Sunday, July 28, 2019

Apple : I filmed an entire short film on a Sony Xperia 1, just to see if I could

Apple : I filmed an entire short film on a Sony Xperia 1, just to see if I could

I filmed an entire short film on a Sony Xperia 1, just to see if I could

Posted: 28 Jul 2019 08:30 AM PDT

One of the biggest hurdles for budding filmmakers is getting decent gear. A decent film camera, like the Sony Alpha A7S II, can cost a four-digit price, then you’ve got to buy or rent tripods, lights, light stands, boom or lapel mics, field recorders, and much, much more – in short, filming can be inaccessible for those with limited funds.

One of the key selling points of the Sony Xperia 1 is the Cinema Pro app. This app, which comes loaded on the phones, recreates the experience of a Sony Alpha camera, with a similar interface and technology. It lets you record high-end-quality video on your not-as-high-end smartphone, making film recording accessible and easy.

At least, that was Sony’s pitch, and it was certainly a good one, as the smartphone (and app) have proven quite popular. Indeed, in our own review, based on some hands-on time with the phone and our experiments with the Cinema Pro app, we praised the ease of the app.

However proper budding film-makers aren’t going to simply film some bushes and rocks, as we did for our review; they’re going to be using the phone to film proper projects, with multiple scenes, in different locations, and shooting different shots.

So as a budding film-maker myself, I decided to use the Sony Xperia 1 to film an entire short film, just to see if it could be done.

About the project

The short film was based on a poem by a friend, and the footage would be b-roll style material to play over the top. That way the cinematography wouldn’t need to be too wild or experimental, as it can often be a little confusing shooting with a new camera – especially if that camera is a long, fragile smartphone.

The kit I used to shoot with included two soft lights on tripods, and a smartphone-specific tripod to hold the Xperia 1 for static shots. I also did some handheld shooting, and you can be sure we’ll get into that later.

As a final point, I actually wrote and followed my shot list on the phone itself, instead of having it as a separate form – this made it super easy to quickly find what shot to set up next, and how I had envisaged each scene, as instead of digging through a stack of papers I could easily switch apps to Google Sheets.

Once I had my shot list, and kit prepared, and the Sony Xperia 1 charged, with plenty of memory spare, I was ready to film.

Setting up on a Sony Xperia 1

The first shot I needed from the Sony Xperia 1 was a static shot of someone sitting in bed – easy enough. I set up the phone tripod at the end of the bed, with the two soft lights behind it, and got ready to film.

Or, at least, I tried to get ready to film. You see, my tripod used a grip to hold the smartphone in place – which was conveniently position so that when it gripped the phone tight, it pressed the power button, turning off the phone. Eventually I managed to angle the clasp so it sat between the volume rocker and power button, but the phone was decidedly lop-sided when I did.

No matter, after a while of tinkering and angling the (admittedly rather cheap) tripod, I was ready to film again. Note to prospective Xperia 1 film-makers: don’t cheap out on your tripod!

Now it was time to find the ‘look’ of my film – I needed to choose which lens to use, as well as white balance, ISO, framerate, resolution and more. Thanks to the Cinema Pro app this was easy, and I could see the effects of each choice immediately on the master display – it’s not like with actual film cameras, in which I’d need to unscrew the screw in different lenses to test them. This made it super easy to optimize settings for each shot.

The different options also helped me learn more about the effect of changing certain options, like the color grade or white balance, as often these are the kind of things you only think about when editing.

Filming on a Sony Xperia 1

When I filmed the rest of the short on the Xperia 1, I stopped viewing the device as a smartphone, and considered it more like a camera-lite. That sentence makes my opinion seem a little ambiguous, but it’s safe to say, that’s it’s a huge compliment.

One problem with cameras is that they can be quite bulky, and doing handheld shots for long periods of time can be tiring. The Xperia 1 weighs less than 180g – while I’ve skipped arm day for the last three years, even that’s easy enough to carry for long periods of time.

The portability of the mobile device also meant moving shots were much easier to film, as the lightweight device took no effort to lift or move.

That said, not all my handheld shots are particularly stable, and I feel like the image stabilization could have been a little better to balance the natural shake and sway of human hands. In some of my footage, you can see a bit of sway that made footage look a bit too disconcerting to use, particularly in panning or tracking shots.

