Even though I’ve owned a Mac for going on 5+ years now, I never thought I would actually end up using screen savers. But the launch of Aerial a few months ago, which I’ve been using daily ever since, has definitely changed my mind. Awesome Apple TV screen savers on the Mac is a win. And today I came across the Apple Watch Screen Saver for OS X by Rasmus Nielsen and immediately knew it would be my next screen saver of choice.

Incorporating over 80 combinations of the already recognizable and well designed Apple Watch faces, all in Retina display quality, it makes a great additional screen saver to have installed. For those unfamiliar with the process of installing new screen savers on the Mac, or just want an overview before starting, I’ve put together a small guide below to walk you through the process:

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Is this really one of Apple’s official spokespeople for GarageBand? That’s what The Verge says in this T-Painful tutorial that teaches us next to nothing about today’s Garageband update. An update that by the way actually introduces some interesting new features for users of the audio production suite Apple bundles with its iOS devices and Macs.
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In this week’s episode of The Logic Pros, we will be taking a look at three handy little tricks to keep things moving and a little more tidy, as well as some helpful plug-in quick keys and shortcuts.

Sometimes it’s the little things that keep our minds focused on the task at hand, whether it be tedious straight-line editing for film/TV/app work or carefully crafted creative ideas. LPX is at its best when I forget I’m even using it. Personal plug-in menus, customized default plug-in settings, templates and a deeply comprehensive instrument library are just a few things Logic uses to make our lives easier every day. So we thought a new mini series was in-line, covering some of our favorite LPX experience-enhancing shortcuts. Here are a few to get started:

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Whether you’re brand new to the Apple Watch or you’ve been wearing yours since day one, there are a few key tips everyone should know to get the most out of the new smartwatch. Many of these actually weren’t available on day one and only became possible recently, and each of these I’ve found essential to having the best experience possible. Knowing the best apps to add new features is a great start, and each of these tips presented in no particular order will make your Apple Watch even better.

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Over the weekend a good friend of mine shared a screenshot of a really scary error message from Photos for Mac. Every photo and video taken over the last two weeks failed to open, saying instead that ‘An error occurred while downloading a larger version of this video for editing.’ The solution? ‘Please try again later.’ and press OK. What’s worse is he was relying on the app’s Optimize Mac Storage setting to fit the library on his local storage and trusting iCloud not to screw things up along the way. And he didn’t have local copies backed up, a mistake he for obvious reasons regretted.

Stories like these aren’t rare, which is why my colleague Jeremy wrote earlier this year that “iCloud Photo Library still isn’t worth the hassles,” despite Apple lowering iCloud storage costs. But I still recommend Photos and iCloud Photo Library, new features that topped my “favorite new Apple things from 2015 that will last for years” list, just not with the default setup. As with any cloud service, the one major caveat is ensure you have a reliable local backup (followed by plenty of patience at the start).

While there’s no turning back data loss, I shared my personal Photos plus iCloud Photo Library setup with my friend, which he’s moving to now for a hopefully better experience. Below I’ll detail each step, which required a little research before I figured it all out, so you can hopefully have a positive experience with Photos and iCloud Photo Library as well.

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While it undoubtedly drives the rest of my family crazy, I sure love Christmas music and don’t mind one bit that it takes over radio stations on November 1st. FM radio is okay in the car and I’ve used Pandora and iHeartRadio the last few years to find a variety of Christmas music, but ads and skip limits are no good when you’ve got access to a streaming music catalog everywhere you go. This year I’m all in with Apple Music and finding it terrific as my own personal Christmas music station.

Apple Music does a pretty good job of serving up a variety of ad-free Christmas music through stations and playlists … if you know where to look. Here are a few tips to set you in the right direction if you want to feel festive and spread the Christmas mood:

