Our top 10 iPad Apps

Well the iPad is due to launch tomorrow in the UK. I’ve had my mitts on one for the last month and armed with a US$ gift card have been loading it up with apps to really put it through it’s paces.

To save you wasting any of your hard earned dosh (and download time) heres a run down on the apps I’ve been using and the ones I think are over hyped and those that are just great…

We’re looking at developing a magazine app for a client so first of all we really wanted to see what the developments in this area are looking like, so the first apps we downloaded were the magazines that are considered to be breaking new ground in the digital magazine arena.

Wired Mag – launched yesterday and a year in development, I’ve been reading Wired for years here so it was about time they made it into a decent digital format (they re-designed their website a couple of years back and I’ve never liked the re-design). It’s had rave reviews as being the future of publishing and it does have some clever elements. It may be a little overhyped but to me the really interesting work in this mag is how advertisers have taken on board the interactivity. There are some great examples of interactive ads from the Likes of continental Airlines, Heineken, Intel and Pepsi BUT (and we think it’s a big but) how do advertisers measure this interactivity as the entire mag (around 500mb) is downloaded to the iPad so you can’t measure if readers are actually interacting with the ads??? Saying all that it is nice that you can read the mag with all the whistles and bells once it’s been downloaded. Only £2.99 so well worth the money !!
Outside Magazine – Outside is a GREAT print mag, it has had some of the greatest travel writers contribute to it over the years (from good friend of ours Tad Friend to Sebastian Junger to Jon Krakaeur) and I was pleasantly surprised by it’s approach to navigation and ease of access to articles. As well as having a PDF style magazine view it also has a “rapid feature navigation” where you can just get to the articles quickly, read them without any page breaks (ala magazine style) and also view videos and photos in their own galleries. A few areas to tidy up here but overall a great experience (and as ever great content).At £1.79 an edition this is GREAT value.
Popular Science – considered the best example of an interactive mag yet, it has some interesting features for navigation but a lot of it feels like interactivity for interactivity’s sake. The 2 button swipe for the main menu works well and it makes some clever use of page scrolling but overall it just didn’t seem as effective an approach as say Wired or Outside.£2.99 a copy. Outside hit the pricing just right, this feels a little too expensive for what you’re getting.
Alice in Wonderland – There’s been a lot made about this as an interactive book being a groundbreaking innovation etc. etc. Well its nice but it’s not as great as I was expecting. It’s almost like a Flash website from 10 years ago – really basic interactive elements wrapped up in an iPad app with some nice (original) drawings. Not as many interactive elements as there could have been and they’re all the same. Also when you interact with a lot of them an 8 year olds fingers tend to cause the page to flip to the next page, which after 20 or 30 times become very annoying !! £5.49 – too expensive for what it is.
USA Today - if newspapers are going to become digital then this is the approach they need to take. Can’t find anything to fault with this it’s just a great example of the future of newspapers. And it’s FREE !!!
Pinball HD – The iPad is perfect for pinball, the rectangular shape mimics your avergae pinball table and the physics work perfectly. Just wish there were some more table layouts and with more animation, but it does what it says on the tin and it does it well !! £1.79
Marvel Comics – A great example of how subscription based apps could work (magazines and newspapers) and the dynamic approach this app takes for displaying each storyboard is really, really nice. The artwork just seems to pop from the screen too. If it wasn’t for the tactile feel and smeel of comic books (that sort of add to reading them) then all comics should be shown this way. Free app, comics £ vary.
TweetDeck – works really well on the iPad, big screen display and intuitive navigation. Could do with some enhacement for multiple accounts but otherwise a joy to tweet from.FREE
Pocket Pond – kind of pointless but a great example of how the graphics engine works, really powerful imagery.FREE
Photopad – a scaled down photoshop, intuitive to use and fast editing of imagery from painting to levels and curves, almost everything you need her for some quick and dirty photo editing. Very cool AND FREE !