Tech Spotlight

Apps from Fly Labs clear video-editing picture

The Fly app from Fly Labs makes it easy to combine clips into one video on the iPhone, as well as add transitions, music and voice-overs.
The Fly app from Fly Labs makes it easy to combine clips into one video on the iPhone, as well as add transitions, music and voice-overs.

Nearly everyone is carrying around a still camera with video capabilities in their pocket nowadays in the form of a smartphone.

There are plenty of editor apps that make it easy to edit photos and send them to family, friends or social media.

where it’s @

Tempo, Clip, Crop and Fly from Fly Labs are all free to download from the Apple App Store. Android versions are not available. Additions to the apps can be made through in-app purchases. More information is available at editonthefly.com.

It's not as easy to find video editors. They can be complicated, lack features or lack the ability to do basic things, such as turn a video accidentally shot vertically into a horizontal one.

Fly Labs is working to make that a lot easier with a set of apps that allow for easy editing, often with only a touch or two. The apps are available in the Apple App Store. Unfortunately, they aren't available for Android.

Fly Labs has four apps to work with videos: Crop, Tempo, Clip and Fly. Crop takes those vertical photos and crops them to a horizontal video. Tempo changes the speed of a video, giving it either a time-lapse or slow-motion effect. Clip combines different video clips into one, and Fly puts everything together with transitions and special effects, such as picture-in-picture and split-screen.

The apps all have a simple interface and use touch and drag-and-drop gestures to accomplish most of the tasks. The Tempo, Clip and Fly apps can add music from the iPhone or music provided by the apps. Once the clips and music are chosen, everything is put into the main screen to be edited.

Editing is meant to be incredibly easy. Touching a clip puts it on the editing timeline. Touching the next clip adds it to the timeline. The clips play constantly during editing.

In Fly, in-app purchases provide the Gestures Pack, Audio Pack and Clips Editor for $2.99 each, or $5.99 for all three in the Fly Essentials pack. A $9.99 purchase also provides the Multi Cam pack, which allows a user to connect to Fly on other nearby devices and control all of the cameras on one phone. I didn't test this feature, but I did test the other features. Frankly, they're pretty necessary, so it's a bit annoying that each set of editing tools had to be purchased.

The apps basically work the same, but Fly adds some neat special effects.

It's easy to edit clips and audio. Sliders on bars allow you to choose the precise moments in clips or songs to use in the final video. Fly even allows you to record voice-overs for clips.

The four apps can work individually, but they work best together. The idea is to use Crop to prepare the photos to be the right size, Tempo to apply a time lapse or slow-motion special effect, Clip to put the clips together, and Fly to blend it with other clips, music or special effects.

Once the videos are created, the apps provide several options to share them in various social media apps, including Facebook and Instagram. They can be sent in Messenger, provided they aren't too big. They also can be saved to Photos or AirDropped to other phones or Apple devices.

The video editors aren't perfect. While it puts a bit of a fade at the end, it would be nice to be able to add and adjust the fade. It's nice that you can pick which clip of music to use, but it would be nice to be able to put a fade to it, as well. Editing the clips is more crude than precise, but it's usually close enough to get the job done.

The apps won't provide the high-grade editing of desktop video editing, but they're great tools if you're out and about and need something immediately.

These apps can help you do more with the videos that come off that occasional camera in your pocket.

SundayMonday Business on 07/27/2015

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