Welcome to my technology blog!
I am a fan of Anker’s battery backup products and cables. I worked out a giveaway with them that will allow me to giveaway their NEW PowerCore+ 10050 battery backup for your mobile devices. To enter all you have to do is follow me on Twitter here and retweet this tweet. On Sunday, September 20th 2015 I will pick a US or UK based follower that retweeted the tweet.
You can check out the PowerCore+ 10050 here
Like many of you I upgraded my iPhone and iPad yesterday when iOS 9 was officially released. Looking at Apple’s website and looking at the WWDC Apple Keynote from earlier this year, I wasn’t really excited about the update. However, after spending some time digging a little deeper, I found some really cool features and hidden gems. Rather than listing them all here. I’d rather show them to you in action in this video – See What’s NEW in iOS 9 and What Apple didn’t show us:
The latest update to Twitter’s live broadcasting app, Periscope brings the long awaited landscape orientation that it so desperately needed. I have a renewed interest in using Periscope and now have the choice to broadcast in portrait or landscape based on what’s best for the content I’m showing. I’m also noticing more and more people getting on board. That’s why I created this NEW video that goes into detail about How to Get Started on Periscope and it even includes a live Periscope broadcast to show how much fun you can have using Periscope:
I shared some tips in the video, but here are some tips that every Periscope user should know:
Make sure you have sufficient bandwidth. The Periscope app itself does a test before even allowing you to start your broadcast, but I like to know even earlier. So I run the Speedtest App to check my speed. You probably want at least 2mbps upload speed to have a good experience.
Create a compelling title for your broadcast. Remember that you’re competing for the attention of your viewers. If they see an Untitled broadcast or a title that is weak or not very descriptive then they will likely not tap on it to watch. For example I could have titled this post “Periscope tips and tricks”, but “The Ultimate Cheat Sheet On Periscope – 10 Killer Tips” sounds way better. Bonus Tip: Add a few emojis to the title so that it stands out even more.
Time to Break Your Egg. When you first sign up to Twitter or Periscope your profile pic will default to a picture of an egg.
You need to change it before doing your first broadcast. Unless I know your name, I will likely never tap to watch or follow anyone with an default profile pic. I will dismiss you/it as spam.
Introduce yourself every time you broadcast. This is one that I have to remember to do each time. You might think “why do I need to introduce myself? These are my followers.” That’s true, but what you have to remember is that a lot of people may be watching you for the first time that have not followed you yet. They saw your tweet, they saw someone else’s share, or perhaps they saw your broadcast on the Periscope map. They don’t know you!
Continue reading “The Ultimate Cheat Sheet On Periscope – 10 Killer Tips”
When I read my buddy Scott Kelby’s post yesterday on “7 Reasons Why Photographers Need to Be on Instagram” I was reminded why I like this platform so much. I’ve been active on Instagram since January 2012. At first I looked at it as “oh boy, one more thing to have to post to.” That was before I realized that I could use Instagram as my starting point any time I want to share a photo. Unlike most other sites, Instagram allows me to simultaneously share to my Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Foursquare (check-ins), Email and Flickr. If for no other reason I’d use Instagram for this feature alone. However, Instagram actually became the social media site that I visit the most. For some reason (maybe it’s because I’m a visual person), I’m way more likely to scroll my Instagram feed to see all the posts from the people that I follow than I am on Facebook and Twitter. Even when I don’t post, I will still scroll through my Instagram feed checking out posts of others all the way down until I get to the post I saw last. To make the sharing experience even better to Twitter and my Facebook Fan Page, I created an IFTTT script that if I tag my Instagram post with #f it will post it directly to my Facebook Fan Page (as opposed to my personal Facebook page) and #t to post it as a NATIVE Twitter pic instead of just a link to the Instagram post.
Instagram is no longer just for squares. Probably one of the biggest reasons for photographers to rejoice and start using Instagram more is that Instagram now supports landscape and portrait images/videos directly in the Instagram app. I no longer have to use the Squaready Pro app to get the full image into a square format.
They each have a unique style and often post pics that make me pause when I’m scrolling my feed:
Here’s the recap of the people to follow above with links: @dr_brown, @felix_ireland, @glyndewis, @gregsimages, @michielbuijse, @rich_hart_photography, @scottkelby, @squidgallery @victoriapavlov @whyiloveatl
And since you’re in such a good mood to follow people, be sure to follow me too @TerryLeeWhite on Instagram! Thanks in advance.
See more of my photography on my photography site: terrywhitephotography.com
For many people their smartphone is their main or only camera. I’m finding that I use my iPhone 6 Plus to take more and more pictures when I’m out and about. I have no problems with the quality of the images that the iPhone produces, however the one thing that keeps me from using it when it really matters is the lens. Your smartphone has a relatively small lens and sensor. Sure there are some lens attachments out there, but nothing I’ve seen that rivals the quality of my Nikon glass while still maintaining the convenience of a camera that’s in my pocket at all times.
