BrianGriggs.com » Apple

Mobile 2012

Brian — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 17:05:50 +0000

Are you interested in mobile learning, whether it’s on a tablet, a phone, or something else? AZK12 is hosting Mobile 2012 April 11-13.

Check out the list of speakers:
Jaime Casap
Eric Marcos
Janet Wozniak
Tony Vincent

I’ve attended a conference with Tony before and chatted with him. He definitely knows his stuff. And the Wozniak last name should sound familiar in connection to Apple…

Thomas Suarez speaks at TEDxManhattan

Brian — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 17:58:18 +0000

It’s impressive enough to speak at a TED event. It’s even more impressive when you’re in 6th grade.

Steve Jobs (1955-2011)

Brian — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 01:07:14 +0000

Here’s a great video tribute giving an overview of the contributions of Steve Jobs:

Think different.

If J.J. Abrams launched a shuttle

Brian — Tue, 17 May 2011 18:29:55 +0000

Endeavor is delivering a dark-matter hunter to the International Space Station.

That sentence alone sounds epic. Now check out the photo the crew posed for:

NASA did a pretty decent Photoshop to recreate this:

All Photoshopping aside, check out this amazing photo from Stefanie Gordon’s iPhone:

She was in a plane flying by the launch site and snapped a photo. It should be noted that she just gained 1,000+ followers on Twitter.

Reposting: iMovie Titles

Brian — Mon, 07 Feb 2011 04:03:18 +0000

Click on the iMovie HD icon in the dock. (If it’s not there, go to the ‘Finder’ and select ‘Applications’.)
Create a New Project
Name it with the assignment name, your class period, and your last name. (Example: ‘portfolio-4th-guy’). Save it to the hard drive by selecting Macintosh HD->Users->Shared and then click Save
Click on Editing -> Titles to add your text.
Make sure that your text is big enough to read. You will probably need to split up your sentences into smaller phrases.
Type single words as titles for emphasis.
You can use the slide to adjust how many seconds the animation takes and how long it pauses.
For pictures, drag your image from the desktop/documents onto the timeline/clip view.
To change the animation, click on the photo to select it. Click on Media->Photos and then Show Photo Settings
With the Ken Burns Effect on, the photo will slide in/zoom out in many different ways. Drag the top slide bar to zoom in and out. Drag the bottom one to make the animation speed up or slow down.
Your Preview bar has its own animation timeline. Click on the animation timeline to select which place to zoom in.
The hand lets you control the position of the photo. Click and drag to move the camera’s focus.
To add sound, make sure that you are in the project’s timeline mode first. Click on the clock to switch from clip mode to timeline mode.
Click on Audio to view your iTunes library, GarageBand songs, and Skywalker sound effects.
Click on a song and drag it to the second line in the timeline.
Click on the triangle and drag it to go to different parts of the timeline/project.
To shorten a clip, click on it to highlight it, move the triangle to where you want to cut it, select from the top menu Edit->Split Clip to make the cut.
Click off of the clips to deselect both, then click back on the clip that you don’t want. Press the delete key to get rid of it.
Click on Editing->Transitions or Editing-> Video FX to make your presentation more professional.

Well, isn’t that intriguing?

Brian — Mon, 15 Nov 2010 15:36:30 +0000

Do you think Apple’s releasing the app store for Mac applications? No matter what it is, I’m intrigued, even if their grammar is a little off.

Mac VoiceOver as an audio file

Brian — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 23:51:32 +0000

Sometimes you need a computer voice reading text. GarageBand does great when you supply the voice, but what if it’s a big chunk of text that you want as an AIFF and don’t have time to record?

In Terminal (found in Utilities) type in:
say "Hello"

You can change the voice. The names of the voices can be found in the VoiceOver utility (like “Bruce” or “Cellos”). Use the -v option in Terminal to choose the voice:

say -v "Bruce" "Hello"

To have it output as an audio file, add -o and then the file name (with the .aiff extension). It will save the file in your home folder (in Finder, it’s the folder that has your name with the house icon).

say -v "Bruce" "Hello" -o hello.aiff

Instead of just simple “Hello”, you can have the voice read from a text file by using the -f option:

say -v "Bruce" -o article.aiff -f article.txt

If the text file is in your home folder, you can leave it as is. If it’s in a different folder, you need to specify the location. ~/Desktop tells Terminal the file is on the desktop, ~/Documents lets it know it’s in the Documents folder. You can also use that same syntax for where to output the audio file.

say -v "Bruce" -o ~/Music/article.aiff -f ~/Documents/article.txt

Here’s the audio file I just created using the text from this article:
article.m4a
(I saved it in GarageBand as an .m4a to play well with browsers.)

Now to figure out how to write a program to run Terminal. I know it’s possible; I’m just not cool enough yet.

There’s so much great accessibility stuff out there. Click here to see what more VoiceOver can do.

Have you seen a Braille monitor? Very cool stuff:

Apple iBike

Brian — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 01:20:34 +0000

The world of Smart Bikes just got sleeker.

Imagine being able to map out your ride and to wirelessly share exercise info instantly. I’m not a big runner, so I haven’t tried the Nike + iPod thing, but this is pretty cool. If this bike truly responds to voice commands, which Apple has the power to do, we’re one step closer to my flying cars.

In other tech news, Google Wave got canceled. There’s irony in using Firefly quotes, a show that was canceled before it had run its course.

“Can’t stop the signal.”

New Apple Patent

Brian — Fri, 30 Apr 2010 17:00:39 +0000

This will more than likely not be a part of the new iPhone (which I agree with predictions of a June unveiling).

My guess is that this patent is in relation to a second-generation iPad, since the keyboard is the screen. One step closer to a Star Wars datapad:

Even the professionals use GarageBand.

Brian — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 00:38:41 +0000

Tonight watching WordGirl (yes, I have little kids at home and yes, we hang out watching PBS) the show had a news reporter with GarageBand’s “Broadcast News Long” jingle as the background. The show LOST on Hulu uses a GarageBand jingle to transition into the show. I’m telling you, it’s quality software for free on a Mac.