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<keyword id="12668209" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="piano-keyboards" source="Orion">Piano keyboards</keyword> act as a good music system to explore different tunes and sounds, and even make tracks on them. They are also a good and more inexpensive option for people who can’t afford a piano. The best <keyword id="12668210" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="portable-piano-keyboards" source="Orion">portable piano keyboards</keyword> have multiple preset tunes and voices, songs, and even lesson functions. There are various options for piano keyboards depending on your budget that you can buy online. Here’s a list of some of the <keyword id="12668213" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="top-piano-keyboards" source="Orion">top piano keyboards</keyword> available online. <bulletContentEmbed name="B07SVXTRDX" columns="1"><bulletContentHeading name="B07SVXTRDX_head"><div type="image" title="Recommended" msid="87765477" hostid="261"></div></columnHeadThumb>B07SVXTRDX</columnHeadTitle></columnHead></bulletContentHeading><bulleteContentBody name="B07SVXTRDX_body"><bulletContentRow name="B07SVXTRDX_2490690008910921"><bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowHead col="1">YAMAHA PSR-I500 portable keyboard</bulletContentRowHead></bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowBody><bulletContentRowCell col="1">This is a 61-key portable keyboard from Yamaha designed for Indian music lovers. It has a collection of Indian musical instrument voices like the harmonium, sitar, dhol, tabla, sitar and veena. In total you get 801 instrument voices along with 40 Indian instruments, 282 types of auto accompaniment styles along with 50 Indian styles. The Yamaha keyboard is equipped with bass reflex speakers, and professional-quality DSP effects.</bulletContentRowCell></bulletContentRowBody></bulletContentRow><bulletContentRow name="B07SVXTRDX_5536490206833285"><bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowHead col="1"></bulletContentRowHead></bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowBody><bulletContentRowCell col="1">The YAMAHA PSR-I500 portable keyboard also features a pitch bend wheel and lesson function.</bulletContentRowCell></bulletContentRowBody></bulletContentRow></bulleteContentBody></bulletContentEmbed> <bulletContentEmbed name="B083BRZB42" columns="1"><bulletContentHeading name="B083BRZB42_head"><div type="image" title="Cheaper alternative" msid="87765500" hostid="261"></div></columnHeadThumb>B083BRZB42</columnHeadTitle></columnHead></bulletContentHeading><bulleteContentBody name="B083BRZB42_body"><bulletContentRow name="B083BRZB42_5407312053816021"><bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowHead col="1">Yamaha PSR-I400 61-Key Portable Keyboard</bulletContentRowHead></bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowBody><bulletContentRowCell col="1">This is a more affordable version from Yamaha’s PSR series of portable keyboards. It comes equipped with a total of 218 preset styles including 35 Indian styles. This keyboard too is designed for people who want to learn or play Indian music. It has an extensive library of Indian sounding instruments, and a traditional Indian rhythm section. There are also lesson functions for those who are interested in learning on this keyboard.</bulletContentRowCell></bulletContentRowBody></bulletContentRow><bulletContentRow name="B083BRZB42_5300070668313272"><bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowHead col="1"></bulletContentRowHead></bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowBody><bulletContentRowCell col="1">The Yamaha PSR-I400 is also a 61-key portable keyboard that you can get to learn and play Indian music.</bulletContentRowCell></bulletContentRowBody></bulletContentRow></bulleteContentBody></bulletContentEmbed> <bulletContentEmbed name="B07YPTSFMT" columns="1"><bulletContentHeading name="B07YPTSFMT_head"><div type="image" title="Budget friendly" msid="87765511" hostid="261"></div></columnHeadThumb>B07YPTSFMT</columnHeadTitle></columnHead></bulletContentHeading><bulleteContentBody name="B07YPTSFMT_body"><bulletContentRow name="B07YPTSFMT_7247284178896008"><bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowHead col="1">Casio CT-S200 Casiotone 61-Key Portable Keyboard</bulletContentRowHead></bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowBody><bulletContentRowCell col="1">The Casio CT-S200 Casiotone is a budget-friendly 61-key portable. It features an LCD display along with intuitive controls. The keyboard is also compatible with Casio’s mobile app “Chordana Play” through which you can learn how to play different songs. The keyboard is equipped with 400 tones and 77 rhythms. It also has 13 Indian tones and 14 rhythms. There’s also a Dance Music mode that lets you create your own music composition.</bulletContentRowCell></bulletContentRowBody></bulletContentRow><bulletContentRow name="B07YPTSFMT_2528751139338885"><bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowHead col="1"></bulletContentRowHead></bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowBody><bulletContentRowCell col="1">The Casio CT-S200 Casiotone is ideal for those who are just starting out since the keyboard is beginner-friendly.</bulletContentRowCell></bulletContentRowBody></bulletContentRow></bulleteContentBody></bulletContentEmbed> <bulletContentEmbed name="B06XWS1LLD" columns="1"><bulletContentHeading name="B06XWS1LLD_head"><div type="image" title="Pocket friendly" msid="87765521" hostid="261"></div></columnHeadThumb>B06XWS1LLD</columnHeadTitle></columnHead></bulletContentHeading><bulleteContentBody name="B06XWS1LLD_body"><bulletContentRow name="B06XWS1LLD_2044183099064155"><bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowHead col="1">Casio CTK-2550 61-Key Portable Keyboard</bulletContentRowHead></bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowBody><bulletContentRowCell col="1">The Casio CTK-2550 is another 61-key budget-friendly keyboard that you can go for. It features an LCD display with a user-friendly interface. There are 30 user song banks and 60 song bank tunes along with 400 tones and 100 rhythms. It also has 13 Indian tones and 12 rhythms. This keyboard is also compatible with Casio’s Chordana Play app so you can use it to learn different songs.</bulletContentRowCell></bulletContentRowBody></bulletContentRow><bulletContentRow name="B06XWS1LLD_0196388755409985"><bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowHead col="1"></bulletContentRowHead></bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowBody><bulletContentRowCell col="1">The Casio CTK-2550 comes with a free adaptor, and it can also be used with AA batteries.</bulletContentRowCell></bulletContentRowBody></bulletContentRow></bulleteContentBody></bulletContentEmbed> <bulletContentEmbed name="B06XBZH1DZ" columns="1"><bulletContentHeading name="B06XBZH1DZ_head"><div type="image" title="Also consider" msid="87765537" hostid="261"></div></columnHeadThumb>B06XBZH1DZ</columnHeadTitle></columnHead></bulletContentHeading><bulleteContentBody name="B06XBZH1DZ_body"><bulletContentRow name="B06XBZH1DZ_1006423904086919"><bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowHead col="1">RockJam RJ761 Electronic Interactive Teaching Piano Keyboard</bulletContentRowHead></bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowBody><bulletContentRowCell col="1">The RockJam RJ761 is a 61-key teaching piano keyboard that comes with a stand, stool, sustain pedal and headphones. It has a touch sensitive keypad and an LCD display. There’s a built-in teaching system on this keyboard. You also get access to 200 rhythms, tones and 50 songs. The keyboard also supports record and playback functionality. It also has a MIDI output that lets you connect your phone, iPad or laptop.</bulletContentRowCell></bulletContentRowBody></bulletContentRow><bulletContentRow name="B06XBZH1DZ_1251871813409221"><bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowHead col="1"></bulletContentRowHead></bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowBody><bulletContentRowCell col="1">The RockJam RJ761 is a budget-friendly keyboard that you can get to learn how to play the musical instrument.</bulletContentRowCell></bulletContentRowBody></bulletContentRow></bulleteContentBody></bulletContentEmbed> <bulletContentEmbed name="B08GJVK5GX" columns="1"><bulletContentHeading name="B08GJVK5GX_head"><div type="image" title="Pocket friendly" msid="87765561" hostid="261"></div></columnHeadThumb>B08GJVK5GX</columnHeadTitle></columnHead></bulletContentHeading><bulleteContentBody name="B08GJVK5GX_body"><bulletContentRow name="B08GJVK5GX_6711428922138997"><bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowHead col="1">JUAREZ Octavé JRK660 61-Key Electronic Teaching Keyboard Piano</bulletContentRowHead></bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowBody><bulletContentRowCell col="1">This is another teaching keyboard that you can get, and it’s very pocket friendly. It has 61 keys in total with full-range stereo speakers and a music sheet stand holder. The keyboard features 200 rhythms, 200 timbres, and 40 demo songs. There’s also a rhythm programming function and volume or tempo control on this keyboard. It has a one-key teaching function so you can select any demo song and learn it on the keyboard.</bulletContentRowCell></bulletContentRowBody></bulletContentRow><bulletContentRow name="B08GJVK5GX_2218178199920201"><bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowHead col="1"></bulletContentRowHead></bulletContentRowHeading><bulletContentRowBody><bulletContentRowCell col="1">The JUAREZ Octavé JRK660 is a teaching keyboard you can consider if your budget is low.</bulletContentRowCell></bulletContentRowBody></bulletContentRow></bulleteContentBody></bulletContentEmbed>