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Later today Apple is set to pull the plug on Beats Music and completely stop the service. The reason? After buying the subscription music service in a $3 billion deal that also included Beats headphones and speakers last year, Apple Music has now fully launched and replaces Beats Music. Any remaining subscribers will need to transfer from Beats Music to Apple Music immediately to avoid losing saved music libraries and playlists. The good news is Apple Music now has almost all of Beats Music’s features with only a few exceptions…
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In this week’s episode of The Logic Pros, we will be taking a short break from the usual routine to stock up on discounted iPad synth apps, plug-ins for Logic, keyboard controllers and more as we transition from Black Friday to Cyber Monday. We have been tracking all the deals to be had over the holiday weekend on 9to5Toys, so we thought a roundup of the best music production and home recording gear/software was in order for this week’s episode:
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In this week’s episode of The Logic Pros, we will be taking a user-friendly look at Logic’s mysterious and powerful MIDI Environment. Along with what seems like a countless number of possibilities, tools, MIDI FX mods and more, the Environment has an interesting little item known as Touch Tracks that can do some pretty amazing things once it’s set up properly:
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Yesterday I mentioned a useful tip for using physical keyboards with iPads in my guide to unlocking the full potential of the iPad Pro. The tip actually works with all iOS 9 iPads connected to external keyboards over Bluetooth, Lightning, or the Smart Connector: hold Command (⌘) to see a list of supported keyboard shortcuts for the Home screen or app you’re in.

This works in most of Apple’s built-in apps and plenty of popular third-party apps as well, but it can be monotonous prompting that sheet in each app to get a sense of what keyboard shortcuts work. Instead, I’ve compiled a cheat sheet of which keyboard shortcuts work in all the system apps and several popular third-party apps. Whether you’re using Apple’s Smart Keyboard for the iPad Pro, Magic Keyboard, Logitech’s excellent K811, or any other physical keyboard, these will make you more efficient when working on your iPad.

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If you haven’t mastered iOS 9 and all its new tricks introduced in September, then it’s easy to find yourself using the iPad Pro as just a jumbo iPad Air or iPad mini. But new multitasking features like Picture in Picture, Split View, and Slide Over transform the iPad Pro experience and shine on the larger display if you know how to use them and which apps work. And while the iPad Pro doesn’t have 3D Touch like new iPhones, there’s a similar keyboard cursor gesture to now about. All that plus much more on unlocking the full potential of the iPad Pro below:
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If you have a new iPad Pro and have had issues using the new software keyboard, you’re probably not alone. Aside from following the iPhone 6/Plus lead and adding new keys in the space around the QWERTY keyboard, iPad Pro includes a full sized shift key and half-height number keys which in theory require fewer taps to access more characters.

In practice, the new layout requires an adjustment period, to put it mildly, as the keys most frequently accessed are surrounded by targets that you have to avoid tapping accidentally. I’m on day four and getting better, but there’s one embarrassing keyboard bug that had me convinced I was crazy. Turns out I may not be. Here’s the deal:
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When you send pictures, videos, audio messages and other attachments in Messages on iPhone and iPad, it stays on the device by default taking up memory. For a lot of people, Messages is the second biggest app on their device in terms of storage, with Photos often being the biggest, because of the fact that the photos they share from Photos actually gets stored twice on the device: within Photos and within Messages. In this How-To article, I’m going to discuss how to delete multiple images in Messages very quickly.

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The Mac App Store noticeably experienced some problems last night / early this morning with downloaded apps. Upon opening affected apps, the system would say that the app is ‘damaged’ and cannot be opened, just like the examples from Graham. It certainly seems scary at first glance.

The error message recommends reinstalling your apps individually. While this will fix the problem, it’s a pain to do and isn’t necessary at all: your apps are fine, but the error message makes the situation sound far worse than it is. To simply fix the problem, just reboot your Mac, running OS X Yosemite or El Capitan, and the problem will ‘magically’ go away.

The more interesting question is, why did this happen at all?

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Several months ago, I wrote a three-part guide to making amazing wall art from your Mac’s photos (part 1, part 2, part 3) — a popular series that readers told me they’d really enjoyed. The premise: as photography has gone digital, most of the pictures we take have become trapped on our computers, rarely seeing the light of day. Turning your favorite photos into large-format wall art is a great way to decorate your home or office, and with the recent introduction of the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus, higher-resolution photos and ultra-high-res panoramas are possible, increasing the image quality of even your everyday snaps.

Even though Apple’s OS X Photos app focuses on making small prints, photo books, and calendars, there are some great third-party photo-to-wall art services out there. Previously, I looked at how to turn your photos into large-sized metal, acrylic, and canvas wall art. This brand new part 4 explores three additional services, looking for the first time at photo prints on wood, as well as spotlighting several nice variations on prior themes…

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In this week’s episode of The Logic Pros, we are looking at Space Designer, Logic’s flagship reverb plug-in. Much like the Delay Designer we detailed last week, Space Designer is highly customizable with various shaping tools and the ability to create your own impulse responses.
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