Two Reviews for Mercutio

Who would have guessed that the 13th could be a lucky day?! We received our first two review site reviews today for Mercutio.

Check them out at Gamezebo:
http://www.gamezebo.com/features/iphone/iphone-mercutio

and the iphonemom:
http://www.theiphonemom.com/mercutio

Here are some other great comments we have gotten from new Mercutio fans.....

"It is a very good game. Now my challenge is to limit my playing to the bus and subway, rather than every waking minute." Dave, Maryland

"Your game is unbelievably addictive. I even paid for it! Way cool game. Nicely done, you two!" Anonymous, Portland

Demo Video for Mercutio on YouTube

Watch the video to see what the game is all about! You can find Mercutio in the iPhone app store here.

What Have I Been Doing?

Some of you may be wondering why there hasn't been a post here for a while. Well, I've been working on a new App, an original puzzle game called Mercutio! I just submitted it for approval today, so you should be seeing it in the app store soon. The beta testers have really liked this game, and I hope that you will too. I'll post more details in an upcoming post, but here is a screen shot to wet your appetite.

BetterPix 1.5 Released

This version has some additional performance improvements, and user interface changes for iPhone OS 3.0.

BetterPix 1.4 Released

This version has some user interface improvements for the help screen, and a wider range of adjustable focus.

BetterPix 1.3 Released

The new version of BetterPix is a performance and memory usage update. The app can now handle images up to 4 Megapixels and runs about 30% faster. The end results of the flash and focus processing retain the same high quality images.

BetterPix 1.2 Released Today

This version gives full control over the amounts of fill flash and focus. Check it out at http://itunes.com/app/BetterPix. Version 1.3 coming soon, with faster processing and the ability to handle larger-than-iPhone (1200x1600) photos.

BetterPix 1.2 Coming Soon

I am working on a version of BetterPix that supports adjustable amounts of flash and focus. I have it all working, but I'd love some beta-testers to help tune the internal parameters and make sure that everything is solid. If you are interested, send me an email at aaron.michael.cohen@gmail.com. The screenshot below shows how it all looks.

BetterPix 1.0 Released in the App Store!

My second iPhone application, BetterPix, became available today in the iPhone App store. I initially started working on the application just for my own use, but I soon realized that many people take pictures with their iPhones that can benefit from the photo enhancing methods in BetterPix.

Having the iPhone camera always available is great. However the pictures can be poor because the iPhone camera has a fixed-focus lens and does not have a flash. This results in soft images with low contrast in the mid-tones. BetterPix can fix these problems and make your iPhone photos look better.

BetterPix helps to improve your iPhone images with two sophisticated software approaches that help compensate for the deficiencies of the iPhone camera:

• The focus method improves image sharpness without introducing the harsh pixelation of simple sharpening filters.


• The fill flash method improves exposure and contrast in backlit situations and when outdoor subjects are in partial shadow. It will add light to underexposed areas without blowing out the highlights or muddying the shadows.

Unlike many other iPhone photo processing apps, BetterPix processes and saves FULL RESOLUTION 1200x1600 pixel images! Most other apps reduce the image to one-quarter size, vastly decreasing the quality and usefulness of the image. BetterPix keeps every precious pixel that the iPhone camera captures. Also, BetterPix supports both portrait and landscape modes, as well as zoom, pinch, and pan viewing of the preview image.

iKalied 2.1 Available in App Store

The next enhancement to iKalied is now available in the app store. The main benefits of this update are that the distortion effects are now about 3x faster, and a new "Save Central Square" save option is provided. This saves the 320x320 pixel central square of the kaleidoscope, perfect for posting to Flickr or Facebook.

iKalied Whatzit? Number 2

So what's this? I'll give you a hint that the image has been distorted, but the colors are unchanged from the original. Note that this iKalied image uses the new 'Save Center Square' save option which will be available in iKalied 2.1. The new version has been submitted, and will appear as soon as the app store gurus give it their blessing.

Answer to iKalied Whatzit? Number 1

Here is the answer to Whatzit Number 1. It is a picture of the keypad of my office phone. Not very interesting before it was iKalieded.

iKalied Whatzit? Number 1

This is the first in a sort-of-weekly series of iKalied images created from common ordinary objects. Can you guess what this is? Be the first person to post a comment to this blog entry with the correct answer! I'll post the original image for everyone to see and check their answers in one week.

iKalied 2.0 Available in App Store

The latest version of iKalied is now available in the iTunes App Store. It has a bunch of new and fun features including shake-to-change animation, two new symmetry modes, more special effects, and an enhanced user interface. iKalied will be on sale for the original price of $0.99 for a couple of weeks. After that, the cost goes up to the regular $1.99 price. Take a look.