Best portable piano keyboards for beginners and professionals

Today, our laptops and computers are an integral part of our lives. For many, work and recreation are on the laptop. We’re handicapped if we’re unable to access our phones. From writing work emails to texting our friends, the <keyword id="53607" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="keyboard">keyboard</keyword> is something we have gotten so used to that we can type even with our eyes closed even though the keyboard isn’t arranged alphabetically. Ever wondered why the alphabets on the keyboard are not alphabetically arranged or in no other particular chronology like everything else? We’re so used to arrangement today, but it might have created a whole lot of confusion in the 1800s when it came into use. Why Such An Unusual Pattern? The <keyword id="713967" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="QWERTY-keyboard">qwerty keyboard</keyword> was invented in the 1870s by one of the creators of the original typewriter, Christopher Latham Sholes. This first typewriter was patented in 1868 and it was designed with an alphabetical arrangement of piano-like keys. In this arrangement, commonly used letters were too close to each other, making the keys jam frequently. We all know that you couldn’t just hit backspace if you made an error on a typewriter. Therefore, the alphabets are now in a seemingly random layout because Sholes created the qwerty keyboard to purposely spread out the commonly used alphabets so that mechanical errors can be avoided. The First Application He made a deal with Remington which incorporated the new qwerty keyboard in their Remington No. 2 machine. Fun fact is that the top row of the qwerty keyboard has all the letters to make the word ‘typewriter’. There Is A Plot Twist However, there are two researchers that have a different theory. In 2011, Koichi Yasuoka and Motoko Yasuoka tracked the evolution of the keyboard back to Morse code. They argued that early typewriters were used by telegraph operators who found the alphabetical arrangement confusing for transcribing messages. Either way, the qwerty keyboard gained familiarity among the masses. This led to its adoption on electronic keyboards on computers. This is the keyboard that has become a key component of all our digital appliances today. We have come to love and depend on it and can’t imagine the keyboard in any other arrangement.

Unfolding the logic behind the QWERTY Keyboard

<a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MH391ZF/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=biip_081919_roland-entry-level-digital-piano-review-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;creativeASIN=B07MH391ZF&amp;linkId=66f119d1f538a995d2520d55cc730596" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">Sunny Chanel/Business Insider</div></div></div></a><ul class="summary-list"><li>This <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MH391ZF/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=biip_081919_roland-entry-level-digital-piano-review-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;creativeASIN=B07MH391ZF&amp;linkId=66f119d1f538a995d2520d55cc730596" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Roland Entry-Level Digital Piano</a> may be $499, but it's worth it to get your kid to practice.</li><li>The realistic sound quality and the feel of the keys create an authentic piano-like experience in a compact size. </li><li>This isn't just a keyboard. It has all sorts of added bells and whistles that make practice educational as well as entertaining. </li><li>Our favorite element is that the <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MH391ZF/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=biip_081919_roland-entry-level-digital-piano-review-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;creativeASIN=B07MH391ZF&amp;linkId=66f119d1f538a995d2520d55cc730596" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Roland FP-10</a> is also smart. Roland offers the Piano Partner 2 app that can be downloaded to an iPhone or iPad. </li></ul>I have a confession: When we enrolled our daughter in piano classes and needed to purchase a practice keyboard, we went cheap. In our defense, we weren't sure how long she'd stick with it and didn't want to invest more cash into something that could turn out to be a passing phase. In hindsight, this was a huge mistake. While her music classes took place on a standard upright acoustic piano, she came home to practice on a tinny-sounding, 61-key entry-level keyboard that we bought for about $100. The sound of this off-brand keyboard did not inspire her to practice. After trying out the <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MH391ZF/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=biip_081919_roland-entry-level-digital-piano-review-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;creativeASIN=B07MH391ZF&amp;linkId=66f119d1f538a995d2520d55cc730596" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Roland FP-10 Digital Piano</a>, we not only heard the difference in sound quality, but our daughter was a far more engaged budding pianist as well.<h2>The basics</h2><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MH391ZF/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=biip_081919_roland-entry-level-digital-piano-review-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;creativeASIN=B07MH391ZF&amp;linkId=66f119d1f538a995d2520d55cc730596" target="_blank" rel="noopener"></a>Roland</div></div></div>Roland has been a trusted company in the digital music game since they came on to the scene back in 1972. You can hear their keyboards and synthesizers behind such big-name artists as Lady Gaga, Beyoncé, and Green Day. While their top-of-the-line pianos can run into the thousands, they also make entry-level keyboards like the <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MH391ZF/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=biip_081919_roland-entry-level-digital-piano-review-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;creativeASIN=B07MH391ZF&amp;linkId=66f119d1f538a995d2520d55cc730596" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Roland FP-10</a>. The particular model is currently available at <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MH391ZF/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=biip_081919_roland-entry-level-digital-piano-review-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;creativeASIN=B07MH391ZF&amp;linkId=66f119d1f538a995d2520d55cc730596" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Amazon for $499.99</a>. The <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MH391ZF/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=biip_081919_roland-entry-level-digital-piano-review-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;creativeASIN=B07MH391ZF&amp;linkId=66f119d1f538a995d2520d55cc730596" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Roland FP-10</a> is ridiculously easy to set up. All we had to do was unpack the unit, plug it in, turn it on, and start playing. The keyboard doesn't come with a stand, but you can buy one separately, whether a <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01B15JPCQ/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=biip_081919_roland-entry-level-digital-piano-review-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;creativeASIN=B01B15JPCQ&amp;linkId=560a69b7bb52c5df3fa1d801e85091e0" target="_blank" rel="noopener">simple stand</a> or a <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MRGSCKQ/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=biip_081919_roland-entry-level-digital-piano-review-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;creativeASIN=B07MRGSCKQ&amp;linkId=be6750478f95a8970c679eb876de0eca" target="_blank" rel="noopener">dedicated stand</a> that's more sturdy and mimics a more traditional piano setup. It's also an ideal scenario for a piano student to have a practice keyboard that has all the keys, not just some. The <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MH391ZF/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=biip_081919_roland-entry-level-digital-piano-review-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;creativeASIN=B07MH391ZF&amp;linkId=66f119d1f538a995d2520d55cc730596" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Roland FP-10</a> has all 88 keys, not 61 or 54 like some other practice keyboards, and it comes in a compact form, measuring about 50 inches by 10 inches. This piano is lightweight enough (approximately 20 pounds) that it can be moved wherever you need it for practice. My daughter practiced in bed, on the living room floor, and during a particularly lovely afternoon, in our backyard. Having that kind of flexibility is a big plus and helps keep a young student - like mine - interested. If you're planning an extended family road trip, your child can bring the keyboard with them so they don't fall behind in their progress. And when I say road trip, I mean in a car. The unit is far too big to bring on the plane. <h2>What makes it stand out</h2><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MH391ZF/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=biip_081919_roland-entry-level-digital-piano-review-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;creativeASIN=B07MH391ZF&amp;linkId=66f119d1f538a995d2520d55cc730596" target="_blank" rel="noopener"></a>Sunny Chanel/Business Insider</div></div></div>One of the first things my daughter noticed was the feel of the keys. The hammer action feels like a real piano. There is less of a disconnect when switching between an acoustic piano and this digital one. Our last keyboard had a more toy-like quality to it; it didn't possess that full key quality and action. The <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MH391ZF/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=biip_081919_roland-entry-level-digital-piano-review-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;creativeASIN=B07MH391ZF&amp;linkId=66f119d1f538a995d2520d55cc730596" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Roland FP-10</a> keys are responsive whether she plays hard or soft and feel similar to those of a standard piano, with the same tactile sensation. While my daughter noticed the quality of the keys, I keyed into the quality of the audio. It sounds like a piano should, although it doesn't have the depth of sound a grand piano or quality upright has, it is pretty darn close. Roland uses what they call the SuperNATURAL piano sound engine. If one were to close their eyes, they likely wouldn't realize that it is merely a keyboard rather than a standard piano. One of my favorite aspects of the <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MH391ZF/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=biip_081919_roland-entry-level-digital-piano-review-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;creativeASIN=B07MH391ZF&amp;linkId=66f119d1f538a995d2520d55cc730596" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Roland FP-10</a> is that there is an output for headphones. Not to disparage my daughter's playing, but you probably understand if you happen to have a piano student in your home, too. Yes, we love that our children are learning and practicing, but the learning curve can strain the ears. If you do choose to listen to the dulcet sounds of your child tickling the ivories, the onboard speakers are quite impressive with a clear and crisp sound quality.My daughter, always one for experimentation, really enjoys the additional tones you can select. If she wants to change it up from the classic piano style, there's an array of different sound genres she can choose from, such as church organ, jazz organ, and vibraphone. Selecting these different tones is as easy as pressing the "piano" key with one of the designated keyboard keys. She also had a grand time dancing around to the internal songs programmed into the keyboard.<h2>High-tech additions with Bluetooth </h2><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MH391ZF/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=biip_081919_roland-entry-level-digital-piano-review-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;creativeASIN=B07MH391ZF&amp;linkId=66f119d1f538a995d2520d55cc730596" target="_blank" rel="noopener"></a>Amazon/Business Insider</div></div></div>Besides the feel, perks, and quality of sound, our favorite element is that the <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MH391ZF/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=biip_081919_roland-entry-level-digital-piano-review-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;creativeASIN=B07MH391ZF&amp;linkId=66f119d1f538a995d2520d55cc730596" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Roland FP-10</a> is also smart. Roland offers the Piano Partner 2 app that can be downloaded to an iPhone or iPad. It was very simple to pair the Bluetooth on my phone to the keyboard, and the setup was completed in just a couple of steps. The app itself is very intuitive with a variety of options. Along with the Bluetooth connectivity, there's also a USB MIDI output for a one-cable connection to a computer or mobile device. Beginners can benefit from the Flash Card option on the app that gives cues to match sounds and read notations. More seasoned players can find a more challenging experience with the average and expert levels. The DigiScore tool on the Piano Partner 2 displays the score and plays classical pieces by Chopin, Liszt, and Debussy so that pianists in training can play along (and learn while they're at it). There's even a remote control to set the volume, tone, and brilliance of sound and a metronome to keep the beat on track. For more options, users can connect with Digital Audio Workstations (DAW) and a variety of other apps like Apple GarageBand. Beyond all these bells and whistles, the tool my daughter had the most fun with was the Recorder function. With one touch, she could record anything that she played on the piano. The Recorder is a useful bonus for those who write their own music or want to give a listen, more objectively, to what has just been played.<h2>The bottom line</h2>If you're looking for a practice keyboard for yourself or your family, this portable piano is an excellent option. While the price may be a bit daunting, the additional bells and whistles justify it, especially the recording function. I found that it's a good investment that can help encourage my daughter to practice.Pros: The sound is fantastic and clear. Different musical styles options, Bluetooth connectivity, and recording function are all useful extras. Cons: The piano, with its full set of keys, could be a bit too large to lug around depending on where you're headed. Pricier than other entry-level pianos.<h3><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07MH391ZF/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=biip_081919_roland-entry-level-digital-piano-review-20&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;creativeASIN=B07MH391ZF&amp;linkId=66f119d1f538a995d2520d55cc730596" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Buy the Roland 88-Key Entry-Level Digital Piano for $499.99 at Amazon</a></h3><a href="http://e.businessinsider.com/join/ci/insider-picks">Subscribe to our newsletter.</a> Find all the best offers at our <a href="https://coupons.businessinsider.com/">Coupons page</a>. Disclosure: This post is brought to you by the <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/insiderpicks">Insider Picks</a> team. We highlight products and services you might find interesting. If you buy them, we get a small share of the revenue from the sale from our commerce partners. We frequently receive products free of charge from manufacturers to test. This does not drive our decision as to whether or not a product is featured or recommended. We operate independently from our advertising sales team. We welcome your feedback. Email us at insiderpicks@businessinsider.com.

