Thursday, April 19, 2012
Thursday, April 22, 2010
iPad/iPhone App of the Week: Air Video
Every now and then an App or website comes along that solves perfectly a need you have but that you didn't know a solution existed for.
And for me that App is Air Video...
You see I have an extensive collection of movies stored on an external hard drive...far to many to add to iTunes and in any case, most are in .avi format which iTunes doesn't like.
To watch those videos I have to copy them to the machine where I want to watch them usually via a memory stick or a network transfer and play using an application like the VLC player.
And then along comes the iPad and of course I'm thinking, well, I want to watch those videos on the iPad but I don't want to have to convert them to an iTunes compatible format and sync to the iPad every time I want to watch a particular movie.
What to do, what to do...
Then I see a brief tweet by Don McAllister from Screencasts online saying that there is an iPad version of Air video.
And I'm thinking...could this solve my problem?
And amazingly, it did. I CAN'T believe this app has existed for the iPhone for ages and now there is an iPad version and it works PERFECTLY and I DIDN'T KNOW ABOUT IT!
After having downloaded the app to the iPhone or iPad and installed a software application on the computer where the videos are stored (and identified folders containing the videos) you simply navigate to the server on the iPad (or iPhone) in the Air Video App, select the video and hit play (for videos in an Apple friendly format like .mp4). For videos in a non-Apple friendly format you select play with live conversion and the server will convert the file before streaming to your device on-the-fly.
And it works and it is beautiful and I can watch my videos on my iPhone or iPad wherever I want to be.
I can't recommend this App highly enough if, like me, you have lots of videos you don't want to sync to your mobile devices via iTunes.
I don't think I can suggest any improvements at all. The App works perfectly right from installation.
Kudos to the developers.
ps now if only there were a version of Air Video I could run on my laptop...hint hint.
Saturday, January 9, 2010
2009 - The Year of the Vampire Movie
When I'm not on the computer working, I'm more likely to be watching movies than anything else. So from time to time I plan to post on some of my favourite movies from the present and times gone by.
Any of you that are also into movies will have surely noticed the attention given to the Twilight franchise last year. Now I don't want to comment on the merit of the Twilight films. They have certainly been a crowd favorite and while I find them entertaining, I don't place them in the category of great cinema by any stretch of the imagination.
As it turns out, however, 2009 did see the release of two fantastic films in the Vampire genre that I want to draw your attention to. The first is the Swedish film 'Let The Right One In" and the other is a Korean film 'Thirst'.
Let The Right One In (imdb.com rating: 8.1 out of 10) rated R
Voted the movie of the year by Empire magazine this dark coming of age tale of good and evil is a superb genre defining movie. I absolutely loved it as it gave a very different look at the Vampire genre because the Vampire in question is a young 13 year old girl. This is a must watch and I couldn't believe it didn't win the oscar until I watched the film that beat it which I will post about soon.
Thirst (imdb.com rating: 7.4 out of 10) rated R
This film by Chan Wook Park (maker of the brilliant Oldboy) again seeks to explore the Vampire genre in a different way. It is about a priest that becomes infected after a blood transfusion that turns him into a vampire. If you are familiar with Chan Wook Parks work then you won't be surprised by the dark, violent nature of this film with many plot twists and turns.
If you like beautifully told vampire stories or are a fan of Chan-wook Park, seeing THIRST should be obvious. Easily one of the best films of 2009.
So there you go if you like Vampire films and want to explore the genre beyond the slick entertainment that comprises the Twilight films I highly recommend Let The Right One In and Thirst. Please note that both of these films are rated R so would be unsuitable for a young/teen audience.
Enjoy,
GuruBob
