WWDC 2022: 5 Features To Excite Architects
M2 Macbook Air.
My very first Youtube video was on the Macbook Air M1 and whether it could carry the load for Archicad users. The answer was a “yes”. With the new M2, it’s a better deal than ever. With faster processing, more RAM, a beautiful redesign (Midnight Blue, anybody? Everybody.) and a price that barely sees a bump in this inflationary era, it’s bound to be a better deal than ever. Plus, let’s not forget that Archicad is scheduled for an update later this fall that will allow it to run natively on Apple Silicon. So theoretically this is a computer that is only going to get more capable with time…which you can’t hardly ever say.
Continuity Camera.
If you’re like me and your monitor doesn’t have a camera—or maybe it does but it isn’t very good—then you’ve tried apps like EpocCam or used a DSLR to be your webcam. EpocCam has been pretty good to me, to be sure, but Continuity Camera appears to have features that tap into Apple’s APIs in ways only Apple is allowed. You will get Portrait Mode, Studio Lighting, and Center Stage. There are neat mounts apparently coming to make this simpler. But what really caught my eye was the mode that—somehow through tricks with one of the many lenses on a fancy Pro model iPhone—allows the phone to look down at your desk in almost a birds eye view. Imagine being on a call with a client and sketching by hand on a sheet of paper like the good old days and not having to hold it up to the webcam like a child in art class for them to see it. Brilliant.
Freeform for the iPad.
A place to have pinups and charettes over Facetime with both teammates and clients. With Apple Pencil integration, you can have meetings to write notes, sketch ideas, add photos and sketch on top of them, and even supposedly mark up PDFs… though I really want to tamper my excitement about the PDF implementation until I can see how well it does it with large architectural drawing sets.
Desktop-Class Apps for the iPad.
More potential for iPad apps to reach desktop-level performance. It makes sense considering the latest iPads have the same processor as the the recently replaced Macbook Airs. Combined with a better file manager, more virtual memory, and a new take on multitasking, we may really begin to see the iPad separate itself a bit more from iOS. Personally, I’m optimistic that Morpholio Trace will see nice increases to its performance… it’s always felt a little bit crippled by what iPadOS allows it to do.
Dictation.
I’ve never been one to use voice dictation for much of anything. I find it unreliable at best and downright frustrating at worst. But today Apple announced that we will be able to dictate using our voice while also editing using our keyboards. This may be the secret sauce I’ve always needed but never known I wanted. Editing content created by voice has always felt like too much work. I don’t even get what I type correctly on the first go. So being able to have more control about what is coming out of my mouth while it is coming out could be something that ends up saving me a lot of time. Or not. We will see.
Honorable Mention:
Health and Fitness Watch Features
I figured this was worth mentioning because there were a lot of good things here that will hopefully help everybody. My father-in-law—a doctor—is a big believer that Apple’s future truly lies within healthcare—and they made a stronger case today with some of their additions to sleep tracking, medications, and working out. As professionals, we often sacrifice our health for the task ahead. The Watch can be a nice little assistant in helping us remember that we aren’t robots and do require a break from all the great tech we stare at and design with every day.