This Roland Entry-Level Digital Piano inspired my daughter to practice and play way more than ever before

<ul class="summary-list"><li>For the world's wealthiest people, Christmas can look a little different.</li><li>The most <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/billionaire-gift-guide-what-worlds-wealthiest-give-gift-christmas-holidays-2023-12">sought-after gifts for the billionaire set</a> can cost five figures — or more.</li></ul>Money, a sweater, perfume, and a smartphone are among the most desired <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/holiday-christmas-shopping-americans-spending-more-gifts-this-year-2023-10">gifts in the US this Christmas</a>, a recent Statista survey found. But unless that check under the tree is for $10,000 — the amount <a target="_blank" href="https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/warren-buffett-christmas-gifts-sees-candies-dresses-10000-cash-2019-12-1028780601">Warren Buffett</a> used to give each member of his family — most of those won't cut it when it comes to the gifts of the ultrarich."The most amazing thing about billionaires is that there tends to be no budget," said Nicole Pollard Bayme, the founder of luxury styling firm Lalaluxe, which provides bespoke gift sourcing for clients. That "allows us to have unlimited imagination," she added. For these shopping services, she charges a starting price of $600 an hour, plus a percentage of the cost of the items purchased.Alongside Pollard Bayme, Business Insider also spoke to Winston Chesterfield, the founder of Barton, a consulting firm focused on luxury and the wealthy, and Elisabeth Brown, a client manager at travel and lifestyle concierge company Knightsbridge Circle.They gave us their insights about what the richest people give and get for the holidays. The answers varied from the eye-popping — a $5 million villa — to the ear-pleasing — a Steinway in a stocking (well, not literally).Here's a look at the presents that the .001% are giving and receiving this year — and just remember, it's probably best not to compare those socks you got from your mother-in-law with any of the items on this list.Pianos: Multiple wealth experts said there's been a newfound interest in giving pianos, and not just your average upright or electric keyboard.Grand pianos — which can run to tens of thousands of dollars, if not more, Brown said — are a great gift for someone who actually plays, of course, but are also appreciated as a part of one's decor."Our members appreciate the finer things in life, including good craftsmanship," Brown said, "and a piano oftentimes can be a focal point of a room."Chesterfield added that a piano doubles as a party trick, with the wealthy hiring professionals to tickle the ivories while hosting events.Birkins: The <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/hermes-birkin-bag-realreal-handbag-expert-so-expensive-2019-6">Hermès Birkin</a> is perhaps the most exclusive and expensive type of handbag in the world. With a starting price of $9,000, it's not surprising it's a popular gift for those who also have exclusive and expensive taste.One of Chesterfield's contacts gives a new Hermès bag to his wife each year, and the color of the purse sets the tone for the rest of her gifts. A red bag, for example, will be surrounded by red items from other luxury retailers.One of Pollard Bayme's clients requested a rare <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/how-the-iconic-hermes-birkin-handbag-was-invented-2023-7">Himalayan Birkin</a> with diamond hardware for a particularly special gift. Crafted from dyed crocodile skin, the bag cost $750,000 and required security to deliver it to the client."For the person that has everything, why not have diamonds on your handbag too?" Pollard Bayme said. Why not, indeed.A trip to space: "The ultimate flex for the billionaire class" is two tickets to space, Pollard Bayme said.Following in the footsteps of billionaires like Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson, two of her clients are heading into orbit for the holiday. The gift also includes training with NASA astronauts.While Pollard Bayme did not disclose how much her clients were paying for the unusual vacation, a seat on Branson's <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/virgin-galactic-blue-origin-spacex-commercial-space-flights-tourism-cost-2023-7">Virgin Galactic flight</a> can go for $450,000 each, while one on <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/jeff-bezos-blue-origin-spaceflight-ken-griffin-8-million-teacher-2022-5">Bezos' Blue Origin rockets</a> can cost millions. At that price, BI hopes the champagne up there is very well-chilled.A wellness retreat — and the very best gear to go with it: Though the other gifts on this list prove that excessive opulence isn't dead, Chesterfield said many of his contacts are choosing to give experiences, and forgoing presents like jewelry and cars."People seem to be a bit exhausted with what you'd call hard luxury," he said. Instead, they're giving travel experiences, particularly wellness retreats like a bike trip through Mallorca or a week at Austria's Vivamayr spa.To be sure, even though these gifts are not emblazoned with designer names or encrusted with gems, they're not cheap. The bike tour starts at $5,999, for example, while a stay at Vivamayr costs a minimum of $2,500.And to really round out the gift, a stocking stuffer of the best of the best gear can't hurt, like a $3,450 Loro Piana windbreaker or $2,000 Moncler ski jacket.<div type="image" title="A view of a Tuscan vineyard and house amid rolling hills." height="1200" width="1800" msid="106250097" hostid="261" sizebytes="391436"></div>Eats, drinks — and then some: "People are just becoming so passionate about food," Chesterfield said. "You end up having enough bags, enough jewelry, enough of this stuff, and it doesn't go away. But food is always needed."And while aged balsamic vinegar from Italy — a bottle can cost hundreds of dollars — can be a nice stocking stuffer, those who want to go the extra mile can add an experience: A cooking lesson and dinner in one's home from a <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/best-restaurant-uk-michelin-star-ynyshir-gareth-ward-2023-12">Michelin-starred chef</a>, for example, or a ten-course meal at an impossible-to-get-into restaurant.Brown also suggested that food or wine events can be the focal point of an entire trip. Tickets to the Golden Vines, the Oscars of wine (the top tier cost about $13,000 a head this year) as well as a week in the hosting country are a popular gift for oenophiles, she said.A vineyard in Tuscany: And for those with a higher budget to spend on the wine lover in your life, a vineyard in Tuscany may be the ultimate gift.Knightsbridge recently helped secure one for a client as a gift for their partner. Complete with a villa that Napoleon slept in and honey and olive oil production facilities, it cost about $5 million. And on Christmas Day, they can wash down their meal with their very own wine. Santé.

