Chill Sector

I’m a firm believer in brandishing an iPhone in the raw.  What I mean by that is that no case should be added.  But of course, then Incase goes and intros the Perforated Snap Case and totally throws me a curve ball.  Just like the pair of Clae sneakers I want, this case adds significant style and a cool perforated look to your tired and now ubiquitous iPhone.  They’re currently on sale for $30 and are available in black, white and girly pink.

Cases, holiday 2009, iPhone, incase

Why we didn’t see these Star Wars iPhone cases 2+ years ago when the iPhone launched is beyond me, but nonetheless they’re here.  For $30 you get a hard shell case (fits 3G or 3GS only) with either Darth Vader or a Storm Trooper’s face adhered to the back.   Ships December 8th -  just in time for Xmas.

Cases, Darth Vader, Star Wars, holiday 2009, iPhone, iphone cases, storm trooper

Finding an iPhone case that’s attractive and utilitarian isn’t always easy.  It is now.  The iSkin Solo FX is a totally swank iPhone case that will have onlookers gawking uncontrollably at what they think is an absolutely unknown phone. 

3G, 3gs, Apple, Cell Phones, FX, Review, Reviews, case, iPhone, iSkin, solo

The HypnosEye Projector is a completely wireless projector and is a cheap and easy way for you to display visual media from your iPhone.  It actually works with any phone that has an adjustable brightness as it uses a special mirror with a reflection agent at the top of the glass instead of the bottom making for a more clear image.

Apple, Cell Phones, Cheap, HypnosEye, Portable, Projectors, Wireless, iPhone, iPod Touch, japan, projector

Doubling as a hacky-sack, the MovieWedge is a convenient way to view media horizontally on your iPhone or iPod touch.  The MovieWedge is lightweight and portable beanbag-esque cushion that supports your iPhone for prime viewing. Embracing a brutally simple design aesthetic, the MovieWedge can effectively adapt to most any surrounding.  Capable of changing shape to a small degree, the MovieWedge can easily fit in where ever you need it.  From a stiff but moving airplane tray table, to your bed or your grassy backyard, the MovieWedge is unlike any iPhone stand you have used before.

Apple, Cell Phones, Cushion, MovieWedge, PMP, Review, Reviews, Stand, iPhone, iPod Touch, movies, pillow

It’ll be a long time, if not never, that Americans start using NFC (near field communication) to pay for their goods via a cell phone.  But just in case you want to be on the cutting edge and happen to have a need to read and send RFID signals than you’re in luck.  Wireless’ Dynamics just announced the iCarte 110, an accessory plugs into the iPhone or iPod Touch’s 30 pin connector and adds the aforementioned abilities to the handset.

RFID, contactless payment, iPhone, icart, nfc, wireless dynamic

In this week’s incidentally infringing app roundup: NASA enters the iPhone’s orbit, Earthworm Jim is ALIVE, your handset learns two tricks it should’ve known already, rhythm gaming goes pro, and Loopt users crudely proposition one another.

The Best

NASA: NASA’s really stepped up their online presence in the last few years, giving armchair astronauts more media, stats and news than they could ever want. Nasa’s iPhone app, matter-of-factly named “NASA app for iPhone,” aggregates it all, including Twitter feeds, orbit trackers, images, video and mission updates. Free, unless you count income tax.

GameCenter: A free encyclopedia of games, GameCental taps into GameFly’s massive database of titles to immediately spit out everything from release dates to platform availability to screenshots to reviews. It’s a field guide for games, essentially—a type of tool which lends itself well to the iPhone.

Pet Semetary: A gored-up mobile take on Stephen King’s eponymous book and film, Pet Sematary is proudly straightforward: You shoot zombies; the zombies are often cats. It’s a slow-build game, with short stages that get progressively harder, and accordingly, it’s great timekiller. A dollar.

Wolfram Alpha: For this week’s obnoxiously contrarian pick, how about a calculator app that costs $50, and doesn’t do a whole lot more than the web-based version, available for free through the iPhone’s browser? Yes, perfect. I don’t totally buy that whole “graphing calculators are $100, this app is just $50″ reasoning, but the mathematical shortcut keyboard as well as a streamlined interface are pretty great. In other words, if (and only if) you can somehow expense something like this—ie, you work at CERN—totally do it.

ReelDirector: This is as close as you’re going to get to iMovie on your iPhone (which is still not very close, at all). Video stitching alone, though, will be worth the ($8) price of entry for many people, at least until Apple builds it into their camera app.

Rock Band: Despite the obvious success of games like Tap Tap Revolution, the big rhythm game players have generally steered clear of the App Store. Until this week! Rock Band, late as it is, is pretty good, with caveats: the control scheme isn’t ideal; the singing mode isn’t actually a singing mode; and it could stand to include a few more than the base 20 songs. Which are licensed, popular songs, by the way—not lame mashups or no-name material like you see in some other rhythm apps. $10.