If we’re on the topic of things I found a little bit annoying – most cameras have movable screens, so you don’t have to be facing the device straight-on to see what you’re filming. This isn’t the case for the Xperia 1, so shots at weird angles are a little challenging.

At one point I tried to film an object dropping on the floor, from a floor-level perspective. It was impossible to see what I was filming, in order to line up a shot, and I didn’t manage to capture a useable video of this particular shot.

One final, minor nuisance? Auto-focus was great, but it was a little fiddly trying to work manual focus while also holding the Xperia 1 straight, and it took many takes to get this to look good.

But back to the positives – the screen-grab mode let me take a still of what the phone was pointed at, so I could show the actor, and we could work on their performance. Not all video cameras can do this, but it was really useful to be able to do so, and saved a lot of time when I’d otherwise have to describe what I wanted in greater detail.

Using the screenshot mode I coud work out how overexposed this shot needed to be.

I also want to sing the praises of the Cinema Pro app – it loaded up quickly whenever I closed it to bring up the shot list, the interface was easy to work my way around, and since it sent videos straight to the phone’s main gallery, I knew where to go to replay old footage.

But the Sony Xperia 1 is still a phone!

While filming, I started to view the Sony Xperia 1 as a camera, and forgot it was just a smartphone (thank you, airplane mode) – and by that I mean, I forgot that it had a battery that could run out quickly if I tried to film a lot. And it did.

After only a few hours of filming, the battery was sub-30%, and the phone had long past the ‘worryingly warm’ stage. Of course, it’s nice to have an excuse to take a lunch break, but the battery and heat limitations are something you don’t get on a standard video camera, and depending on the shoot, (especially if you’re in a remote location) frequent recharging isn’t always possible.

Luckily, I was filming in my flat, so I could easily plug it in to charge when I needed. But you don’t always want to film in an interior with easy access to plug sockets, so you’re going to need to find the best power bank you can if you’re filming outdoors.

Memory was less of an issue, though, as the Sony Xperia 1’s 128GB was enough. After two days of filming (one day for the main project, a second, half day for practicing and some b-roll) I had just under 80GB of film files, and despite all the apps, pictures and files I had on the phone already, I didn’t come close to the storage limit.

So how did the film turn out?

One major disadvantage the Sony Xperia 1 has over its camera competitors is that, in video cameras, it’s easy to take the memory card, insert it into your computer, and have all the files ready to edit in minutes (well, many minutes, but still). 

However, for the Xperia 1, the files were too big to transfer them over the web, so I had to plug the handset into my computer. Remember when people used to do that? I barely do. It took nearly eight hours to get all the files through – which wasn’t exactly ideal.

I had to do this because, while the Xperia 1 has its Cinema Pro app for shooting footage, it has no app for editing footage, and I didn’t want to ruin the 21:9 experience by downloading a third-party app, so using a PC video editor was the only way.

Would I recommend the Sony Xperia 1 to film a short film on?

Learning to film with cameras is quite a steep learning curve, and it’s also rather expensive – the Sony Xperia 1 and its Camera Pro app solve these problems, and I found the experience of filming on the smartphone incredibly easy and relatively painless.

Of course, I only tested with a film that was all indoors, with a relatively simple selection of shots, and enough gear to see me through, so in other contexts, and for other shoots, people may have a different experience.

But for budding film-makers, people who don’t want to carry loads of camera equipment around with them, or just people who think phones are the future, I’d wholeheartedly recommend the Sony Xperia 1 as an easy alternative to cameras for creating a short film.

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

New images of the upcoming Galaxy Watch Active 2 leak out

Posted: 28 Jul 2019 06:30 AM PDT

The Samsung Galaxy Watch Active 2 is expected to be launched within the next couple of weeks – perhaps just ahead of the Galaxy Note 10 – and thanks to documents filed with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), we've got an early look at it.

As spotted by Droid Life, the FCC filing is unusual in actually including pictures of the device being registered, something that doesn't usually happen.

Samsung Galaxy Watch Active 2 leak

The pictures don't actually reveal too many surprises about the wearable, with a design largely unchanged from last time. The rumor is that Samsung has added a rotating touch bezel to the watch, but it's hard to tell from these snaps.

