Spring 2019

Spring   2019 April 

Scheduled Tuesday Classes at 12:30pm - 2pm  by Jane Quinns are;  Smartphones Class May 7th, June 4th  cancelled , July 2nd  Windows 10 Class May 14th, June 11th, July 9th

youtube viewing Tip:IF YOU'RE UNABLE TO CLEARLY HEAR THE video YOu can use the help tools  that appear below on the title bar.Clicking on the "CC" will INVOKE closed caption if that's available. Otherwise, you can 

  click the 3dots symbol to the far right for the drop down menu. Click on Transcript. You will see the text belonging to the movie appear. It is in time sequence for you to follow along. 

Making Memories 

 Today's technology makes it easy to create a memory beyond just photos. With today's smartphones and cameras it's easy to record a video or record your voice.

 And Windows 10 let's you edit a video and create a file in MP4, MOV or WMV format. Each is able to UpLoad to YouTube , or post to the Cloud in a Blog, or eMail in some cases.

It would be so unfortunate not to take advantage of these tools you have to make a memory .  If not for you , think of your grand children or your spouse who would enjoy those recorded  moments. Today's technology makes it easy.  I suggest using Facebook movies, movies made from your Smartphone, or movies made from your camera.

Upload your personal video to YouTube

First you must create an account on YouTube to manage your videos. Then you can Upload your MP4 , or MWV movie to your Youtube account. The term that is use is Your Channel. It is similar to managing a Blog. And basically you create your own space on YOUTUBE, that you upload your videos . You can make them Private or Public.

Get to your video manager with your google account

 Your YouTube account is where you will upload your videos and manage the settings for them.  How to get to your video manager in the new beta studio on youtube.

Tip: if you cannot hear the person speaking you can always click on the CC below the video to turn on Closed Caption text

https://youtu.be/amFc4UNURlI

How to find the video manager on your YouTube channel. February 2019

https://youtu.be/2cSOgGkKfew

Upload your video TO YOUR VIDEO MANAGER

https://youtu.be/klVWGHtRTuE

CREATE A PLAYLIST FROM YOUR VIDEOS

Creating a Playlist of your videos will make it easy for your viewers to watch all your clips. They will be able to jump from one video to another easily, and you will have more viewers because you made it easy to use.

https://youtu.be/k_jW6O0o0ZM

Save Video from Facebook to your PC or device

1.       Play the video that you would like to download

2.       While it’s playing, right click  on it and select  “show Video URL “

3.       Copy the video URL and STOP the video player

4.       Go to your browser , open a new tab, then pastes the video URL

5.       Change “www” to “m” and press  “Enter “ on your keyboard.

6.       Click on the video

7.       While it’s playing , right click on it and select  “ Save Video As”

8.       You can give it a name if you want, then choose a destination where to save it and press  the “Save “ button.

Click on the Youtube  Video for example of the steps

https://youtu.be/YYmywYAsOog

 

UPLOAD VIDEO TO YOUR YOUTUBE  ACCOUNT USING EMAIL

This quick method will let you upload you video to your YouTube account by sending an eMail 

https://youtu.be/TDqRRUIvF_A

  

June 2018

SUMMER BREAK

The Smartphone class will continue through Mid July. Jane Quinn holds this class.

We will  meet on June 19th, then skipping the 4th Tuesday ,  June 27th  to meet at the Redding Library with the Redding Computer Club at 3pm.   Also, scheduled to meet July 3, 17, and the last time is the  31stThis is open to the public. You're welcome to join us 

See you in the Fall

 The ONCE A month  Tuesday Class for newbees , the SMARTPHONES 101 is seeing a lot of new students. The first week in June 4th is the next class.   The basics are taught to those just new to smartphone. We cover the Home screen, Messaging, Touch Screen, Answering Calls, installing or deleting APPS and using Maps for directions. Bring your device and your questions.

ANDROIDS AND iPHONES FOR SENIORS  2nd, 3rd, and 5th week of the month. GOOGLE. For this class you must be using your device already. And you need to have your eMail and contacts established. We have just completed a 3-week course on Photography using your smartphone’s camera. It entailed; learning features of your smartphone camera, managing photos with Albums and using the cloud for storing and sharing your photos.

  You can always send your questions ahead before class to; one4cugr@gmail.com.   Just as a reminder, we do not meet on the 4th Tuesday.

