My Top 5 Creative Productivity iPhone Apps

Dropbox

By far, one of my absolute favorite applications I’ve come across in years. It is made for both Mac and PC Desktops, as well as iPhone. Dropbox is as the name implies, a central “drop box”, where you can store and exchange files between home and office computers, between colleagues, even as a web-based server of sorts within a work group.  The whole thing is so simple. Once you download and install the software on your computers, you place files into the Dropbox folder at which point they are automatically synced to all computers within the account. So, if you’re working on a file at work, just save it into the Dropbox folder and there it is for you to pick when you get home.

To share contents beyond yourself or group, you could also use the Public folder within Dropbox or create a download URL to attach to an email, Facebook, or Twitter post.

The Dropbox software is free- with storage up to 2GB. Beyond that, it’s $10/month for a 50GB account and $20/month for 100GB.

Mobile Me iDisk

If you have a Mobile Me account, grabbing this free iPhone app is just an added bonus. It functions much like the above Dropbox, but it syncs with Mobile Me’s other features and folders. You can email attachments directly out of iDisk folders, play music and movies and upload files for use in iWeb. And of course, it works seamlessly with other Apple iPhone apps.

myPantone

I wrote briefly about this app back a couple months ago and have continued to find daily use for it. Everything from creating palettes on the fly, to being able to reference all Pantone libraries colors right from within the iPhone are enormous time savers. My favorite feature is the ability to pull palettes from photos.

I took the above photos and was able to immediately convert them into Pantone palettes.

QuickVoice Recorder

For those times when you just don’t have a moment to write a note to yourself or brainpower to remember one more thing… just speak it. I love this thing. Walking around town, driving the car, sitting on the train, this app has your back. It will record anything from a few seconds up to hours. Depending on the size of the phone’s hard drive, a student could easily record entire classes.

With it, you can even make iPhone ringtones and sync with the free QuickVoice Recorder desktop version. also, check out it’s partner app called QuickVoice2Text Email – fantastic as well. It will create and send a text mail directly from your voice recording.

Creative Whack Pack

Every now and then you just need a little kick to get things restarted. Originally created years ago as a card game, the Creative Whack Pack for iPhone has been around for a few years already but is regularly updated with new mind-sparking word games and strategies. Just perfect for diverting your train of thought long enough from your regularly-scheduled-program  so you can return to your work later with a fresh head. The Pack consists of 64 different strategies- illustrated and sound enhanced, full of stories, examples, and questions.

Battle Bears

If The Creative Whack Pack wasn’t enough to get you out of your creative funk, enter Battle Bears! Totally ridiculous and of no particular value, Battle Bears is at the very worst, a lot of high quality childish fun. The app description in the iTunes store sums it up nicely:

“OLIVER the teddy bear is stuck behind enemy lines and has to survive unending waves of adorable Pink Bears wishing to HUG HIM TO DEATH! Armed with his trusted rifle and a whole lot of attitude, OLIVER blasts away armies of cute Huggable Bears and earns powerful weapons along the way.”

Good luck soldier!