Based on earlier tips, the Samsung Galaxy Watch Active 2 could make its appearance on Monday August 5, so all will be revealed soon. That would be two days before Samsung's scheduled August 7 event for the Note 10.

The story so far

If the leaks so far are to be believed, the watch is going to turn up in a choice of 44mm and 40mm sizes, carrying a 1.4-inch and a 1.2-inch display respectively. Both sizes will offer a 360 x 360 pixel resolution and a Super AMOLED screen.

As well as that touch bezel, the Galaxy Active Watch 2 is expected to come with an Exynos 9110 chip inside (the same as in the original Active Watch) plus 4GB of storage.

The Bluetooth model of the Galaxy Active Watch 2 is going to come carrying 768MB of RAM, according to reports, while the brand new LTE version introduced this time – for standalone calls and data access without Wi-Fi – will turn up with 1.5GB of RAM on board.

Black and silver are said to be the colors you've got to choose between, while stainless steel and aluminum finishes are apparently on the cards as well. In a little over a week we should get all the details confirmed.

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

First UAE-made electric scooters to be rolled out in September

Posted: 28 Jul 2019 04:17 AM PDT

A Dubai-based start-up is revving up to launch its first electric motorcycles, designed and developed in the UAE, by the end of September.

Adam Ridgway, CEO of One Moto, told TechRadar Middle East in an exclusive that he and his partner in the UK have been developing electric scooters – Electa for commuter (a vintage model of Vespa), Byka for delivery market and the Commuta (more designed for the European market). There are also two Emiratis as partners.

 “We intend to change the landscape of logistics delivery. We have designed these bikes and we also have a range of parcel delivery vehicles planned for next year.

Ridgway believes that there are around 12,000 bikes on the UAE road and the average cost of a petrol bike is between AED 8,000 and AED 11,000 and the cost of the delivery box above that.

“If an average rider travels around 100km a day, he spends on average of around AED 7,500 on fuel every year and AED 150 for servicing and the maintenance cost, apart from queuing up at petrol stations. So, the average investment comes to around AED 25,000 for the first year.

No Salik and registration fees

The biggest advantage of an electric bike, Ridgway said is that a user doesn’t need to pay Salik and no registration fees as part of government incentives.

“The one main reason we developed the bike is to be environmentally friendly. After the aeroplane, a petrol motorbike is more harmful than an SUV and saloon car.

According to a study by the University of California Berkeley, emissions from motorcycles dwarf that of SUVs. A sportbike can be responsible for 1.5 times the total greenhouse gas emissions of a typical SUV over the lifetime of the vehicles.

 “We have got ESMA [Emirates Authority for Standardisation and Metrology] approval recently. ESMA introduced us to GSO [GCC Standardisation Organisation] in Saudi Arabia. We have been working with government organisations, including RTA, to get the necessary approvals to get the bikes on the road,” he said. 

Moreover, Ridgway said that the bikes are designed by a team of bikers who understand the vehicles, the way a rider rides, and the conditions a rider rides in.

“The magic is fusing all this knowledge into intelligence that’s specific to riders,” he said.

However, he said the bikes are assembled in China and planning to assemble it in the UAE at a later stage.

Normal three-pin socket for charging

“We plan to have 20,000 bikes on the road by 2022 and our focus is on the delivery companies and supermarkets," Ridgway said.

He said the bikes will be launched in the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Egypt for now. In the UAE, it will be officially launched by the end of September.

The Electa is priced at AED 16,450 while the Commuta at AED 14,450 and Byka at AED 14,950.

“When we came to the design and R&D of One Moto, one of the things was convenience. The way we have designed the battery is a slot-in and slot-out method. A customer can purchase multiple batteries and keep one in the office and one in the home for charging. The biggest disadvantage for electric vehicles is the charging stations. We wanted to make sure that we take the hassle of the user. The battery can be charged from any three-pin socket,” he said.

The bikes have a capacity of 85km an hour, including three gear systems to conserve the battery. The battery gives a life of between 90km and 150km. The full charging takes between four and six hours and 80% charge in one hour.

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

Rope-less elevator technology to offer new architectural and design capabilities

Posted: 28 Jul 2019 03:41 AM PDT

The heights of future buildings are poised to grow higher as more people are expected to live in cities due to the shortage of space and urbanisation.

