John Voorhees

5458 posts on MacStories since November 2015

John is MacStories' Managing Editor, has been writing about Apple and apps since joining the team in 2015, and today, runs the site alongside Federico. John also co-hosts four MacStories podcasts: AppStories, which covers the world of apps, MacStories Unwind, which explores the fun differences between American and Italian culture and recommends media to listeners, Ruminate, a show about the weird web and unusual snacks, and NPC: Next Portable Console, a show about the games we take with us.
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voorhees@macstories.net
AppStories - Ep. 190 - 47 minutes

The New iPad Air: Apple’s Most Forward-Looking iPad

FedericoJohn
AppStories+ Deeper into the world of apps

AppStories Episode 190 - The New iPad Air: Apple’s Most Forward-Looking iPad

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AppStories+ Deeper into the world of apps

In this special episode of AppStories, John interviews Federico about the all-new iPad Air, which Federico has been testing and reviewed on MacStories. Federico explains why the new iPad Air is Apple’s most forward-looking iPad that stands at the intersection of the iPad Pro and the rest of the company’s line-up, and covers every aspect of the hardware, design, and differences compared to other iPad models, along with practical advice on who should consider buying the new iPad Air.

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Austin Mann’s iPhone 12 Pro Camera Review→

Photo: [Austin Mann](http://austinmann.com/trek/iphone-12-pro-camera-review-glacier)

Photo: Austin Mann

Pro travel photographer Austin Mann has put the iPhone 12 Pro through its paces in Glacier National Park, Montana. You won’t want to miss the full selection of images shot by Mann who concentrated his testing on the low-light performance of the iPhone 12 Pro’s improved Wide lens, the addition of Night mode to the Ultra Wide lens, Smart HDR 3, and low-light portrait mode photos that take advantage of the Pro’s new LiDAR sensor for autofocus.

Mann also delves into the Camera app’s settings to reveal new controls provided to photographers. My favorite is the setting that allows the exposure settings to be preserved between shots. As Mann explains:

I’m absolutely thrilled about this new (and hardly talked about) feature. We now have true exposure adjustment that doesn’t revert back to auto mode every time a pictured is captured.

This adjustment remains even when you switch between .5x, 1x, and 2x lenses, or when switching modes. Even if you lock your iPhone and come back to it later, it still remembers your exposure settings. This is much more like working with a traditional manual camera and I love it.

Mann’s post includes other compelling additions to the Camera app’s settings as well as beautiful shots that do a fantastic job of demonstrating this year’s camera advances. What I’m most I’m most eager to see, though, what Mann thinks of the iPhone 12 Pro Max, which has what promises to be significantly better hardware than the iPhone 12 Pro.

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Adobe MAX Kicks Off with Illustrator for iPad, Photoshop, Lightroom, and Fresco Updates for iPad, Plus the Addition of Fresco for iPhone

Illustrations: Adobe.

Illustrations: Adobe.

Today marks the start of Adobe MAX, Adobe’s annual conference for creative professionals. Every year, MAX is jam-packed with announcements about Adobe’s many products.

If you’ve been following along the past few years, the rise of the company’s mobile apps has been an unmistakable trend at MAX. Adobe has made apps for the iPhone and iPad for years, but with the launch of Photoshop for iPad in late 2019, it became clear that the company intends to play as big a role on the iPhone and iPad as it has for decades on the Mac. Instead of building companion apps for its powerful desktop apps, Adobe seems intent on building apps that let creative professionals move seamlessly from the desktop to the iPad and iPhone and back again.

Given the complexity of Adobe’s desktop apps, building something comparable on the iPad or iPhone is a tall order that takes time. Photoshop for iPad didn’t start out with nearly all the features users rely on when they use the desktop version, but with a monthly release cycle, Adobe has chipped away at the pain points, bringing the two apps closer together over time. The same goes for apps like Lightroom, which photographers rely on for editing images they take. The iPad versions of Adobe’s apps haven’t reached feature parity with the desktop, but the gap is closing, enabling users to work in new ways and in a wider variety of contexts.

This year the announcements at MAX are no different. I’ve tried all of the apps discussed below that Adobe is releasing or updating for the iPad and iPhone this year to one degree or another, including spending the past few weeks using the beta version of Adobe’s latest pro iPad app, Illustrator. My artistic skills don’t do Illustrator justice, but from what I’ve seen from my testing the past few weeks and demos by Adobe, Illustrator is a remarkably powerful vector drawing app that takes a truly innovative approach to the app that should still be familiar to desktop users, but is designed first and foremost around touch interactions. Adobe has also released Fresco for the iPhone and some substantial new features to both Photoshop and Lightroom.

Let’s take a look at what’s coming for the iPad and iPhone at Adobe MAX.

Illustrator for iPad

Illustrator on the iPad is Adobe’s popular desktop vector drawing app reimagined for the iPad and Apple Pencil. The app integrates with Adobe’s Creative Cloud service, allowing users to do their work from any device.

Adobe has created a context-aware interaction model that, coupled with the same touch shortcut UI first seen in Photoshop for iPad with the Apple Pencil, provides a rich and flexible set of tools for illustrators. The breadth and depth of tools and options Adobe offers comes with an initial learning curve. However, Adobe has wisely provided a set of tutorials and ways to learn from others that make it easy to learn the basics, so you can start experimenting on your own.

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Reeder 5 Review: Read Later Tagging, iCloud Sync, and Design Refinements

Last year we named RSS client Reeder 4 the Best App Update as part of the MacStories Selects awards for a good reason. Reeder has been one of the best-designed RSS apps available for a very long time. With the release of version 4, developer Silvio Rizzi rebuilt the app on a modern foundation from the ground up. Roughly one year later, version 5 is out as a brand new app that takes what Rizzi began last year and extends it further with a host of excellent new features and design refinements.

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Apple Debuts New Music Video Streaming Service Called Apple Music TV

This morning Apple debuted a new video streaming service dedicated to music called Apple Music TV. According to an announcement sent by Apple to Variety, the free service will stream:

exclusive new music videos and premiers, special curated music video blocks, and live shows and events as well as chart countdowns and guests.

The service, which is available through Apple’s Music and TV apps, is currently US-only.

To kick things off, Apple Music TV is streaming the top 100 videos streamed on Apple Music. According to Variety, the service plans to debut new videos every Friday:

It will also have two exclusive video premieres on Friday at 12 p.m. ET/9 a.m. PT, Joji’s “777” and Saint Jhn’s “Gorgeous”; the channel will premiere new videos every Friday at that time.

Apple also told Variety that there will be an all-day Bruce Springsteen takeover of the service on October 22nd to celebrate the release of Springsteen’s latest album, which will includes videos and an interview with Apple Music 1 DJ Zane Lowe.

Variety says there is no word from Apple about whether the service will include documentaries like the recently-announced film by Billie Eilish, which is coming early next year.

Music videos have long felt like an afterthought to Apple. As Federico asked in his iOS and iPadOS 14 review:

The question remains though: is there more Apple could do to surface Apple Music’s catalog of non-music material, such as radio stations, interviews, and music videos?

With so much music video content available, it’s terrific to see Apple giving it a dedicated place inside both the Music and TV apps.