It's nearly Christmas...

Ho Ho Ho!

Well as Andy posted a few days ago our little MyChristmas App was updated and submitted to Apple for review.

The latest version is a free upgrade to existing users so if you want to jump in and grab MyChristmas 1.1 now then feel free.

We're loving version 2 and finding ourselves getting all festive.

To get a feel for the new features in version 2 then take a look at the video.



What's in version 2 I hear you say.... well...

- Multiple Sleeps to Christmas which also allow you to take/use a picture of a loved one on the countdown.

- A Christmas Carol eBook (themed)

- Carols for singing (inc. Wiki lookups on the history etc.)

- Various Christmas music tracks (updated)

- Games which include Solitaire and a couple of Christmas themed match games (updated)

- A Christmas Candle (great for carolling)

- A Christmas fireplace (New and great to keep toys warm)

- A Snow Globe

- Christmas Sounds (updated)

- Mistletoe

- Musical Christmas bells which can be touched or rang using accelerometer.

- New Years Fireworks (updated), Song and words

- The ability to send and receive traditional Christmas Greetings Cards on the iPhone (New)


More will be added on the Talee Talee website soon.
Enjoy.

Worth watching for entertainment

If you are in need of a little light entertainment then I suggest you watch this short video.

You can view it here

Essentially it's lots of people looking a little silly trying to pick up an iPhone (dummy) glued to the floor.

Enjoy.

MyChristmas for 2009

The long-awaited 2009 update to MyChristmas is complete and has been submitted to Apple for approval for submission on the App Store.

Expect it to (hopefully) appear in the next week or 10 days or so... more on the new features and changes to come soon.

Where have we been?

It has been a very busy and hectic couple of months for utopia 365.

We've seen a couple of websites launch which include some pretty clever back-end admin, a couple of iPhone Apps which include the lovely Second Shootr, email templates for our usherto service, a few bespoke RoR jobs on behalf of some design agencies we partner with, and some bespoke development for a great client of ours.

On top of all of the above we were dedicated to a project for a few weeks, but it's one of those we're not allowed to talk about. Shame.

We're now diving head first into a 'top secret' project (Shhhh - but hopefully we'll be able to tell you about it soon) and also getting a new version of MyChristmas with some great new features over to Apple.

We can say in the last 10 weeks or so we have learnt more about running a business than we did in the 1st year we operated, and it's great on reflection.

The blog may have been quiet but we're still around and working hard. We'll try and keep it a bit more updated in the run up to Christmas.

Second Shootr launches

Today sees the official launch of Second Shootr - the wedding photographers App for iPhone and iPod touch.

utopia 365 were commissioned by Plinkk Photography to produce the iPhone App and the Website - providing many development and design services along the way.

Free 2010 Year Planner

Being in the software/tech/development industry everything tends to get done digitally (naturally!).

Generally we use Omnifocus to manage our projects and time. We can create contexts to suite how we want to work without being forced into a particular set of scenarios. We like that. What's better is the lovely syncing to the Omnifocus iPhone App which works flawlessly. We can drag in files, code and emails and attach them to a project keeping everything nicely organised and available anywhere with the joys of mobileMe.

However, there are those times when you just want to be able to scribble down to visualise what's happening (and we have a lot of things happening). It's easy then to rub-out or doodle on before committing a plan into our digital diaries.

We use a simple year planner to achieve this and we thought we'd let you have a copy too. Simply download, print and scribble away!

2009 Year Planner

2010 Year Planner

Second Shootr

Currently in development by utopia 365 on behalf of Plinkk Photography is Second Shootr.

Over to Tim from Plinkk for a brief intro:

"Second Shootr is a revolutionary digital photography assistant for professional wedding photographers. Use Second Shootr to help you plan every aspect of the big day before it happens, leaving you free to get on with what you do best....taking awesome wedding photos."

So, for all you iPhone & iPod touch owning wedding photographers out there, keep an eye-out for Second Shootr - coming soon. You can sign-up for email notifications at www.secondshootr.com and also follow Second Shootr on Twitter or find them on Facebook.

MyBabyTree goes live

The App that let's you buy a tree

After a little wait and anticipation we're pleased to see that MyBabyTree has now gone live in the App store!

Working on behalf of EquinoxApps and in partnership with the World Wildlife Fund (Indonesia), this lovely little App allows you to get green and plant a tree in the Indonesian rain forest. Carbon credits? Bah, just buy this App and you'll be doing a whole world of good.

The fact is, we all like to make donations to worthwhile causes, and most (if not all) of us want to be environmentally friendly. It's good to give, but MyBabyTree gives something back in the form of a nice little App that allows you to keep track on the good deed you have done.

Here's the detail

"MyBabyTree is a hands-on application that allows you to buy and plant your very own baby tree in Rinjani National Park in Lombok, Indonesia. Your purchase of the app for £5.49 will pay for the seed, land, nursery, maintenance, protection and planting."

Go on, go and buy MyBabyTree and feel smug.

Photoshop Amusement

Here is a short post highlighting a site I came across that caused me to literally laugh out loud.

Now, I'm no photoshop expert (ask Andy), but some of the images on this site are just so obviously wrong you have to wonder how on earth they made it to print/web.

If you need a laugh then take 5 minutes out to look through some of these gems!

View them all over at Photoshop Disasters

But here are a couple that I could not resist sharing (some as classic as the recent MS hash) - if you can't spot what's wrong with these then you get the job! :-

utopia solitaire update

Due to huge demand for our development and design services this year, our happy clients have monopolised pretty much all of our time. This has meant we simply haven't had the chance to get utopia solitaire finalised for launch. In some ways that's maybe been a good thing - we've re-visited it a little now, improved the UI and are (finally!) close to releasing it.

As you can see from the screenshots below, it's looking nice - and the utopia theme is optional! :-) You can choose from 100's of different combinations of card and table designs to create your own favourite look.

All things being equal (and assuming Apple's acceptance) utopia solitaire for iPhone and iPod touch will be available on the iPhone App Store this month! We're hoping to get it to Apple for review by 12th September.

utopia solitaire will run on 1st gen iPhones and iPod touches and above (unless things change over the next week). We don't want to limit it to later models only. You will require iPhone OS 3.0 though.