Torn on upgrading to an iPhone 6S or 6S Plus? There are two days to go until they go on sale here but 3 News has been given a sneak peek of what's on offer.
Style
There's a new colour on the block and it's called rose gold. It's to go with your new rose gold watch of course! However, as yo mamma always told you, it's what's on the inside that counts.
3D touch
This "S" girl likes to be handled properly. With 3D touch, she's deeply sensitive. You can tease with gentle touch 'peek' at things like an email, then if it's worth looking at properly, press harder or 'pop' and it opens the email. The peek and pop can be useful for all sorts of things but I also liked it for messages and photos.
Selfies
Talking of which, I'm the world's worst selfie taker. The iPhone 6s has a 5-megapixel front facing camera which uses the home screen to light me up. Made me look better even in our dark and grotty garage.
Photos
Talking of which…. the 12-megapixel camera and auto focus does a good job of highlighting our generally haggard faces.
Live photos
Wish that photo could come alive? Live Photo does exactly that. It's on by default in the camera app and works by taking series of photos for one-and-a-half seconds on either side of the shutter press and it also records sound. HTC or Nokia fans will have seen this kind of idea before. Check out my chicken and waterfall. Yes, I know, I’m rubbish at taking photos.
6S Plus pluspoint
The iPhone 6S Plus camera comes with an optical video stabilization feature that makes it possible to record smooth looking footage even with shaky hands. Just look how well it worked for us as we went for a run.
Processor
A9 is Apple's new third generation 64-bit chip. Apparently 70 percent faster than the A8 on things like opening an app. Not that I usually time these things...
As for the watch update…
watchOS 2
Delayed by a week but now out, and the Apple Watch update is fairly comprehensive. Here are some of the features and apps for it I've been playing with.
Time travel
Check your calendar up to 72 hours forward or backwards by twiddling the Digital Crown. It shows up on your watch face.
Email replies
Reply to emails as well as texts by voice, emojis or a list of smart responses.
Nightstand mode
Charge the watch on its side to clearly see the time and use the Crown to hit snooze.
Faces
The art continues. Even the slightly boring modular mode gets a makeover where you can change the colours up. The time-lapse pictures are great (six so far). Can we get a New Zealand scene on here please? I also like being able to use a single photo or photo album for the watch face.
WiFi
watchOS 2 can connect to open WiFi networks without needing to connect to the phone first. Android Wear's latest update already supports this feature.
Third-party app info
In watchOS 2 you can display info from other apps such as flight departure times, latest sports scores etc. on the face.
New looks
New rose gold aluminium (see video) and gold aluminium cases, and a range of straps.
Third-party apps
This is where the watch is going to really shine. Developers can now create faster, powerful, native third-party apps taking advantage of the Taptic Engine, Digital Crown, accelerometer, heart rate sensor, speaker, and microphone.
The team at GoPro gave me a hands-on experience with their new app which lets you use Apple Watch as a viewfinder so no matter where your camera is mounted, you'll always know where it's pointed. Tapping the screen can put markers on the best bits. I can see this is going to be a huge hit. In the demo, we filmed ourselves driving remote control trucks. Not the best idea for me… I drove it off the course at top speed and straight into someone's shins. Whoops!
Sphero fans will love the robot maker's latest creation BB8. Its founder Ian Bernstein showed me how it can now be operated with the watch using gestures, simply moving his wrist left and right.
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