Przedstawiciel PLAY LUBLIN

3 pierwsze pozycje na aktualnej liście sprzedaży w PLAY zajmują smartfony marki SAMSUNG. To niekwestionowany w tym momencie lider sprzedaży w PLAY. Cieszę się bardzo, że udało nam się namówić pozytywnych ludzi w Samsungu na wsparcie naszej akcji nad morzem. Nasi uczestnicy będą podzieleni na 4 grupy. Każdej grupie będzie patronował jeden producent. Każda grupa [...]

Od dzisiaj nowe promocje w ofercie Formuła 4.0 ! Po kolei: FORMUŁA 4.0/ Super FORMUŁA 4.0 FORMUŁA 4.0 (79) – promocja dostępna dla nowych Klientów – 10 zł rabatu na abonament na zawsze! Super FORMUŁA 4.0 (69) – promocja dostępna dla Klientów przenoszących numer z abonamentu od innego operatora – 20 zł rabatu na [...]

Od jutra, w bardzo dobrych cenach! Cennik

Oprócz nowego Hiujego od jutra ciekawe smaczki w cennikach Nokia Lumia 900 Motorola Defy + Sony Ericsson Xperia Pro Sony Xperia P Sony Xperia Sola Cennik

Od dzisiaj nowe promocje w ofercie Formuła 4.0 ! Po kolei: FORMUŁA 4.0/ Super FORMUŁA 4.0 FORMUŁA 4.0 (79) – promocja dostępna dla nowych Klientów – 10 zł rabatu na abonament na zawsze! Super FORMUŁA 4.0 (69) – promocja dostępna dla Klientów przenoszących numer z abonamentu od innego operatora – 20 zł rabatu na [...]

Oprócz nowego Hiujego od jutra ciekawe smaczki w cennikach Nokia Lumia 900 Motorola Defy + Sony Ericsson Xperia Pro Sony Xperia P Sony Xperia Sola Cennik

3 pierwsze pozycje na aktualnej liście sprzedaży w PLAY zajmują smartfony marki SAMSUNG. To niekwestionowany w tym momencie lider sprzedaży w PLAY. Cieszę się bardzo, że udało nam się namówić pozytywnych ludzi w Samsungu na wsparcie naszej akcji nad morzem. Nasi uczestnicy będą podzieleni na 4 grupy. Każdej grupie będzie patronował jeden producent. Każda grupa [...]

Od jutra, w bardzo dobrych cenach! Cennik

A couple of weeks ago, I compared two reference apps, Encyclopædia Britannica and Wikipedia, to decide which one I think was better. This week I’m doing the same with two panorama apps; Photosynth and Ztitch+. How do they compare?

Ztitch+ £0.79

Ztitch+ is an app that captures your environment in full 360º. However, I’ll be straight with you right from the off, I couldn’t work out how to do it. What I did manage, though, was to capture a panoramic image all across the horizon – not the full 360º I had hoped for.

I don’t know whether it’s because a gyroscope is needed in your device, or whether I just did something wrong. But, whatever it was, the instructions and tutorial wasn’t clear enough to explain why this might be. This disappoints me, somewhat.

Regardless of this, let’s look at the usage of the app.

With Ztitch+ you position your subject – usually a landscape – in the centre of your screen. Pressing the screen (or camera button if you’ve got one) starts your panorama capturing.

The first image shifts to the left and becomes almost transparent, leaving the edge of that first image on your screen. Moving your phone to the right and lining up the previous image to the right of the new one, continue the capturing process. Each time you reach the new point in your panorama, you must press the camera button to confirm.

With a complete and full (ahem) 360º panorama, you can now upload it to your Flickr or Facebook account. By doing this, you’ll link that account with your newly created Ztitch.com account. By navigating to your new Ztitch account you can then explore your photo by panning it around your screen and selecting the map button shows you where you took that photo on Bing Maps. You can also do this on your phone.

Due to there being no embed feature, you can check out my linear panoramic photo over at the Ztitch website.

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Photosynth £Free

We’ve written about Photosynth before. What it does is similar to Ztitch+ where as it captures the world around you in full 360º.

By standing in one position and moving the camera around you from left to right and up and down, this app automatically captures what it sees from your camera. No button pressing, it just does it. It knows when the next photo needs to be taken by matching the edges of the previous shot up for you. I find that this makes taking a panoramic photo, super-easy.

