Samsung Galaxy Nexus Android Phone: One Year In

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If you've been following my experiences with the Galaxy Nexus, you'll know that this phone has seriously impressed me over the last 12 months. It's got a great screen, massive memory and enough processing power for all the latest applications.

The Gnex does have its short-comings. The camera is a bit noisy in darker conditions. The battery life isn't great, and I'd like to have seen a micro-SD slot too, but overall I'd still recommend it.

In fact, and I might change my mind about this, but I'm pretty sure that in 12 months when my contract runs out I'll be hanging onto the Galaxy Nexus and switching to a cheaper Data / Voice / Messages plan.

Thanks, Rob.

How To Watch Video Podcasts Off-Line On The Android Galaxy Nexus

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The Galaxy Nexus is a great phone and its gorgeous 4.6" screen is perfect for watching video, but there is a fly in the ointment, and that fly is bandwidth, and it's swimming with a close friend Google Listen.

To explain further, the common Podcast Aggregator that comes wirh Android, "Listen", at the moment can't subscribe to video podcasts. Sure, there are paid solutions out there, but I prefer a free answer whenever I can.

The fact that most users are also on restrictive mobile data plans means that you don't want an app downloading video podcasts that are hundreds of megabytes in size whenever it likes. We need to be able to control what happens and when, and to do that we need a great fee app - "Podkicker".

With Podkicker you can subscribe to video podcasts without the fear of exceeding your monthly bandwidth allowance, because you choose when to refresh the feed and you choose when to download the video files. 

I really enjoy watching Twit Photo, so in the evening when I'm on my home wi-fi network I open up Podkicker and fresh the feed of that particular show, and if there's a new episode I download it over Wi-Fi and not the mobile network.

Podkickers built in Video Player works fine, but unfortunately it won't remember where you got to if you close the app, but that's a small niggle in an otherwise great app.

Podkicker probably won't replace your audio podcast app, hey, I still use my old Ipod Nano for that, but Podkicker does provide an elegant solution for downloading and watching video podcasts on my Samsung Galaxy Nexus Andoid Phone, using the new Ice Cream Sandwich Operating System. Why not give it a go yourself, after all, it's free.

Thanks, Rob.

Instagram Comes To Android And The Gnex Phone

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If you're wondering what Instagram is all about, please let me explain. It's a combination of photo editing app and social network, a Twitter for photographs if you like. Use the camera part of the app to take a photo, edit it, then share it with your followers. If you're in the mood to look at images you can peruse those of the people you follow or the most popular photographs in the whole network.

What I like about Instagram is the way that you can choose who you follow and then have a daily dose of inspiration from their photographs. Sure, lots of the most popular images are cute girls, cats and pop-stars, but dig a little deeper and choose who you follow with care and you'll have a more rewarding experience.

You don't only have to use your phones camera to take your Instagram photos. It's just as easy to share photos from your SLR or compact camera, especially if you use Picassa and the Google Plus app to upload your photos from your desk top to the net and your phone.

Recently bought for one billion dollars by Facebook, Instagram is only going to get bigger and attract more users, so dive in now and get a piece of the action, and it might just help to improve your photography too.

Thanks, Rob. 

The Best Android Photo Editing App Gets An Update - Vignette

(If you can't see the video please click here.)

Let's face it, with the built-in editors and apps like Instagram and Flickr, it may seem strange that my favourite Android Photo editing app is Vignette, but let me share with you two words - Full Resolution.

Other apps may be more popular, but the paid version of Vignette offers photo editing without a compromise towards image quality and size. To put it simply, Vignette doesn't  make your photos smaller.

This is the paid version of the Android app, and to date it's the only application I've paid for, but it's worth every penny. There are a wide variety of filters, from lomo type extremes to subtle black and white or colour conversions.

There's some nice frames as well, and the only missing feature is the ability to straighten images where they're slightly off kilter, but I'm sure we'll see this in an update in the not too distant future.

So, if you want the best photo eding app for your Google Android Smart-phone, like my Samsung Galaxy Nexus, head on over to the Play store and grab Vignette, you won't regret it.

Thanks, Rob.

Samsung Galaxy Nexus Camera Review

(If you can't see the video, please click here.)

I have to admit that I had great expectations for the camera in the Samsung Galaxy Nexus Android smart-phone, and it almost ticks all the boxes... but not quite.

The camera quality is fine, 5mp main camera, 1.3mp front camera, and it takes nice photos in good light. The sensor suffers from noise in low light situations, but show me a camera phone that doesn't.

The problem for me is the built in editing software, which promises so much but then lets us down by saving the edited photos at a lower resolution than they were captured at. Thats fine for the web, but I like a little extra elbow room with my photographs, and I want to be able to edit and save them at full resolution, so I guess I'll still be using the most excellent Vignette Android App (paid version).

Plus points are that the camera is incredibly quick to take photos, and the built-in panorama feature is very useful. I haven't covered the video capabilities, but the green-screen effects have to be seen to be believed!

In conclusion then, the Gnex has an OK camera with OK editing software, but don't let this put you off if you're thinking of buying or upgrading to the Galaxy Nexus - you'll probably end up taking most of your photos with the camera and then exporting them to Instagram, Vignette or Facebook, and it's great for that.

Thanks, Rob.