Stuff Andy Makes – DIY, make, tinker, play

iPhone Lens Adapters from Photojojo

Mar 17

AndySwank-n-Funk, Tips and Techniques adapter, fisheye, iphone, lens, macro, photography, telephoto No Comments

I’ve seen a few different add-on lenses for iPhones out there and decided to nab a set for myself to make my detail photos and product shots a little more neato. I went with the Photojojo three-lens kit for $49 US.

Photojojo Three Lens Kit

These lenses are just little guys. They come with front covers and magnetic back covers that double as little string handles.

Lenses with Covers next to Kinekt Ring

Kinekt Design Gear Ring not included.

The lenses are tough little buggers. Appear to be made from aloominum (or Al U. Minium, if you’re from Canadia, eh), or something like it. The black front caps are flexible plastic and the backs with the little handles are magnetic metal something something. Quality is nice and the glass appears to be very clean and clear. My telephoto lens did not ship with a fingerprint. I had to accidentally add that myself. It was easy to clean off with a standard microfiber cloth.

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Objective-C/iOS/iPhone: UIColor from NSString

Oct 15

AndyiOS/iPhone/iPad, Objective-C/Apple Development, Programming/Computer cocoa, code, ipad, iphone, mac, objective-c, programming, software 2 Comments

Until I find a home for my little snippets of code, here is where they will go.

While building an iOS (iPhone) application, I needed a quick little method in Objective-c that would take strings of color codes from data provided by web developer peeps and convert those string values into UIColor objects. For instance, sometimes we’d get “#ff7401″ from the data for our app. Sometimes it might be formatted like, “0xff7401″ or even just, “ff7401″. I simply created a category on NSString to make is super-simple.

NSString+meltutils.h

//  UIColor+meltutils.h

//  Created by Andy Frey on 10/15/10.

#import <Foundation/Foundation.h>

@interface NSString (meltutils)

- (UIColor *)toUIColor;

@end

NSString+meltutils.m

#import "NSString+meltutils.h"

@implementation NSString (meltutils)

- (UIColor *)toUIColor {

  unsigned int c;

  if ([self characterAtIndex:0] == '#') {

    [[NSScanner scannerWithString:[self substringFromIndex:1]] scanHexInt:&c];

  } else {

    [[NSScanner scannerWithString:self] scanHexInt:&c];

  }

  return [UIColor colorWithRed:((c & 0xff0000) >> 16)/255.0 green:((c & 0xff00) >> 8)/255.0 blue:(c & 0xff)/255.0 alpha:1.0];

}

@end

So, to use this, all you have to do is import the header file and send a message to your string that contains the color code:

#import "NSString+meltutils.h"
...
UIColor *c = [@"#ff840a" toUIColor];
...

Hope that helps someone out a little!

What happens when a fat guy on a golf cart parks on my iPhone?

Apr 28

AndyEducational/Interesting, Mistakes/Breaks broken, destruction, golf cart, iphone, shattered glass No Comments

Here is what a fat man on a golf cart (who apparently doesn’t look in front of him while he drives) can do to your iPhone 3Gs that accidentally fell off your golf cart at the previous hole:

Ouch. Fat man on a golf cart = ouch.

For those who have weak constitutions, turn away… Oops. Too late. Sorry.

Short story: One day I went golfing with my best friend. I used my iPhone 3Gs as a golf GPS. At the tee on hole number 3, it fell off our golf cart and landed face down on the side of the cart path. While we were playing the short game on hole 3 (up near the green), a fat guy in a hurry rolled up to the tee box and parked his fat ass and his golf cart on top of my iPhone. The end.

$199 later at the local Apple Store, I had a brand-spanking new iPhone 3Gs with not a single scratch on it. Yay (kinda)!