See that image to the right? That’s the cover of the latest Family Tree Magazine – March/April 2012. I received mine in the mail today. If you’re a Family Tree Magazine Plus member, you can view it online here.
I bring it up because iPads and genealogy are pretty popular companions these days. Interesting enough, that iPad is not on the cover of Family Tree Magazine because they are talking about one of the numerous genealogy apps for iOS. In this instance, it’s being displayed as a means to consume data, namely to research online family trees. A very portable web browser. While a lot of us tote our iPads around loaded with genealogy information, PDFs, images, etc., one of the primary intended uses of the iPad is what Family Tree Magazine shows it doing – browsing the web.
Speaking of Family Tree Magazine, somebody asked me why I still get the physical copies instead of the digital versions sold through their online store. Those digital versions are $6.99, or $24 for the whole year (printed = $27). I got one of those insane Amazon deals – like $10 or $15 for a whole year. In retrospect, I should have just spent the extra money and got the digital subscriptions. Would be nice to read on an iPad, but I digress. Back to the topic at hand – my point is that iPads are popping up everywhere. Many of us have seen the Ancestry.com commercials on TV where a person is holding up what is probably a tablet and talking about their genealogy research.
Speaking of the iPad, Mac Rumors is reporting on rumors that the upcoming iPad 3 (iPad 3 rumored to be introduced in March) will have an 8 megapixel camera. If it has the same camera as in the iPhone 4S, and I somehow doubt it, that would be amazing. It would really open up things for a lot of genealogists who use iPads. A lot of us use our iPhones or small digital cameras as portable scanners when you can’t haul a real scanner around. If that camera is integrated into the iPad 3, it will be great.
Finally, let’s talk about photography and iPhones and iPads (and iPod touches). According to the BBC, a course titled “iPhoneography” is being offered at London’s Kensington and Chelsea College. It’s probably the first such course offered in the UK.
The goal of the course is to teach people how to create good images with the iPhone’s camera, as well as using iOS apps to edit and post-processing. Basic photography skills – composition, color, attention to lighting, are a part of the course. However, editing using apps on the iPhone itself is also a part of the course. The article does mention they may add Android phones with good cameras in the future.