May 2018

 The ONCE A month  Tuesday Class for newbees , the SMARTPHONES 101 is seeing a lot of new students. The first week in June 4th is the next class.   The basics are taught to those just new to smartphone. We cover the Home screen, Messaging, Touch Screen, Answering Calls, installing or deleting APPS and using Maps for directions. Bring your device and your questions.

ANDROIDS AND iPHONES FOR SENIORS  2nd, 3rd, and 5th week of the month. GOOGLE. For this class you must be using your device already. And you need to have your eMail and contacts established. We have just completed a 3-week course on Photography using your smartphone’s camera. It entailed; learning features of your smartphone camera, managing photos with Albums and using the cloud for storing and sharing your photos.

  You can always send your questions ahead before class to; one4cugr@gmail.com.   Just as a reminder, we do not meet on the 4th Tuesday.

February 2018

A New Tuesday Class SMARTPHONES 101.  1st Week in each month starting Feb 6th.  You will learn the basics such as; setting contacts, Google Account, the Home screen, Messaging, Touch Screen, Answering Calls, installing or deleting APPS and using Maps for directions. Bring your device and your questions.

ANDROIDS AND iPHONES FOR SENIORS  2nd, 3rd, and 5th week of the month. GOOGLE. For this class you must be using your device already. And you need to have your eMail and contacts established. We have just completed a 3-week course on Photography using your smartphone’s camera. It entailed; learning features of your smartphone camera, managing photos with Albums and using the cloud for storing and sharing your photos.

  You can always send your questions ahead before class to; one4cugr@gmail.com.   Just as a reminder, we do not meet on the 4th Tuesday.

solving problems in the classroom

This Tuesday Feb 13th, we worked in class on using QuickMemo and Memo from the iPhone.  These APPS are a part of the operating device. You can create documents, grocery lists, make a note, and Capture a screen. 

Also with the text tools, you can change the color, use a pen to draw or put your signature to a note, create a PDF file ( printable document ) and capture a screen image then add text to it.

Print note from QuickMemo APP

There are many choices to SHARE the note to social media, or send it to an eMail account. Plus, you can change the Category  aka Type of note anytime.
The text tools 

This week we solved the riddle of making incoming text messages read aloud. Most users have an alarm or a sound play for incoming activity on their smartphone. The text messaging APP  that comes with your device has a feature that lets you set Messages to be read aloud.  

I have an LG, and the APP to find this setting is in the Verizon package of APPS. It’s name is MESSAGE+

 It is not the Message APP you find on Google.  To set it , click on  Notifications.  Then turn on  Read Incoming Messages

aNOTHER OPTION TO HANDLING AND PRINTING TEXT MESSAGES

You must be in the message, then press on the date line and you can come up with the menu option to handling your text messages. As you can see you can COPY the TEXT, SHARE with another user, and many more ideas.

Smartphone Apps of the month

Airdrop Share your photos with another smartphone as long as you’re on the same network and both have this APP. Perfect for family sharing or vacation photos

Word Warp- Free APP

ABOUT WORD WARP - A WORD PUZZLE GAME

How many words can you make with these letters: A E R K R D? Try it out by downloading Word Warp for FREE!

If you love word games, Word Warp will deliver with endless hours of fun. Exercise your brain with countless rounds of challenging word puzzles. Word Warp has NO level blocks, so you can play without buying more lives!

In Word Warp, you are given 6 letters for each round that you may scramble (or "warp"). For each correct word, you will receive 10 points for each letter in the word. Complete all the words in each round to receive an additional bonus of 10 points per word! How many rounds can you complete before it's game over?

Google Duo Just like Facetime or Skype to connect using Video from your phone. You can connect Android phones and Apple phones with this AAPP

Costo Photo APP Put this APP on your phone and you can order prints while you’re shopping at this store

Blog2Print  EASY & AFFORDABLE Our affordable books cost even less now that we’ve reduced our book and extra page prices! The easiest way to make a blog book is now the least expensive way too.

BOOK MADE FROM BLOGGER

What is the iCloud?

If your photos, videos and contacts, and more are backed up to iCloud they’re safe and accessible from any apple device and most web browsers. To see what’s there , log onto icloud.com and poke around.

Windows Window's 10 Creator update

The Thursday class is studying the enhancements from Windows 10 update. There are many useful and improved tools to work with other devices. I was curious how difficult it would be to pair my laptop with my Bluetooth headset after learning this feature is one of the updates. I have been using my LG  phone headset to pair to my smartphone to listen to radio stations and my music. But never thought to attempt to connect my headset to my computer.