Luxury gifts the world's richest want under the tree: Birkins, a Tuscan estate, and tickets to space

<ul class="summary-list"><li>New York City judge Arthur Engoron is presiding over <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trumps-ny-fraud-trial-opens-today-heres-why-still-matters-2023-9">Donald Trump's NY fraud trial</a>.</li><li>Engoron, a Democrat, has ruled repeatedly against Trump in the three years he's been presiding over James' lawsuit.</li></ul>He's driven a taxi cab, played in a band and protested the Vietnam War. As a New York City judge, Arthur Engoron has resolved hundreds of disputes, deciding everything from zoning and free speech issues to a custody fight over a dog named "Stevie."Now, in the twilight of a distinguished two-decade career on the bench, the erudite, Ivy League-educated judge is presiding over his biggest case yet: deciding the future of former President Donald <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trumps-ny-fraud-trial-opens-today-heres-why-still-matters-2023-9">Trump's real estate empire</a>.Engoron ruled that <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-new-york-judge-finds-business-2023-9">Trump committed years of fraud</a> by exaggerating his wealth and the value of assets on financial statements he used to get loans and make deals. As punishment, the judge said he would <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-fraud-ruling-corporate-death-penalty-for-his-empire-experts-2023-9">dissolve some of Trump's companies</a> — a decision that could cause him to lose control of marquee New York properties, like Trump Tower.Engoron will now preside over a non-jury trial in Manhattan to resolve remaining claims in New York Attorney General Letitia James' lawsuit against Trump, his company and top executives. He will also decide on monetary damages. James' office is seeking $250 million.The case will be <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-no-jury-bench-trial-ny-fraud-case-paperwork-2023-10">tried as a bench trial</a>, as opposed to a jury trial, due to paperwork submitted by Trump's lawyers on July 31.During a bench trial, a judge hears the entirety of the evidence and later makes their own decision on a verdict without a jury's input. Trump, who is listed <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/video-donald-trump-don-eric-cohen-deposition-ny-fraud-case-2023-10">as a potential witness</a> and could end up face-to-face with Engoron in court, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-says-judge-fraud-trial-is-getting-away-with-murder-2023-10">called the judge's fraud</a> ruling "the corporate death penalty." <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-says-judge-fraud-trial-is-getting-away-with-murder-2023-10" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Trump attacked the judge</a>, calling Engoron a "political hack" and promising to appeal."I have a Deranged, Trump Hating Judge, who RAILROADED this FAKE CASE through a NYS Court at a speed never before seen," <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-new-york-fraud-trial-campaign-event-politicizes-2023-10">the 2024 Republican frontrunner</a>wrote on his Truth Social platform.Through a court spokesperson, Engoron has declined to comment on Trump's barbs. He is barred from commenting to the news media about the case.Trump typically hasn't gone to court in the many cases involving his company. He was absent from a criminal trial in which the Trump Organization and one of its top executives was convicted of tax evasion and skipped a civil trial in which he was found responsible for sexually assaulting the writer E. Jean Carroll. But asked Friday if he planned to be at the New York trial, Trump said: "I may. I may."Engoron, a Democrat, has ruled repeatedly against Trump in the three years he's been presiding over James' lawsuit. He's forced Trump to sit for a deposition, held him in contempt and fined him $110,000.Now, Engoron is poised to permanently disrupt the collection of skyscrapers, golf courses and other properties that vaulted Trump to fame and the White House.At a hearing in the case last Wednesday, the day after his ruling, Engoron offered "a little bit of New York humor" to break the tension. He repeated an oft-told story about a judge who ended up agreeing with everyone who spoke in his courtroom.Engoron, a fan of puns and pop culture references, routinely turns to humor — even in the gravest of hearings and decisions."We certainly can use it today," Trump lawyer Christopher Kise said.Engoron, a few years younger than Trump at 74, spent his early years in Queens, about 3.8 miles (6 kilometers) east of the former president's childhood home.Engoron's family later moved to East Williston on Long Island, where he ran track and wrote for the student newspaper at The Wheatley School, a public high school in Old Westbury, New York, and graduated in 1967.A proud alum, Engoron is the founder and director of the school's alumni association and writes an online newsletter with news about fellow graduates who've nicknamed him the "Mayor of Wheatley." He even posted a link last year to an article about his involvement in the Trump case.At the end of one newsletter, he posted a quippy call to action: "Please send me your autobiography before someone else sends me your obituary."Engoron first made headlines in 1964, when he and three friends won the grand prize in a "Banner Day" contest where the New York Mets, then just two years into their existence, invited fans to parade across the field carrying banners painted with creative messages about the team.In an early sign of Engoron's irreverence, the message was a take off on a popular political quote from the era: "Extremism In Defense Of The Mets Is No Vice." Engoron was just 15 at the time.While attending Columbia University in the 1960s, Engoron drove a taxi — a fact he revealed a decade ago while ruling against then-Mayor Michael Bloomberg's plan to expand yellow cab service outside New York City. A state appeals court later reversed that decision.Engoron's rulings are rife with biographical information, part full-disclosure, part nostalgia. He revealed in one decision that he participated in "huge, sometimes boisterous, Vietnam War protests." He's also described himself as a free-speech absolutist and said he's been a member of the American Civil Liberties Union since 1994.Engoron got his law degree from New York University in 1979. He's worked as a litigator and was a law clerk for 11 years for a judge in the same court where he now sits. Engoron also taught piano and drums and played keyboard in what he describes as a "moderately successful" bar band. He's been married three times and has four children, according to his Wheatley alumni page biography.Engoron joined the bench in 2003 as a judge on the New York City Civil Court, which handles small claims and other lesser-stakes lawsuits. In 2013, he was appointed an acting justice of the state's trial court and ran unopposed for a permanent post in 2015. His term runs until 2029, though New York requires judges at his level retire when they turn 76.A former law clerk, Michelle Bernstein Ravenscroft, said she remembered Engoron being "kind and approachable and that he was very invested in making sure his clerks had a good learning experience with him."Engoron frequently peppers his rulings with song lyrics, movie quotes and the occasional New York City history lesson. He's quoted Bob Dylan and Shakespeare and movies like "City Slickers" and the Marx Brothers classic "Duck Soup." He signs them with a logo of sorts, his initials, AE, drawn together in a circle.In 2017, Engoron turned to the Frank Sinatra hit "Love and Marriage" which, the song notes, "go together like a horse and carriage" for a ruling restricting protests on horse-drawn carriages in Central Park. He punily titled a subsection "Balancing of the Equines, er, Equities."In a 2015 ruling on the custody of "Stevie" — a female, mixed-breed, part Basenji — Engoron offered a philosophical discussion of the rights of animals — or lack thereof — while reversing his previous ruling that sought to do what was in the pet's best interest."Conferring rights on animals would create the ultimate slippery slope," he said, reasoning that "if dogs were deemed to have rights, why not cats, raccoons, squirrels, fish, ants, cockroaches? Could you be imprisoned for swatting a fly? Where will it all end?"In another ruling, Engoron said New York's review process for new housing "seems like Rube Goldberg, Franz Kafka, and the Marquis de Sade cooked it up over martinis."Engoron has been involved in Trump-related cases since 2020, when he was assigned to intervene in quarrels among Trump's lawyers and James' office over demands for evidence and the direction of her investigation.Trump's lawyers wanted James' lawsuit moved to a judge in the court's Commercial Division, which is set up to handle complex corporate litigation, but an administrative judge kept the case with Engoron, citing his experience with the matter.Back in the courtroom last Wednesday, as Trump's lawyers reached rare consensus with James' office on procedural issues, Engoron dispatched with one last quip."I knew this case would be a love fest," he said.

Trump trial judge Arthur Engoron: Who is the quippy, Ivy league-educated judge deciding the fate of Trump's NY business empire?

