I Bought a New Recording Studio and It’s In My Phone!

I’m always looking for a good deal and when I find an app that let’s me use one of my many microphones and be outdoors I’m the first one to hit that “Buy” button! During the holidays I saw the app Backpack Studio on sale and decided to check it out. The developers were the same ones who created Bossjock Studio and I had a great time using that app. So, I figured this would be a better app with more options and settings based on the app store description.
Digging around in my box of goodies for a mic and my Shure Motive audio interface, I decided to put the app to use and go out and have some fun!

The app works with just about any microphone that you can connect to your iOS phone via lightning connection or blue tooth. However, if you wish to just get going on recording, you can use your Apple ear buds to get the show started. There are plenty of settings for control junkies like myself who have to have control over the compression, EQ and limitor settings. But, Backpack Studio let’s you start recording with settings that are adjusted automatically. The automated settings are actually rather good if you don’t wish to dig around in the settings and adjust things yourself. There are tiles that you can assign sound effects to or even complete intros and outros for a podcast. There are no lengths to what you can assign to these tiles so you can program several songs on them and record an entire radio show with you as the DJ inbetween songs. There are obviously plenty of options here but of course my favorite feature is that you can monitor yourself easily through the app so you can hear what is being recorded. I can’t tell you how many recordings I’ve had to retake because I couldn’t tell if the app was recording what I wanted it to record. So thank you developers, next round of beer is on me!

Now at this point most Voiceover users will ask if the app is accessible. Being a Voiceover user myself, I had to test the developers claim on their web site that Backpack Studio is fully accessible. To my delight, the app was incredibly accessible. All settings for the microphone and recording settings are fully adjustable with Voiceover. The preset Tiles where you store recordings or songs are activated quickly with a single finger double tap. Recording a show in person at your favorite coffee shop, convention or concert and uploading instantly is a snap. Imagine recording that awesome interview and publishing it up on Youtube or Facebook right away. If you prefer to do some post editing, you can upload your work to Dropbox or iCloud and choose your recording format in wave or MP3 with various sampling rates.
The great thing is that at no point during any of these actions does Voiceover appear in the recording. Once you hit record, the app does its thing and you can simply swipe left and right on the horizontal list of tiles and double tap on the one you wish to start playing. If you need to adjust volume while it is playing, simply swipe up or down as needed. Using Voiceover you are in total control of the entire show. This ability took me back to my college radio days where I learned to hit play on carts for ads and sound effects. All I need now is to sneak in some 99 cent tacos from Jack in the Box and this will be exactly like my college days.

During the holidays Backpack Studio was on sale and the price has since gone back up to $9.99 on the Apple App store. However, for what it does and how easy it is to use with Voiceover, I would still pay that price for recording interviews on the go. I love being able to record funny clips and send them to friends through Whatsapp . I think I may just start Air Dropping funny clips to people on the train ride into work.

Whatever your use may be for recording on your iPhone, Backpack Studio can definitely help improve the quality of your sound. The ability to upload any of your own effects or songs to the app and send it just about anywhere makes it worth the price alone. However, for control junkies like me, it has tons of settings to shape your recordings exactly how you want them to sound. I grabbed this app to have fun on the go and to fulfill that desire I get when I’m out and about and suddenly hear things that make me say “I wish I had my microphone with me.” With this app and how quickly I can get it going on my iPhone, I can do that and so much more. So pick it up, get out there and record something wonderful today.

One of my favorite movies of the 1980’s is the cold war science fiction classic Wargames. If you haven’t seen it, I recommend it highly, specially if you call yourself a gamer of any kind. Although I still play tic-tac-toe all the time, I still wish there was a game where you could play Thermo Nuclear War like they do in the movie. My favorite site to play games doesn’t have that game yet. However, there are tons of games available and I most recently found out that I can play them along with my sighted friends! So as the super computer in Wargames asks, “shall we play a game?”

There are tons of games available for the blind if you just know where to look. One of my favorite places to spend an afternoon… All right, sometimes an entire evening too is rsgames.org.
Whether you play games on a PC, a Mac or on your iPhone , you have plenty of games to choose from here. Games like Uno, Blackjack or the ever classic Monopoly are ready to be played along with your friends.
Recently, while setting up a non-digital version of Monopoly at home with Braille cards and dice, I wondered if there was a way to play Monopoly on RSGames along with a sighted player. Being the tech nerd that I am, I shouted “for science!” and headed on over to see what was possible…

Turns out, not much testing had to be done. Right on the main page, on the Quick Links section, is a link that says Play using the RS Games Web Client (In a Web Browser). So long as your sighted player has access to the web, they can play alongside you with any of the games listed on RSGames without having to download the client.

That’s excellent! Will they get to see what I hear?

Unfortunately, there is no video or animation of any kind on the web server version of RSGames. But, for many of these games not having any video or animation doesn’t take from the excitement of gameplay. So what if you don’t actually get to see that you are holding a Blue 2 card in Uno or that your battleship is tucked away in that little corner I can never find! The web client still provides a sighted person with a text version of everything that a visually impaired person is hearing while playing the game. Additionally, buttons are provided for all the commands as well. So your sighted gamer can also participate with chats and taunt you relentlessly while you sit with $5 left in Monopoly.
Sadly, there is no music provided on the web client. Now, for some that may be a plus, specially after you heard the same beat for the past 4 hours… All right, I admit six plus hours for me… Those Cards against humanity games can get seriously funny on a Friday night with good friends!
But, whether there is any audio or video at all, the fact that there is 23 different games that you can currently play with both your sighted and non-sighted friends is amazing!
I can now have game nights at my apartment and just loan my sighted gamer friends a Chromebook if they fail to bring a laptop. All right, I did do a proper test and made sure that the web server works on any platform and it does with any browser. For those visually impaired gamers downloading the client, you can do so onto PC, Macs and Linux computers. Options for playing games on your iPhone are also available for a small fee. Moreover, while testing from my PC using Jaws 2018 I discovered that the entire list of chat and play buttons are available while using Jaws. Hmmmm, maybe that discovery wasn’t so good… I may have to start playing from work now!

Let’s Get Ready to Rumble!

Call it a scientific approach to ensuring the long-term benefits of interaction of both sighted and non-sighted game players or just plain laziness… My decision to test if RSGames was a viable option turned out to be one that I wish I would of tested out a long time ago. The web client is currently an Alpha Version. So it may run into some problems while playing. However, in a multi-hour Monopoly game I recently took part in, there was no problems what so ever that my sighted companion had while using the web client.
So grab a laptop or two and share with your friends. Playing in the same room is fun. But, you can also play while in different parts of the world and still hear each other. RSGames has a built in voice feature that lets you talk in real time with your fellow gamers. This feature seriusly comes in handy when you want someone to take another hit in Blackjack. Talk about peer pressure! Unfortunately voice chat is not available on the web client. However, alternate solutions are available like Skype conference calls or using TeamTalk to carry on voice chats with your fellow players.
Those Friday Game nights can get pretty intense as your hoping everyone lands on your Boardwalk with 1 hotel! but fortunately, you have a way to share those intense moments with both your sighted and non-sighted friends. Look for me when you’re setting up a game and if I’m not already blowing up someone’s submarine for the win, I’ll gladly join. I go by the obvious name of TheVIGeek.