Table of contents for Issue 48 in iPad User Magazine

Every autumn brings a big new update to iPads (as well as iPhones, and Apple’s other products). iOS 12 focuses on speed and stability improvements more than flashy new features, which is great if you use your iPad daily for work (or just as a computer replacement), because it’ll be smoother than ever. But there are still great new features to explore, and we’ve highlighted lots of them this issue. We’ll take a quick overview of the changes to things like the News app, we’ll look at how the Photos app’s search has been made even more powerful, and we’ll take you through using the brand new app Measure – and that’s just a taste! We’ve got some other great guides too, of course. Our guide to the guitar instrument…

1 The right space Your iPhone needs to calibrate itself to understand where it is before you can measure objects. It takes seconds. 2 Point and scan Simply point at any object and the Measure app will recognise it and produce immediate data to work with. 3 Tap to capture Tap a marker and the measurement will be displayed ready for you to copy to any other app. 4 Easy conversions You will be shown the measurement in two formats and you can tap once to share with others instantly. 5 Point to point Tap the ‘+’ icon to measure from a new point. You can do this again and again until it is complete. 6 It’s not exact Remember that the measurements are not exact. They are great for…

Notifications are vital for keeping in touch and for connecting with friends and work colleagues, but they have tended to be slightly clunky when it comes to how they can be controlled. iOS 12 resolves this issue and you can now manage the settings in a much more personal way which will let you receive notifications in the way you want. It takes no time at all to learn. 1 Individual notifications Multiple notifications can be tiresome to view if you receive many throughout the day via various apps. They need a little taming. 2 Bringing order Notification Centre in iOS 12 groups everything by app, which makes it much easier to view what has come in with just a glance. 3 Tap to expand One tap lets you view…

Siri gets a rough ride from many critics. Apple’s strong stance on privacy is partly the reason for the limitations, but a minimal loss of automation is a small price to pay to stay safe when travelling or going about your daily business. Siri in iOS 12, however, is now smarter and will offer more genuinely useful benefits. 1 Know your celebrities You can ask Siri for celebrity facts and most answers will be displayed within the Siri interface rather than through a third-party website. 2 Instant translations Siri is capable of translating phrases in 40 languages. Say a phrase and ask Siri to translate it to the language of your choice. The results are instant. 3 Understand your food The USDA database now backs up Siri and it offers…

1 Get a guitar Start or open a song and tap on the instruments icon top left. Swipe until you see Guitar. The easiest way to start playing is to choose Smart Guitar, so let’s do just that by tapping on the appropriate icon. 2 Start strumming Smart Guitar is fun. Tap a string and it’ll play the appropriate note; tap the name of the chord above the strings and GarageBand will play the whole chord. You can also strum by swiping up or down on the strings. 3 Change the key Fancy a different key? Tap the settings icon (the wrench) and then choose Key Signature. You can now choose the root note and whether it’s a minor or major key. The guitar chords change accordingly. 4 Play some…

Apple is known for making software that can be used by people of all ages and technical knowledge levels. There is rarely a learning curve, as is evidenced by the lack of manuals included with the products, and for most people it is a case of jumping in and discovering what the hardware and software has to offer. However, if you take the time to truly understand what each new feature can do in iOS 12, you will get more out of your iPhone and iPad and you can learn how to become an iOS genius in no time. We will guide you through what’s new and highlight the changes to classic iOS apps, some of which are hard to spot at first glance, and we’ll show you how to…

The hardware is what makes mobile iOS photography so popular and there is no doubt that Apple has put many resources into its development over the years. In iOS 12 there are no large-scale changes in the Camera setup, but there are two useful additions. Some would like to see major changes, but the only way to seriously improve your photos is to take time to improve your own technique with continual practice. 1 Fun effects When you snap a photo in Messages or FaceTime you can now tap ‘Effects’ and take advantage of a host of fun features to add personality. 2 Add a filter The first option, and most obvious change, is to add a filter. There’s a nice selection built into iOS 12, with a preview of…

FaceTime is a crucial feature for families and friends, but it has some big limitations. iOS 12 is set to add some much-needed flexibility: you will be able to converse with multiple people (2) at the same time in a group call. When someone is speaking, the software will intelligently make them prominent on the screen (1) which makes the conversation visually as well as audibly logical throughout. Try it with a few acquaintances and you will see just how quickly and smoothly it works no matter how many people are present. There is little to learn in the new FaceTime, and you will find that the screen prompts are completely obvious from the first use. People can join the call (3) from an iPhone, iPad, Mac or even an…

Photos’ search facility is now more intuitive and is fast enough to change the results as you type with multiple word searches built in. Sharing suggestions give you ideas of the content you can share with others and it is clever enough to allow the recipients to complete a memory by adding photos from the same event or day. 1 It just knows Tap the ‘For You’ tab and see what pops up. You will see photos at the top with sharing suggestions beneath them based on who is in the actual photos. It is eerily clever. 2 Time to share When you tap the option, a list of people in the photos will populate. You can now select them all or individually choose who you want to share the…

1 Side-by-side apps Open an app, then swipe up from the screen’s bottom edge to reveal the Dock. Hold a finger on an app icon. When it enlarges, drag it to the left or right edge. When the first app shrinks to make room, let go to open the other app on that side. 2 Move or swap apps One app has a line at its top. Drag the line to move the app to the other side of the screen. Drag and drop is also used to replace what’s open. Drag an icon over one of the already-open apps. When the latter dims, let go to replace it. 3 Apps not in the Dock You can drag app icons from places other than the Dock. Return to the Home…

