Tech Tuesday :: Pic Frames

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If a picture's worth a thousand words, what about a multi-photo, fancy-schmancy collage?

Camera phones, photo sharing platforms and social media are giving way to a new breed of amateur digital photographers who snap more photos than the Sartorialist and add more filters than a celeb photoshop pro. I'm not sure if Ansel Adams would join the revolution, or roll over in his grave. Likely, the latter.

Kill two, three, four, five or six birds with one stone using the following picture frame apps. Gather and create a photo montage of everything from your breakfast, to shots of the Grand Canyon from multiple vantage points. Here are two photo grid/collage apps I consistently use:

Picture Frames FREE - easily add photos from your iPhone into 18 different frame configurations - squeeze or expand the photo for best fit - add a border with varying thickness and colors - finish and save to your phone, email it or send to Facebook or Twitter - note: you have to opt out of two or three ads each time you use the app - available for iPhone, and here's a similar free photo grid app for Android

{Shot in Vancouver's Gastown district at the Acme Cafe}

PicFrame {$0.99} - easily add photos from your iPhone into 60 fully adjustable frame configurations - squeeze or expand the photo for best fit - add a straight or rounded border with varying thickness, colors and patterns - apply 18 different filters to each individual photo with the collage/frame - finish and save to your phone, email it or send to Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram and Flickr - available for iPhone + Android {Shot in Vancouver's Gastown district at Save-On-Meats}

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[photos by @tripstyler using the above-mentioned apps]

Tech Tuesday :: Tingo

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"You just can't lose" is the unique selling feature of new hotel booking site Tingo.com, built to refund customers after they book if the price of their hotel drops before their stay. With no online forms to fill out, the refund is done automatically.

In case you're worried that a site offering automatic hotel stay refunds is sketchy, Tingo's legit. Its sister company is Trip Advisor.

How It Works Tingo functions like any other travel booking site. Enter your destination and dates, and this hotel booking engine will render a series of matching results gathered from Expedia. In a recent search for hotels in LA, 75% of the results were eligible for money back, while 25% were just typical hotel rates---no bells or whistles {see below}. For example, if you book a "money back" hotel one month in advance of your arrival date, and the price lowers one to three times, you'll get a refund every time. And no, you don't get charged extra if the price goes up.

What do you think of this hotel booking/refund concept? Will you use Tingo?

PS - did you know that a service like this exists for flights too? It's called yapta, except the onus is on you as the consumer to ask for the refund once yapta tracks the price of your flight.

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[Images via Tingo.com]

Tech Tuesday :: Instagram For Android

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This is kind of a big deal. In 2011 we declared our love for Instagram, a photo editing and sharing tool with a massive early adopter buy-in {read: one million-plus downloads in three months}. Last week the online photo 'club' got a whole lot BIGGER. Previously only available for iPhones, the app just opened its membership to Android users too, AND as of yesterday afternoon, it was purchased by Facebook for $1-billion USD.

Think of Instagram like an all-photo Facebook, sans melodramatic status updates. Just pics that can be enhanced with 12 vintage-to-saturated filters and shared with your friends on Instagram, then pushed to Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and other social sites.

How It Works After downloading the app, take a picture, apply a filter and share it with friends, fam and/or the world. At its core, the photo filters offered in the app are a lot like camera bag‘s {featured May 4th, 2010}, but Instagram takes it a step further and integrates heavy sharing capabilities like finding and following friends who are using the app {similar to fb & twitter}, sharing photos on major social networking sites and commenting on others’ photos. The app is as much about snapping photos near and far, as it is about sharing.

PS - Find Trip Styler {@tripstyler} on Instagram.

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[photos via @tripstyler's instagram]

Tech Tuesday :: A Nanny On High

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Sky nanny anyone?

Need help at the airport, getting settled into your seat or taking shifts with a crying baby? That's where the new, California-based NannyInTheClouds.com touches down. For a $10 matching fee, this brave website is aiming to pair families and registered babysitters traveling on the same flight. Once a match is found, the parties sort out details like payment, where to meet, etc...

As you can imagine, there's a fleet of opinions flying about this new service. Most parents are rightfully concerned about leaving their child with a stranger, and to this end the website offers "you'll be right beside or near them." Moreover, if you and your sky-nanny-to-be are already booked on the same flight, how do you get your seats together if the plane is full? And with 30,000 daily commercial flights in the US alone, what's the likelihood of a registered nanny or babysitter actually flying on your same flight?

I'm not sure if this service will get its captain's wings or be forced to hang its hat, either way, it'll be interesting to see if the trend takes off {one of many puns  intended}.

PS - Squeamish about a sitter in the sky? On land check out US-based SeekingSitters.com, a babysitting placement and matching service founded by a licensed private investigator and mom of three. Might be an option for traveling families in need of a sitter...

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[photo via nanny in the clouds]

Tech Tuesday :: Animated Photos

Created by stefugee with cinemagr.am

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I'd like to introduce you to the Honda Prius of iPhoneography, a hybrid---part photo, part video.

Meet Cinemagram and Kinotopic, both cinemagraph apps. Use them to create a specific and repetitive animation sequence in a photo. Film travel scenes like the Bellagio's dancing fountains, a hippo rolling around in mud or a flamenco dancer flaunting her moves.

Honestly, I'm not sure how I feel about animated photos. They harken back to the web's early, razzle-dazzle ad banner days, and today's flashing twitter handles.

Are present-day photos with animated features a hit or miss? I guess that depends on the videographer, on the photo, on the moment captured. The jury's out, you decide.

How it works

• Download the free apps, currently only available for Apple products.
• Cinemagram - 5 filters, share to fb, twitter & tumblr.
• Kinotopic - 12 filters, share to fb, twitter, tumblr, email, ability to make photos private. Nice interface.
• Capture a 3 - 4-second video or use a sequence from one of your old vids.
• Specify the animation area.
• Publish.

Example Cinemagraph Created by thekcrussell with cinemagr.am

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[photos via cinemagram] {Hat Tip}