Software STORE GUIDE
PHOTO EDITOR (MAC)
Affinity Photo
£48.99 serif.com
VIDEO EDITOR (MAC)
Screenflow 9
£129 telestream.netWRITING APP (MAC/iOS)
iA Writer
£8.99 (Mac/iOS) ia.netREMINDERS APP (MAC/iOS)
Things 3
£48.99 (Mac)/£9.99 (iOS)
culturedcode.com
UTILITY (MAC)
Carbon Copy Cloner 5
£31.10 bombich.comSYSTEM ENHANCEMENT (MAC)
Bartender 3
£11.10 macbartender.comPHOTO EDITOR (IOS)
Pixelmator
£4.99 pixelmator.comPRODUCTIVITY APP (MAC/iOS)
Fantastical 2
£38.99 (Mac), £2.99 (iPhone)
flexibits.comEMAIL MANAGER (MAC/iOS)
Spark
Free sparkmailapp.comIt’s hard not to love
Affinity Photo. Whether
you fancy yourself
a seasoned pro or a
photo novice, you’ll
find this image editor powerful and simple
to use. Its interface offers the perfect
blend of ease of use and quick access to
powerful features, and its useful batch
processing is a great addition. An app
that packs both power and practicality
for less than £50? We’re in!
ScreenFlow enables you
to create professional-
looking videos with tools
like animation, tiling and
graphics. With version 9,
you get multiscreen recording, a new
tool palette, keyboard shortcuts, an Adobe
Premiere-like clip editor, and proxy editing
for producing high resolution videos
without taxing your Mac. Screenflow’s
advanced tools make this a great way to
record and edit videos of your Mac screen.iA Writer offers a clean,
distraction-free interface.
Create documents in
plain text and export to
PDF, Word and HTML.
The app supports Handoff and external
storage devices, as well as iOS 13’s new
text-editing guestures. For iPad users,
there’s Split View support baked in,
making it a really versatile application.
And the best bit – it’s just a one-off cost,
there’s no rolling subscription.When disaster strikes
and your hard drive fails,
having a backup can be
a lifesaver. This app
makes creating and
restoring from backups an absolute
breeze. It comes with a helpful guided
restore feature, plus a Cloning Coach that
monitors what you do and looks out for
potential problems. If you’re looking to
clone or back up your hard drive, this is
the app you need.Some apps are so
simple and effective
that you don’t know
how you lived without
them. Bartender is one:
it lets you choose what appears in
the menu bar, and when things appear
too. You can set triggers, such as an app
only appearing when it’s updating, and
rearrange items. Bartender’s settings are
clear and concise. It sounds simple, but
it’ll change the way you use your Mac.Feeling inbox anxiety?
The solution could be
Spark, our favourite
iPhone email app after
winning MF #340’s
group test. Its ‘smart inbox’ prioritises
emails based on perceived importance –
no more vital messages getting lost in
a sea of spam. You can snooze messages
to be reminded about them later, and
search your mailboxes using natural
language. And to top it all off, it’s free.If your calendar and
reminders are getting out
of control, Fantastical can
sort things out. It has
support for natural
language entry, so you can enter events
and reminders as you would say them. It’s
got a nifty menu bar shortcut, plus a great
interface, clever calendar management
and a powerful iOS app. It won MF #338’s
group test, underscoring its prowess.Pixelmator is a full-
fledged layer-based
photo editor, graphic
design and painting app.
It offers over 100
brushes, dozens of tools and 32 blending
modes giving you full control, all for a
really affordable price. The app works with
iCloud to sync all your projects across
devices including Mac. It also supports
formats like PSD, PNG and JPEG, making
it the best app for all your graphic needs.
Image credits (left to right, top to bottom): Serif, Telestream, Information Architects,
Haha Interactive, Bombich Software, Surtees Studios, Pixelmator, Flexibits, Readdle
BEST BUYS... Curated picks of additional apps
APRIL 2020 | MACFORMAT | 103The award-winning task
manager has been
redesigned to be more
powerful. Use Siri, Things’
app extension and
widgets to create a quick to-do. Create
projects and group them as you like. A
today list offers an overview of the day
ahead, and plan your day with your to-dos
listed by your calendar. Tags offer easy
ways to search and customise your day.