<ul class="summary-list"><li><a href="https://www.insider.com/category/pixar">Pixar</a> gets its characters to move by giving them an inner skeleton called a rig and filling it with controls that allow for unique and nuanced movements.</li><li><a href="https://www.insider.com/category/movies">Movies</a> like "The Incredibles" gave animators the ability to convincingly move human muscles while "Coco" let them beautifully animate guitar playing.</li><li>In "<a href="https://www.insider.com/category/soul">Soul</a>," innovative new hand controls and a digital piano rig let the character Joe Gardner play piano in complex and realistic ways.</li></ul>Following is a transcript of the <keyword id="21654" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="video">video</keyword>: Narrator: This is a shot from <keyword id="161299" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="Pixar">Pixar</keyword>'s latest movie, "<keyword id="5286" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="Soul">Soul</keyword>." Even though it's animated, everything about how the fingers float from one key to another to the small details like tendons moving in the hand feels just as real as the reference footage that inspired it. While Pixar has used reference footage since the beginning, it could not have pulled off a scene with movement this nuanced and realistic back in 1995 for "<keyword id="177078" type="ENTERTAINMENT" weightage="60" keywordseo="Toy-Story">Toy Story</keyword>." And it took years of technological breakthroughs. So how did Pixar get here?First off, they have an army of animators and riggers. We talked to seven who worked on "Soul" to see how far Pixar has come. Let's start over 26 years ago with the technology built for "Toy Story."Getting a given character to move starts in Pixar's rigging and modeling department.Mara MacMahon: Whenever you're thinking of a character model before it's rigged, it's in a completely neutral pose. There's no expression on the face. The arms and legs are all straight. And so the controls that we put in in rigging lets parts of the body move like you would pose like a doll or a puppet.Narrator: To get a clearer idea of the basics, let's start with this character model of Woody. The rigging department will add the rig, which is essentially an inner skeleton. Throughout this rig you can see all these controls called animated variables, or avars, which animators use to make different parts of a character move around. This early version of Woody had 596 of those controls, which may seem like a lot, but by 2019's "Toy Story 4," Woody had more than 7,000. To make things a little more complicated, one control point is often connected to other control points. So moving one in the eyebrow will move the wrinkles on the forehead. Adding more controls to these "Toy Story" characters would have let them move with more nuance, but back then, Pixar was making a brand new rig for every single character. That would change with "Toy Story 2."Pixar introduced Geppetto, later updated to Presto, which allowed animators to reuse and adapt rigs for multiple characters. This sped up the <keyword id="21778" type="TECHNOLOGY" weightage="60" keywordseo="animation">animation</keyword> process and gave animators more control over movements and facial expressions. The new software provided a template of two-legged and four-legged rigs that could be altered depending on the specific needs of a character. According to rigger Jared Fong, the sea lions in "Finding Dory" were actually constructed from dog rigs, with legs folded into flippers. More control with Geppetto also meant more expressive facial movements, as seen in 2003's "Finding Nemo."To really nail the character's emotions, animators used reference footage. Now fish don't have eyebrows or eyelids, but eyebrows are so important for expressing human emotions. So animators decided to add eyebrow-like lumps to characters like Marlin and Dory. And replicating real facial expressions meant connecting more control points with each other. You can see that with Dory. The control points around her mouth are connected with her eyes and her cheeks, giving her a more believable smile. A smize, if you will. After making major strides with toys and sea creatures, the most daunting challenge was yet to come: humans.Mr. Incredible consisted of 426 primary controls, 111 secondary animation controls for more subtle movements, and 1,061 modeling controls for sizing and other adjustments. Thanks to Geppetto, the rigging and modeling team could perfect Mr. Incredible and then reuse his rig for other characters. And to really make his movements realistic they used full-body reference footage. For example, this clip where an animator lifts up this exercise ball was helpful for moments like this, where Mr. Incredible lifts up an Omnidroid. And the team didn't animate just a rigid skeleton. On top of the skeleton was a layer of muscles, which could bulge and flex. And the skin on top of that would need to respond realistically. So Pixar developed a new system called Goo. This allowed the animators to see the skin and muscles react in real time as they worked, allowing for greater flexibility and movement and more control over how humans move. Goo led to breakthroughs in moving more challenging body parts, like the shoulders, which were more primitive in earlier films.Bobby Podesta: The Buzz Lightyear shoulder's a ball and socket. Woody's shoulder is just a stitch line. He's got no shoulders, right? That arm just hinges. Mr. Incredible has a big old strong shoulder. How you get a trapezius muscle there in the shoulder, and how it moves in the pectoral, really complex stuff.Narrator: The rigs built for "The Incredibles" were designed to let the characters stretch further than the average human. Which was important for Elastigirl, who needed to transform into all shapes and sizes. And just like how superheroes needed to react to forces like gravity, so too did the cars in Pixar's next feature, "Cars."Pixar extended its technological boundaries yet again with a system called ground locking, which made sure the cars always stayed on the same path, regardless of terrain, without animators having to move them frame by frame.Bobby Podesta: We had to have our characters be able to follow the contours of the ground without having to animate them, like up and down if it was like, a rolling hill. So it's going to move along these things. And then we're going to animate on top of that.Narrator: Because of ground locking, Lightning McQueen could now drive smoothly on a flat road that turns into a very windy path automatically. This may seem like a specific advancement just for the "Cars" movies, but it would be important for some of the most memorable characters in "Soul."By 2007, animators could have up to 150 controls in the human face. So they could give characters a much wider range of emotion. Perfect for a movie like "Ratatouille," which is largely set in the human world. All these intricate controls allowed for the complex array of expressions seen on Chef Skinner. Look at how far Chef Skinner's mouth extends as he's yelling at Linguini. According to supervising animator Mark Walsh, the tech wouldn't have been able to handle such a stretch in "Toy Story" or "Finding Nemo." The groundbreaking muscle work in "The Incredibles" allowed animators to give Linguini more spontaneous movements in the scenes where he's controlled by Remy in the kitchen.By the time "Toy Story 3" came out in 2010, Pixar's animators had gotten such precise control over how characters move, that it's surprising they'd want to take a step backward. But they actually relied on fewer controls to better replicate the trademark toy movements audiences knew and loved.Jared Fong: If a character has a limited range of motion in its shoulder, what we'll do is we'll basically lock off some of that range of motion, and then that forces you to animate it in a different way.Narrator: They still had room to pick and choose what they would keep about the old characters and where to elevate them. For example, they could have put 25 controls in each of Buzz's eyebrows, but decided to keep them simple, like when he had just three per brow in the original, while also giving Spanish Buzz these complicated flamenco-like moves. There was one particularly hard toy to animate: the octopus named Stretch. Despite the innovations in stretchiness from "The Incredibles," making eight tentacles stretch and curl was still a daunting task.Bobby Podesta:We're fighting against the computer. The computer wants to make things that are that are solid and that are perfect.Narrator: But it was a challenge they would eventually master in "Finding Dory."The hardest part of an octopus to replicate is the tentacles, which need to bend, curl, and unfurl. You can see early attempts at this with Stretch and this octopus-like monster all the way back in "Monsters, Inc." In "Finding Dory," Hank also needed to move around quite a bit and grab onto things, like this coffeepot. Hank also had more than 350 suckers combined on his tentacles. Those were so unpredictable that they had to be simulated, a process where movements are automated using code, like with strands of hair and clothing. The tentacles themselves were so dynamic that when one moved it would move other parts of Hank's body as well. And animators used an altered version of this tentacle rig on Dante in "Coco," giving the dog a long, twisty tongue. You can see it grab onto objects here in the short film "Dante's Lunch." But the biggest challenge for "Coco" was music.Pixar had to figure out how to get Miguel to accurately play guitar. So they strapped GoPros directly to guitars, giving themselves the closest possible angle. They would listen to the guitar music and mimic the exact finger and string movements. It looks so authentic. But Pixar found it could push this even further and make playing music look even more real in 2020's "Soul." As with previous Pixar films, some assets were reused from "Coco." For example, the same rig built for the "Coco" guitars was repurposed for Miho's bass.Jason Davies: We modified it for four strings and just kind of repositioned it to work for that. For the scenes where Joe plays piano, they went far beyond just matching the music directly to audio.Narrator: For reference footage, Pixar captured Jon Batiste playing piano at multiple angles. Then, character technical director Jason Davies and the rigging team built a piano rig, which functions like a digital piano. Davies fed the audio files directly into the rig, and the piano would play automatically in time with the music. If a key lit up blue, the animators would place Joe's left hand there, and his right hand would be placed on any key that turned red. They also tried developing a simulation for Joe's piano playing, but it proved tricky, as his finger was too heavy on the small piano keys. So Davies developed a finger contact rig similar to one used on "Coco." Just like in "Coco," where fingers moved the strings on guitars, Dorothea's fingers could play the saxophone, and most importantly, Joe could play the piano.Jason Davies: When their fingers would intersect the space where a key was, so it pushes down into the keyboard, it would calculate the proper angle that that piano key needed to rotate to make it look like he's pushing it.Narrator: While the piano played on its own, the hand still needed to capture the complicated motions of playing. Which is why Joe was equipped with 292 controls in each of his hands. That's about half the amount of controls in Woody's entire body in the first "Toy Story." The riggers added variables to Joe's hand that they had never used before. According to character model lead Mara MacMahon, the team even added a control for each tendon in Joe's hands.Mara MacMahon: So that was something that could kind of capture the tension in his hands as he's playing the piano. So there's a control for each hand, just to make a tendon appear if the animator wanted to really, like, emphasize that particular pose.Narrator: These state-of-the-art hand and wrist controls weren't just useful for playing music. They also allowed for flexibility. Like Linguini in "Ratatouille," Joe is tall and lanky and has a lot of frenzied movements that had to be highlighted in scenes where he is inhabited by 22. For all of this, Joe had 477 controls in his face and 789 additional controls throughout his entire body, giving him 1,266 controls total. Conversely, they limited the movements on Dorothea to show her regal stature. They even went as far as removing subtle blinks and nods.MontaQue Ruffin: It's all in like, the look, you know. How they hold their head up, or how they just set their gaze upon whatever they're looking at.Narrator: But sometimes it's the simplest-looking actions or characters that prove the hardest to control. Take the counselors. They look like simple 2D lines, but they were the most complicated characters to animate.Bobby Podesta: Doing the counselor characters for "Soul" was pushing our limits of what we could do. And they turned out amazing. That's building on 25, 26 years of history to get to that point.Narrator: Terry consisted of around 300 controls. A new tension control allowed animators to sharpen or add an angle by assigning it a higher value. This allowed Terry and the Jerrys to randomly grow fingers off their hands. Plus, they were able to easily transition between Terry's multiple forms using just a few controls, pivotal in scenes where Terry mutates into objects on Earth, like this handrail, or this bag of chips. But of course, even something so new and unusual couldn't have been made without looking to Pixar's past. The stretchy software that built Hank and Dante's tongue allowed Terry to disguise herself in elaborate ways, like in this heart monitor, and this brick wall. And the counselors couldn't just move the way a person could, posing another major challenge.Royce Wesley: Since they don't have legs, right, They just slide around on the ground. The closest analogy is actually "Cars" and that kind of stuff.Narrator: That meant they needed to borrow from the same ground-locking technology pioneered in "Cars" to keep the counselors in motion. When you get so good at making things move realistically, it's OK to sometimes let your imagination run wild.Royce Wesley: We're not trying to make things look necessarily perfectly real. What we're trying to do is make sure that the emotions that are coming out of the characters, and what they're thinking, feel 100% real.

