3 Weeks \’till Christmas: Great Gift Ideas

It\’s exactly three weeks until Christmas as I write this post, meaning the countdown has begun in earnest. If you want to catch up with all of my prior 12 Weeks \’till Christmas gift ideas, the stream begins here.

This week, some apps you might find useful enough for stocking stuffers.

I begin with my all-time favourite.

I might have purchased my iphone just for the Hipstamatic camera, I\’ve had so much fun with it.

The Hipstamtic, with it\’s old-fashioned analog feel will remind you of your old Polaroid. Sort of. It\’s much more, actually. With it\’s wide range of film and options, be prepared to transform your shot into whatever mood or vintage flavor you\’d like to impart it with.

I took both of these Arizona shots within a minute of each other while riding.
A year or so ago, I shot our annual fashion photo shoot in Hip, which allowed me to bring a much different perspective to the day than the professional photographers on site.

I\’ve taken a ton of horse show shots with it.

. . .  and, I\’ve tortured countless teenagers with it . . . including my own.

If you know someone with an iphone, it makes a great stocking stuffer at $1.99.

Another toy camera app I\’ve just gotten into is the Tilt Shift Generator. I purchased it to explore tilt-shift miniature faking, which allows for a diorama effect to your photographs, giving the illusion of a miniature scale model.

I love this effect, but I haven\’t quite mastered it, this being my best try at it thus far. Here\’s 50 beautiful examples of what can be accomplished with tilt-shift photography. Again, a great app for anyone who is into photography.

If you know a horse person with nomadic tendencies, always planning the next leg of travel or horse show to attend, either or both of these travel apps would be welcomed.

Kayak: This is Apple\’s most popular travel app, and much like the website, is a cost- and time-efficient way to search for flights, hotels and car rentals all in one place. It even features a function for a Packing List.  With Kayak you can track your flight, convert currency and check out tours and attractions around your destination.

Trip It: For those with multiple trip bookings on the go, this handy app links to your e-mail account and picks up any confirmation number that comes into your Inbox – from dinner reservations, to flights, hotel and car rentals. Install Trip It and lose the messy and inconvenient paper trail typically storing this information.

Of course, there are numerous equine apps to be downloaded as well. My confession at this point is I haven\’t tried any of them! Rather than me wading through all of the choices and reviewing them, I\’m calling out to you to let us all know what equine apps the most useful, and of course, entertaining.

In the comment section below, let us know what your favorite equine-related app is (If you don\’t currently use an equine app, just name any app you find useful), and we\’ll enter you in draw to win a Kim Taylor daytimer. I gushed over these daytimers back at week 11 of the countdown. They are a gorgeous and useful timepiece of western ranch photography, and I still have one or two at the office to give away.

Looking forward to hearing your suggestions for best apps.