TouchRetouch Review: Object Removal Made Easy

On my best days, I’m a novice photo editor – a lot of my work involves color and brightness tweaks to make my shots look better. If I’m feeling adventurous, though, I’ll try to touch up the pictures and remove unwanted objects, blemishes, or lines.

A lot of times, that ends in horrible failure.

However, TouchRetouch makes me feel like a pro photo editor. In just a few taps, I’ve been able to remove elements in my pictures at my will, making my photos look much better than before. And with a pretty interface and a low price, I think I’ve found another tool to add to my repertoire.

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Connected, Episode 132: Fun Conjecture Hour→

This week, Stephen talks about a possible iMac Pro while his co-hosts play Zelda. They come back to round robin some things that they find frustrating about working from iOS and the iPad.

On this week’s Connected, we share some more thoughts on USB-C and describe the areas where iOS is still lagging behind the Mac. You can listen here.

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Prisma Launches Store for User-Created Filters

Prisma, the popular photo editing and sharing app, launched a filter store today with its latest update. The store allows filters created through a new desktop tool to be shared with others publicly. At this time, only the most active Prisma users can access the desktop tool and share their filters in the store, but according to The Next Web, the app’s developers hope to expand the option to more users in the future.

The filter store can be accessed whenever you’re taking a photo by tapping the orange icon in the center of the screen. The store’s main page presents a number of filters, currently categorized as ‘New Releases,’ ‘Popular in Your Country,’ and ‘All the Old Styles.’ There isn’t a particularly large selection of filters currently available, but that should change with time.

My favorite part about the store is that when you tap an available filter to view it, you’ll also see a feed of images that have used that filter. I find this helpful for evaluating whether a particular filter might work well with the type of photo I’m editing.

One other thing worth mentioning about the store is that on its main page there’s a bookmark icon in the top-right corner. Tapping this will present a list of all the filters you currently have installed. This is a nice way to gain a quick overview of all your current filters and remove any you may not want. You can also view filters you’ve removed in the past from this screen.


Prisma is a free download on the App Store.

Apple Pay Launches in Ireland, Coming Soon to Italy→

Benjamin Mayo, writing for 9to5Mac:

As we reported exclusively last night, Apple Pay is now live in Ireland. The service allows iPhone and Apple Watch owners to use the NFC chips in their devices to pay for their shopping at contactless terminals in retail stores across the country.

Apple Pay requires iPhone 6, iPhone 6s, iPhone SE, iPhone 7, or any Apple Watch, and is launching with support for Ulster Bank and KBC in Ireland. Apple has also announced that the service is coming soon to Italy.

I’ve been waiting for Apple Pay to launch in Italy, and I’m glad to see Apple has confirmed the service will roll out “soon”. However, as I feared, my bank – despite being one of the largest banking groups in Italy – is not going to be supported at launch. This has happened with 14 other countries (including Ireland) before, though, and I hope Apple will quickly get other major Italian banks on board.

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GAget: Google Analytics Widgets and Alerts for macOS

GAget is a Google Analytics app for macOS that started life as a Dashboard widget. These days, GAget resides in macOS’s Today widget panel of Notification Center. If you’ve ever used Google Analytics, you know that its web interface is complex. There’s a place for digging through Google’s many tabs of data, but when all you want are the highlights, GAget is better. It takes Google Analytics’ data and boils it down into cleanly-designed dashboard widgets and alerts that make it easy to understand what is going on with your website at a glance.

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Game Day: The Escapists

The Escapists is an award-winning indie title from Mouldy Toof Studios and Team17 that has been available on consoles and PCs since 2015. This week marked the title’s first appearance on mobile systems, though, with simultaneous releases on iOS and Android. The goal of the game is straightforward – escape from a series of prisons with varying levels of security – but there are so many complex variables at play that The Escapists is good for many hours of exploration.

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Apple’s Latest iPad Pro Videos Highlight Note Taking and Decluttering

Apple released two more short ads on YouTube highlighting features of the iPad Pro. The first, called ‘take better notes’ starts, like similar recent videos, with a tweet: ‘My math notes are a mess since I’m half asleep.’ In response, the narrator explains ‘You know, iPad Pro and Apple Pencil have revolutionized the way we take notes.’ The camera cuts to someone taking notes in Notability, the note-taking app that Federico highlighted in the iPad Diaries this week. The spot concludes with the narrator pointing out that even if you fall asleep, you’re covered if you use Notability’s audio recording feature.

The second video is called ‘need less stuff,’ which emphasizes the ways the iPad Pro can cut down on clutter in your life. In response to a ‘There are way too many things on my desk’ tweet, the narrator explains that an iPad Pro can replace a scanner, a pad of paper, and laptop, using the iPad version of Procreate as the example of an app that replaces a pad of paper.

Apple continues to strike a nice balance with these videos, highlighting a couple features of the iPad Pro that set it apart from a laptop or smart phone but keeping the tone light and humorous by responding to the sort of frustrated tweets with which many people are all too familiar.

Apple Highlights HomeKit’s Potential on New Webpage→

Today Apple’s webpage about HomeKit and the iOS Home app has been completely revamped. It includes a new 45-second video where Siri commands and scenes in the Home app are used to control lights, window shades, door locks, coffee makers, and more. The video highlights how easy and convenient it can be to control smart devices once they’re set up in Home.

Besides the featured video, the new Home-centric page includes sections covering various aspects of the Home platform, such as:

  • Every type of home accessory that is available with HomeKit, with a link to the full list of devices that are either on sale now or have been announced for future release.
  • An explanation of how the Home app organizes devices by different rooms.
  • Short videos showcasing several different scenes that can be set up, like ‘Good Morning’ or ‘I’m Home.’ Each of these features parts of the featured video mentioned above, but with different music.
  • Examples of voice commands that can be used with Siri to control HomeKit devices.
  • A description of the Apple TV’s role as a home hub.
  • Automation’s presence in the Home app as a tool for enabling certain actions automatically.

This past year has seen the first major smart home push from Apple since HomeKit’s announcement nearly three years ago, at WWDC 2014. It comes at a time when Amazon’s Alexa is quickly expanding its reach beyond the Echo and into devices of all kinds. It will be interesting to see if any announcements are made at this year’s WWDC to further bolster HomeKit against increased competition.

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