Current high-rise buildings have an average height of 300 metres but the Burj Khalifa in Dubai has a height of 828 metres while Saudi Arabia’s Kingdom Tower will have a height of 1,001m when completed in 2020.

“The higher the building gets in the future, the more the technology is needed. The actual technology the roped elevator can go has reached the maximum and new technology is needed to attain further heights,” Prof. Michael Cesarz Miguel, CEO for Multi elevator system at ThyssenKrupp Elevator, told TechRadar Middle East.

Vertical and horizontal movements

Multi makes use of the linear motor technology developed for the Transrapid train or Japan’s maglev train and allows multiple cars in a single shaft, both vertically and horizontally.

Moreover, Miguel said the rope-less elevator technology has the potential and a much-needed solution for sky bridges.

Economically and technically, he said the ropes can go up to between 300 and 400 metres and up to 500 metres with stress, which means the efficiency of a traditional elevator suffers.

With Multi, he said it can go up to 5,000 metres but “we have regulations as nobody thought of buildings with those heights some years back. In our portfolio, it can go up to 1,600 metres.”

“Multi is an ideal solution for the UAE as the country is an early adopter of innovative technologies and is at the forefront of the real estate development,” he said.

Less sensitive to earthquakes

The world’s tallest buildings need to support increasingly heavy cables required to lift elevator cars but the swaying of buildings due to heavy winds puts a lot of stress on conventional cabins and the elevators may not be used for safety reasons.

Since Multi is not electrified, Miguel said that linear motors are powered by electromagnetic coils embedded in the rear wall of the shaft.

As multiple cars can share the same shaft space, he said the amount of real estate lost to elevator infrastructure is less than the conventional system and it is less sensitive to earthquakes.

“It is not a mass product and more expensive than a conventional elevator but needs fewer shafts. So, the real estate developer can rent out more space,” he said.

Furthermore, he said that the initial investment for installing a Multi will be higher but the cost can be offset by the reduction in the number of elevator shafts.

Working on 20 projects globally

The company is working with OVG Real Estate’s new East Side Tower in Berlin to install Multi and expect to be operational by 2025.

“We will be showcasing our technology at Dubai Expo 2020. We are working on 20 projects globally, three projects in the Gulf. Without smart buildings, you cannot have a smart city. We will use less ropes in the future and more linear motors, but that will take time,” he said.

Miguel, who is an architect himself, has worked on both the technological and architectural aspects of buildings across several real estate asset classes, including Dubai’s Majid Al Futtaim Shopping Mall, said that the rope-less technology offers new architectural and design possibilities.

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

Windows 10 preview ushers in new Cortana app with chat-based interface

Posted: 28 Jul 2019 02:47 AM PDT

Windows 10 has witnessed the release of another preview build for the update due to land in the first half of 2020, and the big change here is what Microsoft’s describing as a new experience with Cortana.

Build 18945 has been released to testers in the fast ring, and sees the digital assistant being turned into a separate app within Windows 10 (you may recall that the beta version of the application was spotted in the Microsoft Store in June). And as was previously indicated, Cortana features a new chat-based interface that facilitates natural language queries. At the moment, though, this is only for testers in the US.

Most of the features Cortana could previously handle are still here, but some important new functionality has been added. Microsoft notes: “We have updated Cortana with new speech and language models, and significantly improved performance – making it faster and more reliable than ever before.”

The ‘Hey Cortana’ screen has been made more subtle and streamlined, so it represents less of an intrusion on what you’re currently doing on the desktop, and Cortana now supports both light and dark themes in Windows 10.

Cortana

In the blog post introducing the preview, Microsoft stresses that this Cortana app is still in beta, so you may well see glitches (as ever), and not all functions that used to be accessible from Cortana are here – but more will be added over time, naturally.

All the key core features are here, though, such as using Cortana to open apps, manage lists, set timers or reminders, along with Assistant conversations, Bing answers, and so forth.

Slow rollout

As mentioned, this new Cortana beta is only available to Windows Insiders in the US, and even then, there’s a phased rollout, so you may not see it just yet. As time goes on it will be deployed more widely, and outside the States.

Microsoft has described the pace of the rollout as slow, but hopefully it won’t be too sluggish, and other territories won’t have to wait too long to get their teeth into this major change.