Once you’ve finished taking your photo, your sharing options are: Facebook; Twitter; Bing Maps; Photosynth.net; Email; and Camera Roll.

Uploading your image to Bing Maps adds your image to a collection of 300,000+ geo-tagged panoramas stored by the Bing Maps team. This is great for sharing famous landmarks with the rest of the world.

Much like Ztitch+, you’ll need to create an account with their site to be able to make full use of their services, like exploring the panorama in a 360º environment and having the option to embed it.

So, two panorama apps with very similar features and usability. However, I do prefer one to the other.

For me, Photosynth wins in the usability and feature comparison. I just couldn’t figure out why I wasn’t able to take full 360º panoramas with Ztitch+. Sure, there might be a reasonable explanation, however in the midst of trying to take a photo I really don’t want to be standing in the middle of a field trying to figure out how to use the app; it needs to be simple to use.

Photosynth’s point and (auto) click does exactly what you want. Take cleverly stitched panoramas just by pulling your phone out of your pocket. No messing about. The image embed feature is just a bonus for me, as it means I can share my images to wider audiences.

What’s your favourite of the two? Let me know, below.

Image credit: Panoramas

Smartphones, feature phones, mobile phones. What’s the difference? You may think it’s easy to distinguish between them all, but sometimes there’s not much difference between them. Here’s our breakdown of the three.

As a rule of thumb, the best way to differentiate the three groups is to keep in mind its features and therefore, cost. If a phone just makes a phone call, sends a text message and offers very little else, it’s mobile phone. If it offers a high-megapixel camera, enables you to edit Microsoft Office documents and photos then it’s a smartphone. And anywhere in between is probably a feature phone.

To explain things further, let’s look more in detail about the differences.

Mobile phones

These are usually the most affordable phones on the market. A great example of this is the Nokia 100. While a mobile phone doesn’t come packed with a high-end features, what it does offer is a brilliant battery life. This one has a standby time of 840 hours – well over a month – for example.

A mobile phone is principally there for the crucial jobs; to enable you to make a phone call and the odd SMS. In addition to its affordable price, one of the key reasons this model is so popular in places like Africa is its durable, dust-resistant design. 

Feature phones

Feature phones lie in the ever-contested space between mobile phones and smartphones. They are rich in features, very clearly more advanced than a mobile phone, but not quite so advanced as a smartphone. Often they have built-in cameras sometimes with a fairly high megapixel count. They support apps, game downloads and feature a Web browser. The Nokia Asha 305, Nokia Asha 306 and Nokia Asha 311are all feature phones

These particular examples are very close to being smartphones, and by some people’s definitions, they are. For now we’ll stick with Wikipedia’s definition of a smartphone, though: “A smartphone is a mobile phone built on a mobile computing platform, with more advanced computing ability and connectivity than a feature phone.”

Of course, there’s a problem with this definition. What is “more advanced” changes every year. Ten years ago, having a calendar app would have been enough to get into the smartphone camp. Today, it’s nothing short of augmented reality browsers and HD video capabilities.

Feature phones are perfect for people who want more than just to make a phone call, but possibly don’t want to spend a lot of money on a fully-fledged smartphone. It’s a very good happy medium.

Smartphones

A smartphone is, as we’ve just discussed, a phone that’s at the forefront of current technology.

Current smartphones are capable of taking high-res photos that you can edit right on the phone. You could also create Office documents, edit them and upload them to the Cloud. Smartphones also feature GPS for finding your way around the world, plus much more.

The Nokia Lumia 900 is one example of a smartphone. It’s beautifully crafted, meets most of your needs and is for all intents and purposes a mobile computer

Most people start their phone journey with a mobile phone, as it’s the perfect way to be introduced to new technology. Then, after time, their confidence – and desire – grows and it’s time to upgrade to a feature phone. From here, not everybody takes the leap to smartphone, as feature phones are capable of so much.

However, those that do progress to smartphone do so to always be connected to the things that are important to them, whether it be friends and family on social networks, or to be kept up-to-date with the latest news from around the world, or to just blast some aliens in a high-def online game.

What did you first own? A mobile phone, a feature phone or a smart phone? Let us know, by using the comments section below.

Image credit: Per Olof Forsberg