Android Magazine UK - Issue No. 49

VSCO

Cam

Getintouchwiththewider

photo community

This app is really one for

the photography fan in you.

VSCO has brought together

ahugecommunityofphotographers,

all of whom are encouraged to

upload their work to the app with a

journal explaining the how, why and

where behind the pictures. As you’d

expect from an app of this type, it is

gorgeously presented, with sweeping

tiles and elegant typefaces. It will

takeyoualittlewhiletogettogrips

with the menu options as there isn’t

much by way of explanation, but

onceyoudoyou’rerewardedwitha

worldofincrediblephotographyand

interesting stories. It’s incredibly

easy to import your photos onto the

appandshareonyourpersonal

VSCO page. If you are into

discovering new photographers, this

isdefinitelyasuperbfreeappthat

feels much more premium and

worthwhile than scrolling through

dozens of Instagram snaps of food

and sunsets. It looks great, is easy to

get involved in and is regularly

updated to create a unique and

rewarding user experience.

»PriceFree+IAPs

» Designed for Phone and tablet

» Requires Android^ 4.0

View and post your own photography easily

with VSCO Cam

»PriceFree

»Designed forPhone and tablet

»Requires AndroidVaries with device

Snapchat

Snapchat evolves once again

BBC NEWS»If you want news, entertainment, sport and music

news, we can’t really recommend anything other than the BBC

»best free

alternative

Snapchat is building itself

up to be more than just a

photo sharing app. First

came the ability to chat to your

contacts. Then came My Story and

now it’s Discover. One tap gets you to

the home screen where you can fi nd

video and photo content from Yahoo,

Cosmopolitan, Mail Online, Food

Network, Vice, MTV, People, National

Geographic and Bleacher Report.

This provides users with a rounded

set of news, sport, entertainment

and music news to enjoy. A swipe to

the left brings up a full page picture

and a swipe upward lets you read

that story. A couple of taps on the

back button of your phone takes you

back swiftly to the menu. All in all this

is nicely put together and we hope

we can customise it in the future, but

until then we can’t really see

ourselves using it that much.

Humin

Organise your contacts book

without jumping betwee

screens. Humin syncs

together all of your conta

from Google, Facebook an

Linkedin, but only after ask

your permission and it says

doesn’tuseanyofthatinfor

beyond what is needed to ma

app work, so your data should

safe from marketing vultures.

Syncing all this data builds up a

of data about each contact, suc

their phone number, workplace a

thelasttimeyouwereatthesam

Facebook-organised event, which

useful. The contact screen also

gives you the options to call, text or

email, so this app is very much a

one-stop shop for all your

communication needs. The scroll

menu for finding your contacts is in

no real order, despite looking neat

with its tile format, and it would

actually be handy if this were

organised either in alphabetical or

favourites order. Humin hasn’t so

much reinvented the wheel as

refined it, but we have to give credit

for the way it has made sorting

contacts much easier.

CONTACTS+»Not only does Contacts+ combine all your contacts,

butitalsoblocksspamcallsandtexts

»best free

alternative

With the alphabetical

and recently called

lists, it was generally

assumed that phone

manufacturers had cracked the

address book.However, the folks

at Humin disagreed and set

about creating a more intuitive

way of organising your contacts.

Settingituptakesonlyafew

minutes and once you’ve done it

you can set about organising your

Humin home screen. Scroll

through your contacts list to

make a small database of your

most commonly called contacts.

This puts your favourites list right

at your fingertips, which is

incredibly handy, especially if

you’re permanently attached to

your phone and want to make

calls with just a couple of taps

and minimal scrolling. Directly

below that is your recent

contacts list, which pulls

together incoming calls, outgoing

calls and texts. Although

favourites lists and call logs are

fairly common, it’s defi nitely a

bonus to have both sitting on the

app’s home screen where you

can access them in a fl ash

Excellent modernisation of

the contacts book. Would

defi nitely recommend it

Performance

Design

Value

»specification

Designed forPhone

Requires Android4.0.3

PriceFree

» verdict

Apps

EDITOR’S CHOICE