Build 18945 also introduces some accessibility improvements including Narrator delivering a better experience when reading out messages in Outlook or Windows Mail.

Windows Subsystem for Linux has also been tweaked with some useful bits and pieces such as the addition of global configuration options.

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

Apple registers two more iPad models ready to launch later this year

Posted: 28 Jul 2019 02:30 AM PDT

We could be in line for quite a major iPad refresh later this year, as Apple has registered another two tablet models with the Eurasian Economic Commission (EEC) regulator – models that don't match anything in the current line-up.

As spotted by MySmartPrice, the new additions take the total number of mystery iPad devices in the EEC database to seven. It's likely that some of these are just slight variations in storage rather than distinct iPads.

What the filings don't tell us is all that much about the devices themselves: all we know is that they're listed as running iPadOS, due out this September. It's possible that Apple is planning an October iPad event, something it has done in previous years.

Filling in the gaps, we could be in line for some new iPad Pros, which will be a year old this October. It might also be time to refresh the entry-level 9.7-inch iPad, originally introduced into the world in March 2018.

Changes are coming

We haven't heard much in the way of rumors or leaks about the new iPads – except that some of them might include improved cellular reception – so it's possible that we're looking at smaller upgrades rather than major refreshes.

What we do know is that Apple unveiled a 10.5-inch iPad Air and 7.9-inch iPad Mini back in March 2019, so those two particular lines won't be getting a revamp this time around.

It's possible that Apple wants to eventually get all its iPads looking like the iPad Pros, with thin bezels and no Home button, but considering the main selling point of the 9.7-inch iPad is its affordability, it might retain the classic design.

If new iPad Pros are indeed on the way, the main changes are likely to be internal ones, with extra speed bumps on the cards. The new, modern design is not yet a year old, so will probably be retained for another 12 months.

Via MacRumors

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

F1 live stream: how to watch the German Grand Prix 2019 online from anywhere

Posted: 28 Jul 2019 01:51 AM PDT

Well this is starting to get all too familiar...Lewis Hamilton has landed yet another 2019 Formula 1 season pole position and will look to cement his place at the top of the Drivers' Championship standings in Germany today. Here's how to live stream F1 at the German Grand Prix from anywhere you are.

The 2019 F1 season has reached Germany and with that the legendary Hockenheimring circuit. This track, used by the F1 since 1970, is set in the beauty of the surrounding forest and features some fast lap times despite lots of dramatic corners.

So it's Hamilton leading from the front again, but this time with a less familiar front row partner - Austrian GP winner Max Verstappen. Mercedes man Valtteri Bottas starts in third, while Sebastian Vettel and Ferrari's woes continue at the driver's home track. He failed to post a qualifying lap and so starts right at the back of the grid today.

Last year saw Hamilton take the win as local lad Vettel slid out in the rain. Even a four-time world champion can be caught out at Turn 11 near the stadium section, so that's definitely worth keeping a close eye on this year.

This should be a really intense race with lots of high-pace action, that you get to enjoy. Yup, you can stream F1 live from anywhere in the world – read on to find out how to watch the German Grand Prix where you are.

How to watch the German Grand Prix from outside your country

To see how you can stream F1 live from the German Grand Prix in the UK, Australia, the US, Canada and New Zealand, then scroll a little further down this page to see the broadcast options. But if you try and tune in to your native stream from outside your country, you'll quickly discover that it's geo-blocked.

How to live stream German Grand Prix in the UK

How live stream German Grand Prix 2019 in Australia

Watch the German Grand Prix in the US: live stream F1

How to watch a German GP F1 live stream in the Canada

How to get an F1 live stream in New Zealand

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

Do fitness trackers have an impact on eating disorders?

Posted: 28 Jul 2019 01:00 AM PDT

Content warning: There are details and personal anecdotes about eating disorders in this article. 

Tracking workouts, steps and calories with wearable devices and apps has become the new normal. Take a look around next time you’re at the gym or go for a jog around the park – most people working out have a wearable strapped to their wrist or a phone strapped to their arm. 

The number of connected wearable devices worldwide will push 74 million this year and is expected to rise to more than 1 billion by 2022 – health-focused wearables will make up a large part of that number. 

Right now, there are fitness wearables aimed at casual users, like the Fitbit Inspire HR, through to those more serious about running, like Garmin’s Forerunner range. 