How Pixar's character movement evolved from 'Toy Story' to 'Soul'

Armed with a knack for TikTok and an uncanny ear for pop melodies, Puth has reclaimed control of his career.<keyword id="12999051" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="charlie-puth" source="Orion">Charlie Puth</keyword> is done "pretending to be the cool kid."In an interview with Insider, the 30-year-old pop star and superproducer explained how he reclaimed control of his career after a string of disappointing releases in 2019.Defined by an aloof sound and sexy attitude, those three singles marked a departure from the heartfelt tone of Puth's earlier hits, like <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RgKAFK5djSk">"See You Again"</a> and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3AtDnEC4zak">"We Don't Talk Anymore."</a> Critics <a href="https://studybreaks.com/culture/music/charlie-puth-bad-boy/">said</a> he was trying to rebrand as a "bad boy." Elton John later <a href="https://www.insider.com/charlie-puth-elton-john-friendship-old-music-not-good-2022-1">told him</a> the songs were "ass." They all failed to crack the Billboard Hot 100. Puth decided to scrap the progress he'd made on his third album and <a href="https://twitter.com/charlieputh/status/1405558834492448772?s=20">take a moment to recalibrate</a>. Two years later, he's gearing up to release an entirely new collection of songs, appropriately titled "Charlie.""The one word that comes to mind when I think about this album in the beginning when I was making it, was 'revenge,'" he told Insider on Thursday."I was mostly, I guess, angry," he continued. "You know when someone cuts you off in traffic and they speed ahead of you and you obviously shouldn't do anything because it's dangerous, but you start to think in your mind, 'Oh, if they pulled up next to me, I would've flipped them off, and I would've said this and that?' It was basically a year of that."Puth said he began to question his relationships, both romantic and platonic, as well as his professional motivations — and came to realize that he was his own missing ingredient."'Why is this song not resonating with people? Why did this relationship not work out?' It was a lot of that," Puth explained. "I was coming to terms with who I was for the first time in five years. And that's what I realized at the end of the album, and while I was making 'Light Switch.'"Puth began teasing "Light Switch," which he described as "the most lighthearted song out of the whole bunch," back in September on TikTok. He <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@charlieputh/video/7008700077309054213?_t=8Pn5tr3FwKM&amp;_r=1">filmed himself</a> in real-time producing and recording elements of the song, including the click of an actual light switch."It felt special to me because it's the most polarizing record I've ever made. It's unusually fast. It sounds like nothing I've ever made before," he told Insider.Puth has made a habit of using TikTok to bring fans into his creative process. He's teased a handful of songs that will appear on his album, including "That's Hilarious," "Loser," and "There's a First Time for Everything."As opposed to the careful choreography of his "bad boy" singles, Puth's new songs boast an authentic, off-the-cuff charm that more closely fits with his aura offstage."The difference is I'm not trying to be so cool. I'm not trying to pretend," he said. "I'm not pretending to be the cool kid with the overly minimalistic, bare-sounding records that work for other artists, but didn't necessarily work for me."He added: "My <keyword id="11898471" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="music" source="Orion">music</keyword> thrives when it's filled with layers and six different piano tracks, which is what I've illustrated on my YouTube channel and my TikTok or whatever, wherever you find my weird ass poking around on the internet."As it turns out, the Charlie Puth who's not trying to be cool is actually very cool.In the few short weeks since he released "Light Switch," the song has racked up more than 45 million streams on Spotify and 25 million views on YouTube. He's the star of <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@charlieputh/video/7058791835497565487?is_from_webapp=1&amp;sender_device=pc&amp;web_id6941467851099670022">billboard campaigns</a>, countless viral videos, and now, <a href="https://youtu.be/YCLPiIAKqZY">a Flamin' Hot commercial</a> that will air during the Super Bowl.When Puth agreed to participate, he didn't even know it would be featured during <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/how-the-super-bowl-became-the-championship-of-advertising-2020-1">the biggest TV event of the year</a>."They kind of just threw in casually, almost like a subtle flex, that it was a Super Bowl commercial," he said. "If you told me 10 years ago something like this would happen, I wouldn't believe you."<div type="image" title="charlie puth super bowl commercial" height="2000" width="2666" msid="89548997" hostid="261"></div>In the semi-animated clip, Puth stars alongside <a href="https://www.insider.com/megan-thee-stallion-interview-tinder-pyot-challenge-2020-12">Megan Thee Stallion</a> as a beatboxing fox and a fiery red songbird, respectively. The unlikely musical duo leads a group of animals in a snack-fueled rendition of Salt-N-Pepa's "Push It."The spontaneous singalong isn't unlike the way Puth works in real life, whipping up beats and perfect pop hooks at mind-boggling speeds. He came up with the melody for <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTJczUoc26U">The Kid LAROI's No. 1 hit "Stay"</a> when he was just messing around on his keyboard."He heard that melody and just sang it exactly, which is not what I expected him to do," Puth revealed. "But that ended up being written really fast and it was one of the top five most interesting sessions for me.""And I never do sessions for other artists," he added, "but I think it was so successful because it just started out as a hang."Puth assured us that new music is imminent, and his follow-up single won't take nearly as long to arrive as "Light Switch" did. In fact, some eagle-eyed fans think they've already cracked the code. There are two dates sneakily hidden in the "Light Switch" music video: February 25 appears on a phone screen and August 12 is on a poster.Although Puth declined to say whether these are official release dates, he did confirm their inclusions were intentional.He also said there are more Easter eggs — although he initially referred to them as "ice cream cones" — buried in the video that fans haven't caught yet.But maybe they're just too busy dancing to go hunting for clues."I made 'Light Switch' on the internet thinking it was not going to see the light of day and here I'm talking to you about it and millions of people have heard it," Puth reflected. "And I love watching the reaction videos, when they put the song on and the beat drops. I live for that reaction.""You make music to make people dance, as cliché as that sounds," he added. "But there's nothing better."

