill in water in the removable water tank. Place your cup on the drip tray. Then you pop the "coffee capsule" into the capsule container. The capsules are colour coded and there are 16 different types which they graded on aroma and intensity.

 

As it was the first time the machine was being used, we were supposed to let the hot water run without any capsule inside for a few times.Initially I thought that the machine was not working as nothing happened - I tried pressing the buttons for the expresso or lungo (double) sizes but nothing came out. My brother-in-law then took over and pressed the lungo button for a couple of minutes and the hot water finally came out.

Once you have the capsule in place, as mentioned earlier - you have the choice of either the expresso or lungo sizes.  I wondered whether the expresso would have a stronger intensity but I could not detect any difference - but then I am no coffee expert. I recommend using the lungo size always as you only get to use the capsules once and would just be a waste to choose expresso and throw away the capsule. If you only want a smaller portion, you just divide the coffee. The used capsule drops down into the holder below automatically once you open the lid to the capsule container.



Nestle has definitely hit upon on a fantastic idea - to get people to keep buying their products. You get to join the exclusive Nespresso club and can order the capsules any place, any time. You also get assistance if you have any problem with your machines. You also get access to the online Nespresso magazine.

Personally I prefer the bean-to-cup machines where you put in the roasted bean and you get freshly brewed coffee. I know they are costly but you get the freshest brewed coffee - straight from the bean. The DeLonghi ECAM 22.110 Magnificia S which costs around £400 is the cheapest among Which? Best Buys. What I like best about this machine is it's cappuccino system which can create the perfect creamy froth.

I guess others would prefer to buy coffee machines that use capsules as they are much more convenient and involves less maintenance. It's all a matter of choice and of course, your budget.