I found it is simple. If I chose to listen to music with my headset   while working on my computer I can.  With the Groove Music App I can listen to all my music.  

To make this work, from Action Center >All Settings> Bluetooth and other devices.  Click the + plus symbol to Add Blue Tooth device. Make sure your device is on and discoverable.

Once you have connected to your Bluetooth device, you can use Music Groove or  File Explorer to play your music.   Here is an example of playing music from File Explorer. Once you choose the music by highlighting it, right click anywhere in that frame to select Cast to device.

Night light feature. This softer light emanating from my monitor is so refreshing to me.  It is the warmer colors lets me star at the monitor longer. Which is great for my spreadsheet input.

Microsoft update addresses these concerns in Creators Update with Night Light (Windows Settings > Night light settings). This feature warms the color temperature of the screen to make it appear more orange than blue. Try it. You will be amazed how reading for a length of time with warmer colors on your screen is life changing.

 You can set Night Light to trigger automatically at sunset until sunrise or manually set the hours. Just be aware that you might want to deactivate this setting if you’re editing photos after sunset. 

Note: Bluetooth with Android phone.

I was able to connect my Android phone to my computer. Use the same process above, and with your Android change your settings to in the Network > Settings>Share and Connect > Media Server to be turned on. Check mark all the files types you want to share. The surprise is your phone access is just your Messages, Music and Photos. It is much like using DLN with your TV. It does not mirror you phone aka an AppleTV or Google Chromcast device. But the bad news is, it reset my computer sound settings. I had to reset them to find my computer speakers.

January 2018

Bring Your Device to Class and Learn How to Use it

 Google Forums Help

This month we will be using Google Photos on-line product. There are many forms of APPS made by Google. You can find specific help with many of their products from the forum site. Often, you can find answers to your problem that are not on Google’s posted help panels

https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!home

 Photography Advice

Composition Tips For Taking Better iPhone Photos

Posted by Kate Wesson |  comments5

Composition is the key to getting your iPhone photos noticed. Anyone can point a camera and take a photo, but it takes a more skilled photographer to compose a shot that’s visually appealing and holds the viewer’s attention. In this tutorial you’ll discover 10 of the most important composition guidelines to help make your iPhone photos stand out.

Composition is simply the way you arrange the key elements or subjects in a scene. With each photo that you take, you should ask yourself the following questions:

·        How can I draw attention to the main subject?

·        How can I lead the viewer’s eye into and around the image?

·        How can I eliminate distracting parts of the scene?

·        With these questions in mind, let’s take a look at some important composition techniques to help improve your iPhone photos.

1. Include A Focal Point

A photo should include a main subject or point of interest. This focal point gives your photo meaning and offers the viewer a place for their eye to rest. Without a focal point your image is unlikely to hold the viewer’s attention for long.

When taking photos, always ask yourself “What is the main point of interest in this scene?” or “What is my main subject?” Including a focal point is often easy, but sometimes you need to search out an interesting subject to include in your scene.·     

The sheep in this image provide a focal point. Without them the photo would be a pretty boring landscape and wouldn’t hold your attention for long. The sheep provide a place for your eye to rest once you’ve looked around the image.

Once you’ve identified a main subject or point of interest, you can then build your composition around that focal point to draw attention to it. The following composition techniques will help you with this.

2. Follow The Rule of Thirds

The rule of thirds is all about where you position the main elements in a scene. The rule (which is really just a guideline) suggests that an image will look more balanced and aesthetically pleasing if you position important parts of the scene off-center.

Switch the gridlines on in your iPhone’s camera app to display two horizontal and two vertical lines. The rule of thirds suggests that the most powerful areas of the image are the four points where the lines intersect, and that our eyes are naturally drawn to these areas first. Position your main subject on one of these intersections to give the most emphasis to your subject.

The most important part of the above photo is the child’s face. Following the rule of thirds, the face was positioned on the top right intersection. While it’s best to apply the rule of thirds when you’re taking photos, you can also do it by cropping the image afterwards.

https://iphonephotographyschool.com/composition-tips/

 

https://www.instagram.com/iphoneps/

 

 What is HDR and When Should I Use It In My Photos?

https://lifehacker.com/5991508/what-is-hdr-and-when-should-i-use-it-in-my-photos

HDR stands for High Dynamic Range imaging, and it's an old photography practice recently introduced to cameraphones like the iPhone and some Android devices (or with the use of special apps). You're on the right track: it's supposed to make your pictures look better, but it depends on when you use it. Here's a quick primer on how HDR works, and when you should—and shouldn't—turn it on.