Charlie Puth explains how 'revenge' inspired his new album

If you listen to <keyword id="12257531" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="gus-dapperton" source="Orion">Gus Dapperton</keyword>'s <keyword id="11898471" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="music" source="Orion">music</keyword>, you'd probably imagine its creator to be polite, self-aware, and supremely chill - almost disarmingly so. You would be exactly right.Dapperton arrived at our <keyword id="11905869" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="interview" source="Orion">interview</keyword> location, a bright Japanese restaurant he selected in <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@tara.raani2/video/6978227978752871686?sender_device=pc&amp;sender_web_id=6941467851099670022&amp;is_from_webapp=v1&amp;is_copy_url=0s_copy_url=0">Brooklyn's famously hip Bushwick neighborhood</a>, exactly on time. He made a point to shake my hand, even though I had my back to the door and hadn't risen to greet him. Then, in a move I found both strange and endearing, he took the chair next to me instead of sitting across the table.This guileless charm is the core of Dapperton's work. Though he's ambivalent about the oft-used label "bedroom pop," he said he understands what it's trying to communicate.Dapperton's favored blend of shimmery synths and Beach Boys-worthy guitar licks feels warm and familiar - like a dream you had long ago, or a half-awake heart-to-heart with an old friend. His writing style is reflexively candid, just as he is in real-time."I'm comfortable just saying whatever comes to my mind because I know I'm not going to say anything too rude," he told me over a plate of spicy tuna rolls, chopsticks poised mid-air.But, as he explained, that comfort was learned - not intrinsic."In high school, I was miserably introverted. I didn't even plan on being a performer and then I kind of had to perform. Over time, I got better at it," he mused. "Somehow, I came to enjoy it."By "had to perform," Dapperton meant that his passion and talent collided in a way that simply refused to be ignored.<div type="image" title="gus dapperton film photo 1" height="1600" width="2400" msid="86812767" hostid="261"></div>Dapperton, 24, grew up as Brendan Rice in Warwick, a farm-heavy town in upstate New York. He spent most of his time skateboarding and editing videos on his computer, not auditioning for school plays or crooning at talent shows."My sister was always a super talented singer, but I wasn't good. I wasn't super gifted at the guitar or anything, either. I just dabbled," he explained. "When you're young, you're pushed to do the things that you're 'better' at. But I loved music."When Dapperton was in eighth grade, his school's newly-installed computer lab presented an opportunity. His class was instructed to create a song in GarageBand, and whichever one the teachers liked best would be played on the town's radio station. Dapperton stayed late after school every day, tinkering away, determined to make sure they picked his.They did."Immediately I was like, 'This is what I want to do for the rest of my life,'" he said.Dapperton originally envisioned himself as a producer, making beats behind the scenes. But many producers also act as cowriters, and when Dapperton tried his hand at lyricism, something clicked. He began to discover his own voice, both physically and proverbially: "I realized the songs I was writing were meant for me."As he developed his unique musical style, Dapperton used different monikers to play with a variety of genres: Spazzy McGee made "old-school hip-hop beats," Fvcking Digital whipped up electronic remixes, and Pablo Pistachio only worked with classical piano.Gus Dapperton was the persona behind his official debut single, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xjlTOqagjuY">"Moodna, Once With Grace,"</a> which he released in 2016.The name suggests a collision of youthful simplicity and stylish panache, allowing the artist to write music that felt true to both his inside and outside. It stuck.<div type="image" title="gus dapperton first aid press photo" height="3000" width="1998" msid="86812772" hostid="261"></div> <div type="image" title="gus dapperton press photo" height="3000" width="1929" msid="86812775" hostid="261"></div>Dapperton's early releases were heavily inspired by artists like Odd Future and King Krule - fellow skater kids who had "weird voices" and no inhibitions - but he also cited supermassive stars like The Beatles, Timbaland, and Britney Spears."When I hear my sister sing those big pop songs, it's impossible to deny how beautiful they sound," he said. "My family would all be in the car chanting <a href="https://www.insider.com/category/taylor-swift">Taylor Swift</a> songs and stuff. I think 'Love Story' by Taylor Swift is one of my favorite songs of all time. My dad would just turn up the volume as loud as possible.""That's why I never denied the pleasures of pop music growing up," he continued.Indeed, Dapperton's music-making ethos is equally rooted in pop's exultant, communal power and a private individualism typically favored by singer-songwriters."I definitely always have the intention of sharing my music and making it for people to enjoy," he explained. "But I make songs for me, without any outside forces messing with the agenda."Although Dapperton was courted by several major labels at the dawn of his career, he knew it wasn't time to commit to a contract. His music is currently distributed by AWAL, a division of Kobalt Music Group that <a href="https://www.billboard.com/articles/business/8482434/kobalt-awal-anti-record-label">allows artists to retain majority ownership of their music</a>.Superfans anxious for a spillage from Dapperton's vault will be disappointed. He estimated that he's sitting on 250 completed songs and "probably 10,000 beats.""I make a ton of beats and then just never come back to them," he said. "Basically, every time I get up to 500 files in Logic," which is a popular music production platform, "I just get a new computer, because it stops working after that."Even more mind-boggling: Dapperton described the bulk of his unreleased songs as catchy ear worms that will never see the light of day."When I see myself writing a song to be a hit, I'm like, 'I just know I'm never going to come back to this again,'" he explained. "I do those things for practice."Dapperton revealed he's made about 40 full songs since the 2020 release of his sophomore studio album, "Orca" - not including the three new tracks on the album's deluxe version, which was released in early June.<div type="image" title="gus dapperton film photo 2" height="2400" width="1600" msid="86812777" hostid="261"></div>When I cautiously requested a peek into the new musical direction, Dapperton laughed."I don't really answer to anyone, so I can just talk about this," he said.Only a small selection of those 40 songs will likely make the final cut, he revealed, but his third album is definitely taking shape. He already has the title decided."A couple weeks ago, I had this revelation. I have the vision. I have all the songs' names," he said, teasing a "slightly more R&amp;B and jazz-oriented" sound. "It's not about New York City, but it's a love letter to my New York City."While "Orca" explored the cycle of depression and healing, Dapperton's forthcoming music will tackle another powerful dualism: love and fear. The two often go hand in hand, but Dapperton is oddly at peace with the turbulence. Contentedness is where he squirms."I wrote this poem recently for the intro, and I say this line like, 'It happens when everything is lost,'" he said. "Sometimes, when I'm so happy, I'm like, 'Well, I'm not going to make a fucking good song for a while.'"Dapperton, who has been dating photographer Jess Farran for more than three years, described the new album's themes as "growing with love, and heartbreak, and time, and being scared of growing old, and growing old with this monotony that's healthy for you."With 2 million monthly listeners on <a href="https://open.spotify.com/artist/6sHCvZe1PHrOAuYlwTLNH4?si=sOTi0KntRk2-U2-iuYMFQw&amp;dl_branch=1ch=1">Spotify</a>, nearly 40 million views on <a href="https://gusdapperton.lnk.to/youtubeYD">YouTube</a>, a show-stopping <a href="https://youtu.be/WzldfXlxGdc">late-night performance</a>, and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rb6Scz-5YOs">a top-40 hit under his belt</a>, it seems absurd that Dapperton has only just begun to feel at home in the "indie darling" conversation - let alone that he's one of its leading voices."I only had about six songs out when we started touring. We had no production, no sound. It was just four of us at the time - my sister, who plays keyboards and sings, and then my bassist and my drummer," he said. "We've played all these big stages and stuff, and it's taken up until <a href="https://youtu.be/tkllCCqlhtA">this year's Lollapalooza</a> for me to feel like I finally belong there.""I mean, I feel like I belong playing music for people, but on main stage?" he asked, his voice filled with awe as he noted: "Tyler, the Creator is headlining it later!"That serendipity had actually struck once before - at a festival in Paris. Dapperton performed mere hours before the former Odd Future ringleader took the same stage."It looked like we were just some band off the street that they got, like we were busking or something," he chuckled. "But this time, I felt like we had everything prepared. I felt so comfortable up there. I was not nervous whatsoever. It was just pure joy."After playing <a href="https://www.musicmidtown.com/">Atlanta's Music Midtown festival</a> last month, Dapperton will officially kick off his <a href="http://gusdapperton.com/tour/">North American tour</a> on October 17 in Carrboro, North Carolina. And if his sparkly eyeshadow, ever-changing hair colors, and cinematic music videos are any indication, fans are in for a full sensory experience."It's about individuality. It's not about trying to stand out so people listen to your music," he explained. "I want to be fashionable because fashion is an art form. I want to make good music videos because directing music videos is an art form. I want to nail a great performance because it's an art form.""I want to put 100% into all those things. I don't want to just put 100% into music and then put 0% into everything else that I'm still choosing to immerse myself in. That's lazy."