IT WILL TAKE 5 minutes YOU WILL LEARN How to use your iPad as a teleprompter YOU’LL NEED Pages 4 or later, iOS 11 or later Whether you have an important speech to give, a talk to record, or just want to pretend you’re a newsreader, a teleprompter is an essential piece of kit. It makes text big, clear and distraction-free, and you can either swipe it up with one hand on your iPhone, or have it scroll automatically on an iPad next to your camera for you to read aloud as you film. Indeed, professionals will use a one-way mirror at 45° with the iPad laying flat beneath the camera, so they’re looking right down the barrel of the lens as they read. There are plenty of mounts that…

1 Start speaking Once you’ve signed up for your free Anchor account you’ll see this screen, which couldn’t be much clearer: to record, it’s just a matter of tapping Record and then pressing the red button to start. 2 Check it out When you hit stop, you’ll be invited to preview your recording to check that it sounds okay. You can swipe the bottom section to add various background tracks to the clip. Tap on Save when you’re finished with it. 3 Ready to go If you’re a shoot-from-the-lip, one-take kind of podcaster, you can upload your recording and publish it straight away. But Anchor enables you to add some extra things, so let’s choose the not-yet option. 4 Mix it up You can have multiple recordings in the same…

Screen Time lets you delve deeper than you normally would into your iPad and iPhone usage. You likely have some idea of how addicted to your devices you are, but here you can back that up with stats and, just like a fitness tracker, you can aim to change your usage over time, if you choose. The amount of data and control on offer is quite astonishing. 1 Enable it When you first open the feature by going to Settings > Screen Time it will enable and start to track your usage of apps immediately. 2 And so it begins The stats will start to build up and you can now spend time diving deep into your usage by app, as well as your overall screen time. 3 Set a…

Some of the standard iOS apps have received an update in iOS 12. What were simplistic apps now have features that will help you to do more with them, and we will show you what is new so that you can explore the benefits. There is nothing technical to learn here, but knowing the changes will help a lot. 1 Interactive stocks The graphs in the Stocks app are now interactive, and when you place your finger on them you can drag to see data for any particular day. 2 The financial news Below the graphs and data, you can also now see full financial articles with just one tap. It links perfectly to Apple News to give you the full picture. 3 A new voice Voice Memos has landed…

Do Not Disturb is literally running in the background every day, doing exactly what it needs to with no fuss at all. To many people it is just about perfect, but this has not stopped Apple from tinkering with it to add a little more functionality that will come in handy time and time again. 1 The classic settings You can still go to Settings and manage Do Not Disturb. It’s not an exciting screen, but it does work well. 2 A new display The lock screen display is now more detailed and transparent than before. A simple, but effective change. 3 The important change Enable Do Not Disturb in Control Centre and new temporary options appear. One tap sets each one.…

1 A new design You will notice a slightly cleaner and more logical Apple News design in iOS 12. The interface is close to perfect now. 2 Manage your channels Spend time tailoring the channels to your preferences and you’ll get daily content that is interesting to you. 3 Play with Spotlight Spotlight is great at presenting long articles in a way that is readable, so you can catch up quickly.…

Siri has gained a new use in iOS 12 by letting you create your own shortcuts for commonly used tasks. No matter what you want to do it takes seconds to record a phrase which is connected to an action and you can create as many as you like. Potentially, you will find yourself using this feature every day. 1 Find the settings Go to Settings > Siri & Search and tap ‘More Shortcuts’. Select an example actions in the list and tap the ‘+’ icon. 2 Build a shortcut Tap the record button and record a phrase to trigger the action. Tap ‘Done’ and it will be available in the future. 3 It’s also proactive Siri also suggests actions on the lock screen. These supplement the manually created shortcuts…

1 Limitations Whether you start a Pages document on iOS, iCloud.com or Mac, be aware that Presenter Mode only works on word processing documents (not layout), and text in boxes won’t display. Special fonts and images will be jettisoned. 2 Take it to iOS Once you’ve got the doc on your iPad, iPhone or iPod touch – via iCloud Drive, AirDrop, iTunes, Dropbox, or whatever works for you – open it, then tap the three-dot icon at the top right of the screen. Choose Presenter Mode. 3 Move text on To move text on, you can either scroll manually – by dragging text, or grabbing the scrubber at the right – or tap the screen to turn on Auto Scroll. Hold a finger on the screen to pause scrolling temporarily;…

IT WILL TAKE 15 minutes YOU WILL LEARN How to create colour grading presets and mix effects as layers YOU’LL NEED iOS 11 or later There are various reasons why a video maker might want to alter the colour and tones of their footage. Clips may be incorrectly exposed or suffer from colour casts. These problems can occur when shooting on Auto or in contrasting lighting conditions. An editor may also want to creatively adjust (or ‘grade’) their footage to create a particular look, such as making their material look colourful and warm, or washed out and cold, to evoke a particular mood. Amateur film makers might use in-camera settings to create high contrasting and vibrantly coloured clips. These clips are harder to adjust in post-production apps, because tonal details…

1 Add ungraded clip Drag an ungraded clip to the timeline. We shot our example clip on a GoPro using the Protune setting to create a flat contrast. Tap the Clip Tools (toolbox) icon, then tap the Edit button. In the Edit panel, tap the Color & Effects tab. 2 Apply a preset Tap a preset such as Contrast. This gives you sliders to tweak. Drag the Contrast slider right to boost it further. The Levels slider’s five handles enable you to adjust shadow, midtone and highlight brightness and contrast. 3 Selective colour boost Drag Vibrance right to increase the saturation of weaker colours without ruining stronger ones. To claw back more highlight detail in bright skies, drag Highlight Amount left. Lighten shadows by dragging Shadow Amount right. 4 Create…