UPDATED 09:30 EDT / FEBRUARY 27 2013

NEWS

Photoshop Touch Arrives, Alongside Urine & Crash Response Apps

It’s been a while in the making, but Adobe has finally managed to squeeze its Photoshop Touch application into the smartphone, rolling out versions for both iPhone and Android phones, plus a new update for the iPad.

The new app sports all the features of the older iPad version, putting the most essential editing functions from the full desktop version of Photoshop into the palm of your hand. It allows for images up to 12MP in size to be manipulated with full layer editing, as well as tones, filter and deep color adjustment options. In addition, Adobe also gives users 2GB of free Creative Cloud storage space, allowing them to sync images and pick up their editing where they left it when swapping between your PC, smartphone or tablet.

That Photoshop Touch on iPhone and Android comes with all of the features of the iPad version is a bit of a surprise, since it’s doubtful that few people would want to do any heavy editing or fine tuning on such a small screen. Saying that, for anyone that uses Photoshop for their work, its probably nice to have these features in an emergency, if nothing else.

To access Photoshop Touch, you’re going to need a pretty recent operating system on your phone. For Android, the minimum is Ice Cream Sandwich and above, while for iOS it’ll only work on a fifth-generation iPod Touch or iPhone 4S and above. Photoshop Touch for phones is available to download now, costing $4.99 from iTunes and Google Play.

Urine Analysis? Don’t Worry, There’s An App For That Too

If you’re one of those health freaks that’s become hooked on all the heart monitor and calorie-burning apps around these days, then this one might just appeal to you. Uchek, which is soon to be available on both iPhone and Android, wants to help people like you check on their health regularly using an entirely novel approach (novel for a smartphone at least), by keeping a regular check on your pee.

Surprisingly, your urine can tell an awful lot about the state of your health, says Uchek’s designer Myshkin Ingawale, co-founder of medical tech firm Biosense Technologies. What’s more, “everybody pees, and everybody carries a cellphone,” and so an app like Uchek that can take advantage of those two certainties makes perfect sense for those that want a heads up on any medical conditions they might be suffering from – or so Ingawale claims.

The app isn’t entirely self-reliant. It needs the help of those urine test strips that you pee on in the bathrooms, taking snaps of them with your smartphone camera to analyze your bodily fluids. This is good because those strips are actually tricky to analyze with an untrained eye, even with the help of a urine-analysis machine that most hospitals use. This is where Uchek comes in, reading those urine strips much like regular smartphones read a QR code. Users are required to snap some photos of the strip at regular intervals shortly after dunking it into their pee – this allows it to read the chemical composition of your urine and monitor how it changes over time.

Ingawale gave a presentation of Uchek earlier this week at the TED Conference in Long Beach, California. See the video to learn more.

Splitsecnd: Dials You An Ambulance, Even When You’re Dead

Your entire life can be turned upside down in just a split second whenever you’re on the road. Road accidents kill more than 30,000 people each year in the US, while many more suffer serious injuries. It’s a big number, but it’s also one that can be reduced – and this is where Splitsecnd comes in.

Okay so Splitsecnd isn’t exactly an app. It’s actually a crash detection and emergency response system, but nevertheless it’s a handy gadget to have should you lose your concentration for just a second too long…

The Splitsecnd dongle is essentially a device born of the Internet of Things. It plugs straight into your car’s cigarette lighter and can detect a collision or accident the moment it happens. Should you happen to be involved in a smash, it automatically contacts the emergency services, uploading your car’s GPS location and putting you through to the operator (in case you’re in a condition to speak to them – if not, it just asks for an ambulance). The device can take some punishment too – the designers simulated dozens of crash tests at the University of Michigan to see how it held up in the worst possible accidents, and even fitted it with a backup battery in case it gets thrown out of the car.

Splitsecnd should appeal to plenty of drivers, particularly parents that drive their kids around, or those whose kids are old enough to drive themselves around, but this extra insurance policy does come at a price. The dongle costs $200 to buy, and on top of that there’s a $15 monthly fee in order to stay connected.


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