Re-Collections for iOS

Re-Collections

They say, Every picture tells a story.
Well, why not get your pictures to tell YOUR story.
Re-Collections captures those moments for you, creating lasting memories for everyone to enjoy.

Now available for iPhone as well as iPad!

Features

  • Make your family history come to life by adding audio and text to your photos.
  • Capture those precious first reactions and memories using continuous audio recording - it keeps recording as you swipe from picture to picture!
  • Create a slideshow connecting several or all of your photos and recollections.
  • Share these recollections with others using email, Facebook, Twitter, Weibo and other social media.
  • Import your photos from Dropbox, your Photo Library or use the inbuilt camera.

Re-Collections ­– sharing real stories.


Concept

Re-Collections was originally conceived as a way to capture the first reactions and emotion conveyed when someone first sees a photo. To make that happen, press the microphone button once to start recording, then simply swipe to the next photo - the audio continues to record. When you have finished viewing your photos, simply press the microphone button once more and your recording stops. There's no need to continually hit the record button to start and stop recording for each photo ­- the continuous audio recording feature cuts and tags the audio for you, saving each photo's audio clip individually, but playable as a continuous recording in your slideshow.

Of course you can also use the Re-Collections app to add audio and text notes to any images - so make a presentation for the office, for your team or group, or anything else.

Background Story

After discovering a satchel of old photos at my father's house, I borrowed them and scanned them in to my computer. A couple of years later my Dad came for a visit, so I asked him if he'd go through the photos with me and tell me something about each one. As we were doing this, I realised the need for an easy-to-use app that would allow making text notes, so that afternoon I hastily created a prototype on my trusty Mac. The next day, as we continued browsing through the photos, I jotted down some of the details that Dad described. But there was something missing.

As I was scribbling away, I realised that the words I wrote only told a fraction of the story. The REAL story was in my Dad's voice, his emotion, his laughter, and the journeys that came flooding back as he described these wonderful snapshots of his parents, his grandparents, his childhood memories of Scotland and beyond.

I realised that I wanted to be able to capture these first moments of seeing a photo - when the emotion is right there with you. Thus I came up with the idea of continuous recording - no action was required to start recording for each photo, so there would be no interruption of the viewer's connection to the photo.

It's that simple.

Unfortunately my Dad is no longer here and I can't use this with him to record his great stories. Just make sure you don't lose the chance to record your family's stories.

I hope Re-Collections can help you with that.

How to use Re-Collections for iPad

Below are some sections with links to show how to use different parts of Re-Collections.
Re-Collections Overview

Overview

Overview of your pictures with control panel.

Re-Collections Slideshow

Slideshow

Play your pictures, audio and text back in a slideshow.

Overview

  • Here you get an overview of all the pictures that you have currently imported.
  • Re-collections Overview
  • To open a picture to add a description or audio comment to it, simply make a long touch and release.
  • Then you will be taken to the editing screen where you can type notes in or record audio notes.
  • At the top of the overview you can see the control panel as below.
  • Organiser control Bar
  • Using the control panel you can:
    • Preferences Set preferences for text appearance, slideshow playback, continuous recording, and so on.
    • Import images Import images from your image library, the camera or from Dropbox.
    • Delete images Delete images.
    • Slide show Play a slideshow of the selected images.
    • Sharing Share images and associated notes via email, Facebook, Twitter, Weibo. Note that some of the available functionality depends on the version of iOS that you're running.
    • Select all Quickly select all or no images with one click.
  • To select an image to include it in a slideshow, simply touch it to select or de-select it.


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Importing Pictures

  • To start using Re-Collections you'll need to import some pictures. You can import pictures:
    • from your Image Library
    • by taking Photos with your in-built camera
    • from Dropbox.
  • To import pictures from Dropbox you will need to log in to your Dropbox account first. Once this has been successful, you will see your Dropbox files and folders on screen, as below.
  • Import images from Dropbox

  • Click on any picture to see a preview of it. Click on the Add button to import that picture.
  • To go up to a parent folder, click on the top line of the contents - the folder with the 2 dots.
  • Click outside the Dropbox window to close it.
  • NEW - select multiple images and import them all at once. You can also quickly select all images in the current folder and add them.
  • A short video walk-through showing importing pictures using Dropbox is below:


Recording Notes

  • To be able to record audio notes or to write text notes for an image you go to the image "Editing" screen. From the "Overview" screen, touch and hold down (long press) on an image, then release to open the image editor
  • Touch in the editing field to start typing in notes about this image.
  • Image editing tools
  • To record audio, touch the microphone icon to start and stop recording. The microphone will flash red while it's recording.
  • Once you have added an audio note, the speaker icon will show how many audio notes you have recorded for this image - you can touch it to select an audio note to play it back.
  • Swipe left or right to move to the next or previous image. Your notes will be automatically saved.
  • Continuous Recording

  • Continuous Recording can be set up in the Preferences screen.
  • If you've set continuous recording up, start recording audio and then just swipe to the next image - audio recording will stop for the current image and automatically start for the next image. Thus you can catch those special emotions and reactions when someone first views an image, without having to repeatedly press the microphone to start and stop recording.
  • Deleting audio notes

  • You can add further audio notes and also delete them.
  • Deleting an audio note
  • To delete an audio note, touch the speaker to open the audio notes list and swipe to the left on any audio note to show the delete button. Press delete to confirm deletion or swipe to the right to hide the Delete button.
  • A short demo of adding notes is below:


Setting Preferences

  • Preferences Set preferences for text appearance, slideshow playback, continuous recording, and so on.
  • Here you can change settings for Pictures, Slideshows and text display.
  • In the Pictures tab, you can set continuous recording on or off.
  • In the Slide Show tab, you can set:
  • Slideshow settings
    • Slide Display Time - including Audio Length, which means show the slide for as long as all audio clips for this slide will play;
    • Minimum Display Time - if Audio Length was selected above, the slide will display for at least as long as you select here, in case there's no or only a short audio note;
    • Continuous Loop - repeat the slide show continuously in a loop;
    • Show Text - show text notes for each slide;
    • Music - play background music during the slideshow. If selected, this enables the next option;
    • Select Music - select music or other audio from your library;
    • Transition - the transition to use between slides - selecting random will enable different, random transitions between each slide. Touch the small box to the right of this to preview the transition you've selected.
  • In the Text tab you can change slideshow text settings (including the backdrop colour).
  • To save your settings or to close the settings window, just click outside it.
  • A short demo of accessing settings is below:


Playing a Slideshow

  • Slide show Touch this button in the control panel to play a slideshow of the selected images.
  • Check your settings to change how your slideshow appears.
  • Touch a slide to pause a slideshow - controls will appear with which you can continue or stop and return to the overview.
  • Slideshow paused
  • A short demo of playing a slideshow is below:


Sharing your Recollection

  • Share your pictures, audio and text notes with friends and family.
  • Sharing Just select the picture(s) that you want to share and click on the share button.
  • Then you can share using a number of services (note that these may be dependent on the version of iOS that your device has installed). These include:
    • Email
    • Facebook
    • Twitter
    • Weibo
    • Printing, saving to a contact, saving to your image library may also be options.
  • Please note that you may have problems if you try to share too many pictures at one time. You may also want to do this when you're connected to a Wifi network and not on a mobile network.

Do you have questions or feedback for us? Get in touch!

We're always happy to hear comments and suggestions for improvements.