Even devices that aren’t marketed solely for their health-focused features, like the Apple Watch, tend to have step counting, calorie burn and exercise tracking built-in as a standard. This means even if you haven’t bought a wearable or smartwatch to track your activity, data about your body is often only a few swipes away. 

However, there’s mounting evidence to suggest that wearable devices may not help everyone to become healthier or fitter. Instead, some research suggests they could take the fun out of fitness, turn out to be useless after six months or hinder long-term weight loss.

What’s more, a handful of newer studies also propose that having instant access to data about your health at your fingertips could lead to anxiety and trigger or exacerbate disordered eating and exercise in some people.

Given the continued rise in wearable technology, and the fact that health-focused devices are being introduced in gyms, corporate ‘wellness’ programmes, and marketed at children and young people, it’s important that we better understand how activity, food and weight tracking could do more harm than good.

The link between fitness tracking and disordered eating

We spoke to Dr Carolyn Plateau, a lecturer in psychology at Loughborough University, who has been studying the effect that fitness trackers, as well as health-focused apps, have on regular users. 

Her most recent study aimed to explore the differences in disordered eating, disordered exercise and mental wellbeing between people who use fitness trackers and apps to record food intake and those who don’t. 

“Our findings were interesting as they indicated that those who did track their activity or food intake showed higher levels of both disordered eating and exercise than those who did not,” Dr Plateau tells TechRadar. “In particular, higher levels of purging behavior (e.g. excessive or driven exercise to control or modify weight or shape) was found among the tracking group.” 

We asked Amanda Perl, a psychotherapist and Counselling Directory member who specializes in working with patients with eating disorders, about this link. “Calorie counting, strict dieting and excessive exercising are all symptoms of disordered eating,” Perl tells us. “Tracking devices can exacerbate these symptoms as they’re fixated on all those things.” 

This preoccupation with health-focused metrics and goal setting also leaves little room for balance, Perl explains, “trackers can increase feelings of failure, self-loathing and feeling out of control.” 

Even those who may not exhibit disordered eating behavior could be at risk of setting impossibly high standards for themselves. “Apps and devices can take over and promote perfectionism,” she tells us, “an unattainable illusion that promotes feelings of vulnerability through to depression.” 

Although participants of Plateau’s study who tracked their activity and food intake showed higher levels of disordered eating, she explains we can’t infer cause and effect and say for certain that trackers cause disordered eating – more research would need to be carried out over a longer period of time. 

“It could just be that participants with disordered eating and exercise tendencies may be more likely to want to track their food and fitness,” she tells us. 

The results do suggest, however, that tracking with health-focused wearables and apps could exacerbate or maintain disordered eating behavior. 

“It’s possible monitoring of activity and food intake could inadvertently encourage or validate some of the features of disordered eating and exercise amongst those who are vulnerable,” Plateau explains. “It is also possible that this could contribute towards the obsessive and highly self-critical perfectionistic tendencies that we see in individuals with eating related issues.” 

But Plateau stresses that there are many factors involved in determining someone’s vulnerability to disordered eating, as well as the likelihood that behavior could turn into a full-blown eating disorder.

The darker side of calorie-counting and nutrition apps 

Although health-focused wearables provide the automatic, real-time tracking that can lead to a preoccupation with exercise and health data, apps used on their own may also validate the same kind of behavior – but with more focus on food intake. 

A number of recent studies have shown apps with large databases of food that present detailed nutritional values, like MyFitnessPal, are widely used in the eating disorder community. 

Hayley Pearse, who is recovering from an eating disorder and documenting her recovery journey at Brunch Over Bones, tells us that she’s been tracking calories in a notebook since 2012, but the rise in tracking apps exacerbated her disordered eating. 

“As technology has progressed, so has the ease of tracking every macro, every calorie and even my body fat percentages,” Pearse tells TechRadar. 

She found she was in a cycle of using many apps, but was always on the lookout for better options that gave her more control over what she ate. “It started with an obsession with my body fat percentage and fitness performance that every meal was portioned to macros – that’s what the apps were telling me to do.” 

“The more I used apps, the more I started to critique them as they didn't quite have every food on there,” Pearse explains. “I found that my safe and fear foods list had also doubled in size and if a certain food was not in the app then it was not going in me either!” 