HDR, as its name implies, is a method that aims to add more "dynamic range" to photographs, where dynamic range is the ratio of light to dark in a photograph. Instead of just taking one photo, HDR uses three photos, taken at different exposures. You can then use image editing software to put those three images together and highlight the best parts of each photo. In the case of HDR on smartphones, your phone does all the work for you—just snap your picture and it'll spit out one regular photo and one HDR photo. The result is something that should look more like what your eyes see, rather than what your camera sees.

This is why, when you turn HDR mode on, your phone takes a little longer to take the photo. It's actually taking three pictures, rather than just one. Check out the image above for an example. It wasn't taken with a cameraphone, but it's a good demonstration of what HDR can do. If you want more detailed information on how HDR works, our friends at the How-To Geek have a great explainer. Photo by Mszklanny.

When You Should Use HDR

As we said, HDR is designed to help you take better-looking photos, especially in certain situations. Here's where you should try using HDR:

• Landscapes: Big landscape photos usually have a lot of contrast between the sky and land, which is difficult for your camera to deal with in just one photo. With HDR, you can capture the sky's detail without making the land look too dark, and vice versa.
• Portraits in Sunlight: We all know that lighting is one of the most important aspects of a good photo, but too much lighting on someone's face—like harsh sunlight—can cause dark shadows, bright glare, and other unflattering characteristics. HDR can even that all out and make your subject look better.
• Low-Light and Backlit Scenes (see above): If your photo is looking a little too dark—which often happens if your scene has too much backlight—HDR can brighten up the foreground without washing out the well-lit portions of your photo. Photos by Jacob Reiff.

When You Shouldn't Use HDR

• Photos with Movement (see above): If any of your subjects are moving (or might move), HDR increases the chance of a blurry photo. Remember, HDR takes three pictures, so if your subject moves between the first and second shot, your final picture won't look very good. Photo by William Hook.
• High-Contrast Scenes: Some photos look better with stark contrast between the dark and light parts of the photo, like if you have a dark shadow or silhouette you want to highlight. HDR will make this less intense, resulting in a less interesting photo.
• Vivid Colors: If your scene is too dark or too light, HDR can bring some of the color back. However, if you're dealing with colors that are already very vivid, HDR can wash them out.

Luckily, most HDR cameraphones will give you two images: one with HDR turned off, and one with it turned on. That means that you can always give HDR a shot and see what the comparison looks like before turning it off altogether (as long as you have time to sit through the extra few seconds of photo-taking). As with all things photography, you can't go wrong experimenting! These guidelines should help you out, but don't be afraid to snap a few photos and look at them later. Once you get the hang of it, HDR can be a great tool for getting better pictures. While you're at it, check out our general tips for taking better pictures on your phone, too.

Don't Forget Basic Photography Rules

https://lifehacker.com/5662812/how-to-take-better-pictures-with-your-smartphones-camera

After doing lots of research and asking around, some of the best tips I got were the most obvious (yet rarely heeded) rules of photography. When you use your phone's camera, make sure you aren't forgetting about the basics.

It's important with all cameras to make sure your subject is facing the light source and you're not, but it's even more important with phone cameras (Unless, of course, you wantto take a silhouette—like all rules, this can be bent). As I mentioned above, your phone's biggest weakness is its inability to take good pictures in low light, which means you generally will want to get as much light as you possibly can on your subject. This may require a bit more thought and a bit more moving around than it might with a point-and-shoot camera, but you'll thank yourself in the end.

Clean Your Lens

It may seem silly, but give your lens a wipe down before you start snapping photos with your phone. While most people are pretty good about keeping their grubby fingers away from camera lenses, it's not as easily done with 

You've probably heard this one a million times, but we can't overstate how useless this feature is. If you need to get closer to a subject, you're much better off stepping closer to them. If you can't, you can always crop the picture later on, which is all digital zoom really does. Remember, you can always crop down, but you can't crop up.

One more GREAT resource material for taking good photoa 

https://lifehacker.com/5662812/how-to-take-better-pictures-with-your-smartphones-camera

BEST CAMERA APPS FOR ANDROIDS 

https://lifehacker.com/5821240/the-best-camera-app-for-android

Click this link for class handouts from Tuesday Smartphotography Class 

SAMPLE SCREENSHOT SHOWING  FILTERS AVAILABLE ON ANDROID PHONE

sample of camera screen and filter choices.

following are photos created using Adjustments when camera is off Auto focus.