SongSift: It’s easy to let your iPhone library get cluttered with odd singles, poorly-tagged strays, and one-off playlist refugees. The real solution is to sort your freakin’ colllection, you slob, but until you do, SongSift lets you filter albums by length, so if you’re setting out on a run, or want to set-and-leave your iPhone for a while, you’ll be able to find large, contiguous chunks of music with a simple slider. A dollar.

NFB: Canada’s National Film Board funds all kinds of interesting films, documentaries and miscellaneous video projects, which their new iPhone app offers up for free. It’s hard to argue with that, so I won’t.

Earthworm Jim: The iPhone-ified Earthworm Jim could be a little cheaper, and the controls could be a bit more refined. But really, it’s hard to imagine a more authentic port for this game, especially to a platform without buttons.

Loopt Mix: Loopt doesn’t just keep track of friends now, it finds new ones. With the “Mix” feature, you can send any nearby Loopt users a friend request. And from the looks of the promotional shots, you’re supposed to parlay that request into an entirely different kind of request, which we’ll talk about after the kids go to bed.

Honorable Mentions

The Colbert Report’s The Word: To be fair, The Word is a highlight of every episode of the Colbert Report. It just seems like, you know, you’ve made this nice video app an all, so why not throw in rest of the otherwise free ColbertNation.com content as well? Oh well. A dollar.

SuicideGirls: A video choose-your-own-adventure story in which one of the possible ending is engaging in light petting with an angry, tattooed, seminude lady. Remember when Apple used to ban dictionary apps for swearing?

Gucci: A free promotional tool for a company I have a feeling our readers aren’t all that in to, Gucci’s iPhone app actually has some neat features, including a in-app DJ tool, local restaurant/bar/whatever recommendations, and, uh, some stuff about clothes, or bags, or something.

Apple, Apps, Software, The week's 10 best iphone apps, Top, iPhone, iPhone Apps, the week in iPhone apps

The real key is using the limits of the iPhone 3GS’s camera as a strength, Japanese pro photographer Koichi Mitsui: Its “simplicity keeps me devoted to only composition and the perfect photo opp.”

In other words, the secret is composition, composition, composition. The one real advantage the iPhone 3GS has in this regard against past iPhones is that you can change the focal point, which lets you alter the shot in subtle ways, which is one of his tips. Also, he suggests trying some different camera apps—he likes Photo fx and CameraKit, though I’m partial to CameraBag.

Here’s a couple of other awesome photos he’s taken, but you can see way more at his photo blog, which gives you a view of Japan that maybe you haven’t seen.

Cameras, Digital Cameras, Photography, Photos, iPhone, iphone 3gs, japan

While I’ll reserve my judement on sound quality until I get my hands on one of what Vestalife calls their ‘iconic’ speakers system, their latest line of bug inspired speaker systems do posses an attractive facade that will get most performing a head turn.

The Ladybug II is an upgrade version of their first Ladybug and adds better electronics, stronger bass and a ported subwoofer. 

Bugs, Speakers, iPhone, iPod, iphones, vestalife

The good news: for those of you who want it, the TomTom iPhone car kit can be ordered for $120 at the Apple Store. The bad news: while TomTom originally promised the device for October, it’s still not shipping for “2-3 weeks.”

Apple, GPS, TomTom, iPhone, tomtom iphone car kit

Compact yet powerful, the DLO Portable Speakers for iPhone let you enjoy your music and videos in stereo sound without any threat of TDMA interference. Featuring an extra-wide sound stage and bass vents for delivering powerful sound, these small speakers pack a powerful punch.

AV Gadgets, Apple, Ipod Gadgets, Smart phone, Speakers, iPhone, iPod

For all you Verizon and Sprint MiFi users with an iPhone or iPod Touch, listen up.  There’s an app called Mi-Fi that lets you monitor your Mifi’s bandwidth, connected IPs, connection time and battery level.  I’m not sure how it jacks into this info, but I’m assuming it’s done over WiFi and doesn’t require any special tinkering.  I especially like that someone built an app for a product that isn’t available from AT&T, but rather their two competitors.

3G, Apps, iPhone, iPhone Apps, mi-fi

I really hope this item doesn’t cause an uproar at the airport, though I’m sure some fool will whip this out and say “what do you think of my bomb” once on board.  For those of you who like to share what’s on you iPod or iPhone with strangers and friends without swapping earwax you might want to give this bomb a looksy. The fuse is your input jack and the little bomb speaker has a internal rechargeable battery that will last for 4 hours.  Since it is powered I’m guessing it might not sound like total crap.  On sale now for $22.

Cell Phones, MP3, Music, Powered, Speakers, iPhone, iPod, speaker