It’s the granular data available on the apps that Pearse believes fuelled her fixation on food. “Apps gave me the knowledge of nutrients in food and also the 'skill' to gauge by sight how many calories are on the plate in front of me,” she says. “It’s too easy to get your hands on this level of information.” 

“Although I no longer track my intake to the same extent, I still to this day have these apps downloaded on my phone as a comfort blanket,” she says. “But I am learning to listen to my body's needs rather than an app's need.” 

Perl tells us this is an important step in recovery. As part of the therapeutic process, she helps people to “respond naturally to physical cues around hunger and feeling satisfied” rather than relying on the metrics or notifications from a health-focused app or wearable.

Ask yourself: why do I need a fitness tracker in the first place?

For every person who finds health-focused tech can exacerbate disordered eating, another might use the exact same app or device to set and reach goals in a healthy way. 

“A lot of the behavior change literature tells us that self-monitoring is an effective way by which to achieve behavior change, and most people will find tracking devices helpful,” Dr Plateau explains. 

It’s difficult to predict what kind of experience someone will have with a tracking device, which is why Dr Plateau suggests everyone who has one should check in with themselves about how the goals they’ve set with their wearable or app make them feel. 

“If someone feels very anxious about the feedback a fitness tracker provides, or finds themselves constantly having to reach specific, escalating targets (e.g., step counts, calories burnt) then it possibly indicates that their relationship with the device isn’t as healthy as it could be, and it may be sensible to stop using the device, at least temporarily,” she explains. 

She also recommends considering the reasons for using a fitness device in the first place. Research has shown that using a health-focused device solely for weight or shape-related goals is linked to more concerning attitudes towards eating and food. 

Although, the reasons for using health-focused devices can easily shift. “Someone may start to use a fitness device to find out a bit more about their level of activity, perhaps to become a bit healthier and a bit fitter,” Dr Plateau says. “It may be that over time, their motivations change and weight-or-shape related goals become more prominent.” 

Regardless of your experience with health-focused tracking, Dr Plateau suggests everyone should take a break from the feedback and monitoring that an app or wearable provides: “I would suggest that we all consider going tech-free every now and again.”

For more information about disordered eating and eating disorders, as well as advice about how to get help for yourself or a loved one, please visit the charity Beat in the UK or NEDA in the US.

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

UFC 240 live stream: how to watch Holloway vs Edgar and the rest from anywhere now

Posted: 27 Jul 2019 06:06 PM PDT

It's UFC 240 time tonight as the world's biggest MMA organisation heads to Edmonton in Canada. The main event has been two years in the making - Max Holloway is finally taking on 37-year-old former lightweight king Frankie Edgar in UFC Featherweight title bout for the ages. Read on to discover how to get a UFC 240 live stream today - it doesn't even matter where in the world you are.

The main event had been scheduled to take place two years ago, but after series of injuries and defeats put the matchup on ice, Max "Blessed" Holloway finally takes on Frankie "The Answer" Edgar.

Holloway comes into the fight defending  his featherweight title off the back of a defeat against Dustin Poirier at UFC 235 which brought to an end to a 13-fight, 6-year winning streak. While UFC 240 marks Edgar's first appearance in the Octagon in over a year, after a bicep injury ruled the veteran out from a planned clash with Chan Sung Jung at UFC Denver in November.

The pair will share top billing with the Women’s Featherweight title contest between Cris Cyborg and Felicia Spencer. Spencer goes into the fight undefeated in seven, but is up against the experienced Cyborg, who makes her return to the Octagon after her losing her title to fellow Brazilian Amanda Nunes at UFC 323.

Whoever you're cheering on during tonight's MMA action, we’ll show you how to live stream UFC 240’s card from anywhere in the world - for US viewers, you should just head straight to ESPN+.

Live stream UFC 240 from outside your country

Worry not if you're a huge UFC fan but aren't in the US to watch the ESPN+ coverage. If you find the coverage is geo-blocked, you can try using a VPN to change your IP address to a US server and watch this week's main card just as if you were back at home.

How to watch UFC online in the US exclusively on ESPN+

Live stream UFC 240 in the UK (not on PPV)

Live stream UFC 240 on PPV in Australia

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

Posted by at

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)