The DxO ONE
Sometimes showing is easier than writing. Check out this video review I did:
Continue reading “A 20MP DSLR Quality Camera for your iPhone – DxO ONE”
If you are out and about these days then chances are you in need of charging your smartphone, tablet and other mobile devices. I travel for a living so I figured I would share the four ways that I keep everything charged when I’m on the go:
The 2nd Gen Anker Astro 6400 mAh is a great external battery to keep on your person. I love it because it has a smooth surface with no buttons to accidentally get pressed while it’s on my pocket. It change charge my iPhone 6 Plus up to 1.5 times.
Get it here.
Continue reading “4 Ways To Keep Your Mobile Devices Charged on the Go”
In this episode of Adobe Creative Cloud TV I answer a Facebook Fan request on how to shoot tethered to an iPad? Unfortunately there still isn’t a way to just plug in your camera to your iPad and have the images show up as you shoot with your DSLR and quite frankly even if you could it would have limited application due to the storage constraints on the iPad itself. So instead I’ve come up with a way to use Lightroom CC and Lightroom Mobile to accomplish the same thing not only to an iPad, but to an iPhone, Android phone, Android tablet or even a web browser. With the technique above you can shoot tethered to Lightroom and have your shots automatically sync to Lightroom Mobile via Creative Sync and those shots will be on all of your devices as well as the web simultaneously.
See more of my Adobe Creative Cloud Videos on my Adobe Creative Cloud TV and get the App below. My iOS App is a Universal App for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. I also have an Android version on the Amazon App Store:
Wow! I just realized that I hit 250,000 subscribers on my YouTube channel. If you’re one of those quarter million subscribers then I want to say THANK YOU. It certainly helps me stay motivated to continue creating new content.
I feel honored to have so many people watching my videos and using them to learn about new products and learn about design and photography.
It was only 18 months ago that I celebrated 125,000 YouTube subscribers. The growth has been phenomenal. If you haven’t subscribed yet, you can do so here.
I just wanted to take a moment to thank all of you who attended my classes, sat in on my Adobe booth demos, and came up to me and said hello. I was especially happy to see the number educators that came up to me to thank me for my videos and to tell me that they use them in their classrooms. Wow! What an honor. Photoshop World is definitely my favorite show to work.
There’s so much inspiration and creativity happening and Photoshop World and I always leave with a list of things that I want to come home and try. I was also honored to see my work on display on the Photoshop 25th Anniversary display in the Adobe Booth. The work on display here was awe inspiring.
Not only was my work on display in the Adobe booth, but I happened to be flipping through the Photoshop World show guide and caught the F.J. Westcott Lighting add featuring my work with their Rapid Box 26″ Octa.
You might remember my post a couple of weeks ago comparing the NEW Live from Facebook Mentions to Periscope. After doing a few more broadcasts to both services I quickly realized that I usually have a larger number of views on Facebook. I thought that it would be great to be able to stream to both services simultaneously. That way I could finally address both my large Twitter/Periscope following as well as my large Facebook following at the same time. This would of course require streaming from two devices. I could use my iPhone 6 Plus and an iPod touch. The real question was, how would I hold both devices at the same time and keep them steady? I went in search of a “dual tripod head mount” and I found this one on Amazon. I ordered it, but when it arrived I wasn’t that happy with it. For one it was bigger and heavier than I hoped and the bigger problem was that the devices were spaced out too far apart for broadcasting the same thing up close.
That’s when I challenged my friends over at Arkon Mounts to make something better! Not only did they accept the challenge, they showed a mock up the very next day.
The mock up was night and day better than the one that I had put together and even better they would bring it to Photoshop World and hand it to me to try. After I used it for a day I was thrilled with it. It was everything I wanted, but that wasn’t good enough for Aaron. Aaron was concerned that the devices could possibly pop out. He had his company overnight their better smartphone grips (the ones used on their motorcycle mounts) and replaced the ones on mine with the stronger ones.
Check out this video review that I recorded over the weekend:
I did several simultaneous live broadcasts to Periscope and Facebook Mentions Live. As I was walking around the show I got lots of double takes as people assumed I must be shooting 3D video.
Even if I wasn’t streaming to both Periscope and Facebook at the same time, I’d still use this to broadcast to Periscope in it’s current vertical video format and use the second device to record standard 16:9 wide video.
This mount is just freaking awesome with lots of uses. Of course it can be mounted on a tripod too.
It’s also versatile enough to be converted into a single mount (the TW Broadcaster) for those times when you only need to mount one mobile device.
I’m thrilled to have this new product which perfectly fits my broadcasting and recording needs. I’m deeply honored to have it named after me as well. Even if you’re not interested in this particular solution you should definitely check out the mounting solutions at www.arkon.com. If you have a need to mount a mobile device, camera, etc, on to something they’ve likely already built a solution for you. If you are interested in the TW Broadcaster Pro you can order it here. Or if you’re interested in the single mount (also great for selfies) TW Broadcaster model you can order it here. You can even take 10% off anything you order from their site with my discount code “twhite”.