A couple more samples

Here are two more kaleidoscopes created with the new features.

What's with all the Bodily Function Apps?

I hate to complain about other people's work, but what is with the huge popularity of bodily function apps for the iPhone? It's not just that there are more burping, farting, sneezing, crying, and whining iPhone applications that anyone could have predicted. It's that the iPhone App review sites actually spend time and space reviewing these apps.

Now I don't really know whether or not potential purchasers need to read an in-depth review before purchase. But I do know that iKalied has been in several reviewers queue's for a while now, and no review has yet appeared. I guess that simulated burping, etc. takes precedence over an app that allows you to create your own art. It's an interesting world we live in.

Showing off New Features

The set of new features for the 1.2 is now complete and undergoing beta testing. Here is an example to give you an idea of the kinds of things that can be accomplished using the effects in combination. I've taken a picture from a family trip to NASA space center, applied the Video Monitor, and (new) Swirl Distortion effects, used Saturate Colors once or twice, and here is what results.

If you would like to see a nice large square tiling of this image, take a look at this image in the Flickr iKalied Group.

New Version Coming Soon

I'm currently working on iKalied 1.2. This next version adds a bunch of new features and special effects, yet maintains the clean and simple user interface. I am particularly interested to see what users do with the new distortion effects, which I think work well with the kaleidoscope symmetries.

User-Created Flickr Group

An iKalied user who goes by 'sandrift' has created an Flickr group for sharing and showing off images created with iKalied. Please post some of your favorites to: http://www.flickr.com/groups/ikalied/

Submit Your iKalieds!

One thing that I would really like to see happen with iKalied is that people create all kinds of interesting images that I have never imagined. If you've created something cool with iKalied, email me a copy and I'll post my favorites here about once a week.

iKalied Goes to India

Well, I wish. Actually the three pictures shown below are iKalied pictures made from some beautiful shots of India taken by my friend Emily. I'm not suggesting that iKalied improved on these great photographs, but they are attractive and interesting.

iKalied Released!

Well, on the third try I was able to address the Apple Human Interface Guidelines, and iKalied has been accepted for sale in the App Store! It doesn't seem to be showing up in the text search indexes yet, but if you search for the app by name, it is for sale. I hope that people find this app as much fun to use as I and my beta-testers (i.e. family and friends) do. I've set the price at $0.99 so folks can play around with it at little cost.

The direct link to iKalied on the Apple iPhone App store is:
http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=303492031&mt=8

One more little problem

The second round review of iKalied by the App Store found another mis-use of a standard system icon. Really, I didn't do this on purpose! I thought that the icons were being used in their intended way, but alas, the iPhone HIGs (Human Interface Guidelines) are very particular in ways that you might not expect. Oh well, round three has started - I have updated the iKalied with a new custom icon and re-submitted the binary to the store. Above is a screen shot from the latest build of iKalied.

One little problem

Okay, the App Store guys found one little violation of the iPhone Human Interface Guidelines in iKalied. This has been fixed and the revised binary re-submitted. Stay tuned!

Still waiting for App Store approval...

Not sure how long this is supposed to take. I sent the support an email asking them for an update.

iKalied Screen Shots

Here is a sampling of the kinds of images that you can easily create with iKalied. The first image is a screen shot showing the main toolbar. The other images were captured using the save kaliedoscope image function.




















The kaleidoscope below started out as a black and white picture of some leaves.

This one began as a public domain image from Wikipedia.



















These are some gingerbread men baked during one of our big December snow storms.



















This is a bunch of strawberries, of course.

iKalied Submitted to the App Store

I have to complement Apple on their web based submission process- it was really easy. I hope that the app review phase goes as smoothly! iKalied screenshots soon to follow.

iKalied almost done

My iTunes Connect account is set up and I am putting the finishing touches on iKalied, an iPhone App that allows anyone to create modern art. I'll post demo images as soon as submission to the App Store is complete.

iPhone Software and Applications

This is a blog to discuss software and applications for the iPhone. Since I am both an iPhone developer and user, I will take both perspectives. I will discuss applications that I am working on, as well as notable software by other authors available in the iTunes App Store.

I will also use this site to provide support to users of my applications purchased through the App Store. Get information about applications that I have developed by following the links under the posting labels shown on the right.