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Birchtree
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Birchtree

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meta

My Favorite Video Games of the Past Decade

1. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild I’ve said a lot on this game already, so seriously, watch the video series below, but I will say here that no game in my adult life has filled me with as much wonder and pure joy than this game. There were times playing this
podcast

Podcast #213: Shoehorning it Into Your Life

Some of us keep waiting for the iPad to “become a real computer” and I continue to be worried that this isn’t something that’s ever going to happen in a way that will make people looking for this happy.
mac

Twitter for Mac is Not a Good Mac App

https://youtu.be/uATN5jYvyTc I don't know how to blame here, Twitter or Apple, but the Twitter app for Mac is really rough in its current form. Text editing specifically is really hard to justify and is not what I would expect from any app on the Mac.
meta

My 10 Favorite Albums of the Decade

It’s the end of the decade and I love lists, so today I’m starting a series of lists about my favorite things. Today we’re looking at my favorite albums of the past 10 years. What I learned more than anything with making this list is that 2010 and 2011 were more amazing
iphone

When it Comes to Performance, iPhone is Still King

Finding things you can test on iPhones and Android devices is kinda tricky. App launch times, while relevant to overall sense of speed, does not really test performance, and many of the apps that I could use to test an iPhone’s performance don’t run on Android. Given this, there are 6 total tests
meta

BirchTree is 9! (belated)

I’m so bad at celebrating BirchTree’s anniversaries, so this post on a Tuesday night 12 days after the actual anniversary is gonna have to do it this year. At this point I have written at this site for over one quarter of my life, which is nuts. This doesn’t even count the
iphone

Deep Fusion is Legit

Apple released iOS 13.2 to the world today and it includes a great new bit of tech that will make your low light photos look even better (as long as you have an iPhone 11 or 11 Pro). It's called "Deep Fusion" and while you won't see this
pixel

Google Pixel 4: The BirchTree Review

Google Pixel 4: The BirchTree Review
This is going to be a different type of review. In part because you’ve likely read and watched a
iphone

Computational Zoom on the iPhone 11 Pro

Google talks a big game about how they enhance zoomed photos in a feature they call Super Res Zoom, which I have tested in the past and found to be less effective than the additional hardware found in the iPhone XS. The Pixel 4 will be in my hands soon and I'll be
iphone

Astral Photography on the iPhone 11 Pro and Pixel 3a

https://youtu.be/hSBMi02DigM I installed the pre-release version of the Google Camera app with astral photography functionality on a Pixel 3a and tried it out compared to the iPhone 11 Pro. I don't have a Pixel 4 yet to see how it does, but I hope to get one pretty soon
Android

Why I Liked the Android 10 Update

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xbXxMKqhQJ4 This can only go well, right? This was actually a video I made in September but didn’t feel like posting right away. As the description and title cards try to make exceptionally clear, this is not a video bashing Android, it’s just fun to see Android
meta

The Delicate Nature of Comparing Smartphone Cameras and a Dash of False Equivalence

Here’s how most smartphone camera comparisons go: 1. Frame up two phones with the same shot 2. Take photo That’s it, no editing or tapping the screen to focus or set exposure, just point and shoot. In many ways that probably the most fair ways to do it, and it does line up
watch

Product Management and the Apple Watch

In 2015 smart watches were not a new thing, and some commentators at the time even said that if Apple didn’t release a smart watch within a year that the whole company would go under. Even in April 2015 there were smart watches with always-on displays. Yet, the Apple Watch shipped without it.
goodie

Super High Resolution Pixel 4 Wallpaper

The Pixel 4 has leaked all over the place, but the one that interested me the most was the new wallpaper in some of these leaks. I don't think it's quite my style, but if you want it on your phone have at it! Download the full resolution 5,760x12,160px
iphone

I Want An “Exciting” Phone: or An Appreciation for Iteration

This is the Estwing 16 oz. Cureved-Claw Rip Hammer: Doesn’t look that crazy right? Surely this is just a random hammer I found at Home Depot, right? Nope, according to The Wirecutter, this is the best hammer money can buy. There are plenty of other hammers you can buy that are bigger, have
iphone

My Quick iOS 13.2 Video Options UI Revamp

iOS 13.2 beta 2 came out today for developers and Apple finally added the ability to change the video settings for resolution and frame rate from within the Camera app itself. This is great! We’ve been asking for this for years and it’s wonderful that it’s coming right around the corner.
iphone

Another Look at Deep Fusion

I happened to be wearing a sweater yesterday so I decided to take a selfie in low light and see if there were any differences. Here's another couple shots where I got Deep Fusion to turn on and off. Long story short, I noticed a few differences, but you really need to look

Podcast #206: Microsoft Surface: Inverse Taco

Microsoft unveiled their new Surface products yesterday and as someone who likes Surface products quite a bit, I wanted to take some time to go over what they talked about.