Eating sushi with Gus Dapperton, the polite king of bedroom pop

<ul class="summary-list"><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/category/bohemian-rhapsody">"Bohemian Rhapsody,"</a> the legendary six-minute single by <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/category/queen">Queen</a>, is what many call the greatest song ever written. </li><li>It's still one of the best-selling rock singles of all time, voted The Song of the Millennium in 2000, and recorded in the Guinness Book of Records as the No. 1 song of all time.</li><li>The song and the band inspired the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/bohemian-rhapsody-is-a-by-the-numbers-biopic-of-queen-2018-10">box-office hit biopic</a> starring Rami Malek as Freddie Mercury. </li><li>Watch the video above to learn how this song that no one thought would be successful became the best <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/category/rock">rock</a> song ever recorded.</li></ul>Following is a transcript of the video.Narrator: It's a song you've all heard at least once. And it was probably not like anything you've heard before. I'm of course talking about Queen's legendary single "Bohemian Rhapsody," a song that, even 40 years later, is one of the most influential and memorable songs of our generation. But have you ever wondered why this six-minute single that no one ever thought would be a hit became one of the most famous songs ever written?"Bohemian Rhapsody" was a song long in the making, but it officially kicked into gear in the summer of 1975, when Freddie Mercury began writing it as an operatic piece titled, "Real Life." After the success of their last album "Sheer Heart Attack," Queen was given complete creative freedom and control over their next piece. And it's obvious that they took that creative freedom and ran with it.Irwin Fisch: "Bohemian Rhapsody" had a very rare effect on people, which is that it was one of those songs where the first time you heard it, you hadn't heard anything like it. In my image is that it's the kind of song that makes you pull over to the side of the road, because you go, "What the devil is this?" Very few songs have done that, and that did.Narrator: And he's right. "Bohemian Rhapsody" was different for its time and still is today. Unlike most pop hits that lasted around three minutes, it was a six-minute pop single that has an opera, an opera, right in the middle of the song.Fisch: It actually in some ways hasn't been influential, because it was so fully realized that it was a little bit of, "Where do we go from here?" It managed to become a ubiquitous part of the culture and something that never gets off the radio and never stops in the karaoke bars and is used in movies, and it's all over the place because nobody has still done anything that sounds like that.Narrator: One of the reasons why "Bohemian Rhapsody" sounds so different is in its structure. The song is neither an a cappella, a ballad, an opera or rock. It's actually all of them in one song. Fisch: It advanced a tradition of suites in pop music, meaning not a continuous song, not a verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge structure, which was the norm. A put together group of different songs, in essence. So if people refer to "Bohemian Rhapsody" as a song, that's a bit of a misnomer. It's actually three or four songs.Narrator: "Bohemian Rhapsody" can actually be divided into five different sections: an a cappella introduction. Ballad. Opera. Hard rock. And finally a reflective coda. It was also highly unusual for a popular single to not include a chorus, while combining different musical styles and lyrics. It is by definition a mind-blowing genre bender.Fisch: This innovation started around the mid-'60s. It started basically with the Beach Boys and the Beatles. Beach Boys with "Good Vibrations." The Beatles with "A Day in the Life." Epic songs that pieced together different ideas into a cohesive whole. Queen, in "Bohemian Rhapsody," took that idea and pushed it way over the top.Narrator: And to see just how over the top they went, you need to look no farther than this operatic section of the song. The lyrics name characters from classical Italian theaters, quotes from the Quran, and the demon Beelzebub. And this section that sounds like it's been sung by a roomful of choir was actually just three people: Freddie Mercury, drummer Roger Taylor, and guitarist Brian May. It's not just the vocals; there's harmony everywhere, even in the instruments that almost sound like echoes. This technique was heavily inspired by a production method called the "Wall of Sound," developed in 1960 by producer Phil Spector. He put masses of musicians in one room, three keyboard players playing the same part but in various similar instruments, like the harpsichord or an electric piano, and recording them together to create a sound the likes of which had never been heard before. That was exactly what Queen wanted to accomplish.Fisch: When people talk about what a great song "Bohemian Rhapsody" is, they're talking equally, or even more, about the production.Narrator: To achieve the sound that they wanted, Queen used a technique known as reduction mixing, also called ping pong recording. Most of the pop songs you listen to today use a lot of audio tracks, each track reserved for different instruments and vocals, combining to make one song. But back then, technology limited the amount of audio tracks that could be used. For example, Beatles' legendary "Sgt. Pepper's" was recorded on an analog four-track record. And to fit more than four tracks in a four-track record, they would record all four tracks, then bounce all their tracks into one, record, bounce again, and repeat. The bounce tracks would combine all of the tracks into one, meaning if you raise the sound of that particular track, it would raise the volume of all the individual tracks within.Fisch: Part of the great challenge of that process was that you had to make commitments to your mix, to the blending of everything as you went along, so you needed to have a lot of foresight and a great image of where you were going. By the time Queen made "Bohemian Rhapsody," we were up to 24-track tape. By today's standards, that's still not many tracks. They had so many vocals and they had so many layers of guitars. I've heard that they had about 180 individual tracks that got put onto a 24-track, two-inch tape.Narrator: But of course this method of bouncing tracks came with its own challenges. Once it's done, you can't go back to just fix it, like we can do now.Fisch: Two-inch, 24-track tape that they were working on, it was a physical process. It was a razor blade. It was an edit block where the tape would sit there. You would slice through the two-inch tape. You would cut out what you wanted to cut out. And you would splice it together with a little piece of white tape. Now it's very easy digitally. You chop it on the screen. If you made a mistake, you can fix it. Everything now is non-destructive. Everything they did then was destructive, so it took a lot of commitment and a lot of knowledge and a very, very intense, deep skillset to be able to piece that stuff together and have it sound smooth.Narrator: Just how much tracking went into the song becomes more evident when you remove the instruments to just listen to the vocals. Fisch: And before the Beatles and before the Beach Boys, a song was a song. It needed to be presentable on the piano. If you sat down and played "Bohemian Rhapsody" from start to finish on the piano, you probably would say, "Wow, that's really wild and interesting." But you probably wouldn't say that's going to be a hit that's gonna endure for 40 years. What made it that had a lot to do with the sound they created.Narrator: And of course, it's hard to talk about "Bohemian Rhapsody" without talking about the man behind the song, Freddie Mercury, because this song was his baby, his brainchild. Unlike most of Queen's songs that were written collaboratively in the studio, this was a song that, according to the guitarist Brian May, was "all in Freddie's head" before it even began recording.Fisch: Freddie Mercury talked about the song in an interview as "experimentation in sound." I think that could be taken to mean that the experiment was to see if he could get what was in his head, his sonic preconceptions, out there. I don't think it was the kind of experimentation where they went into the studio to just see what would happen, because he was famously buttoned-up and had the production and the notes and the arrangements and sound of the thing in his head. I think the experiment was really about seeing if something unique could be realized in the studio. An important reason that "Bohemian Rhapsody" resonates and has resonated for over 40 years is that it embodied something very intense, which is Freddie Mercury's personality and life. That record is an oral extension of Freddie Mercury's self-consciousness without shame. It's music in some ways the sensibilities are out of the closet. As a performer, there hadn't been a Freddie Mercury before Freddie Mercury.Narrator: And perhaps beyond all the notes, lyrics and performances, what truly makes "Bohemian Rhapsody" great is that it embodies what every musical piece should be: the talent and the drive to push boundaries and create something that brings us together, even 40 years later. In a time where pop songs just all generally sound the same, maybe that's why we still can't stop listening to "Bohemian Rhapsody." With just this one song, Freddie Mercury and Queen became something that very few artists managed to achieve: a legend.

'Bohemian Rhapsody': The 6-minute rock single that changed the face of music

30. What does a brand sound like?

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image">Lisa Eadicicco</div></div></div>Apple's new iPhone 6S is the best smartphone the company has made yet. It's a bit faster. It has a pressure sensitive screen. The camera is noticeably better in some ways. The design is more durable. It's an excellent phone all around. But if you have an iPhone 6 or 6 Plus, you probably don't need to upgrade. One of the marquee features to come with the iPhone 6S is 3D Touch, which allows you to press down harder on the screen to perform certain actions.These include launching a quick shortcut menu on an app icon, switching between apps faster, previewing links in emails, and more. Although it's handy and works well, it's not enough to convince me to buy a new iPhone. The enhancements in the iPhone 6S are noticeable, but they haven't drastically changed the way I actually use my phone. For me, this wasn't the case when Apple launched the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus last year. The jump from a 4-inch screen to a 5.5-inch screen was a game changer. It made the iPhone more valuable to me because I enjoyed everything I did with it a bit more since the screen was so much larger.The iPhone 6S is simply a better version of the iPhone 6, and here are all the reasons why. <h2>It's the best camera on an iPhone so far</h2><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">Lisa Eadicicco</div></div></div>Apple has given the camera on the iPhone 6S a big upgrade in terms of hardware. It now has a 12-megapixel camera instead of an 8-megapixel camera, which means the camera is capable of taking in more light. That should ultimately results in better photos. However, in my limited time with the phone, I didn't notice too much of a difference.Take a look at the images below. There isn't much of a discrepancy in terms of image quality - the detail and color accuracy looks the same in both photos.<h3>iPhone 6S</h3><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">Lisa Eadicicco</div></div></div><h3>iPhone 6 Plus</h3><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">Lisa Eadicicco</div></div></div>Apple has also added an entirely new feature called Live Photos. This means the camera captures what happens a second before you actually press the shutter button. The effect adds a hint of movement to your photos, making them look more lively just as its name implies. Live Photos are turned on by default, but you can turn them off by pressing the yellow circles at the top of the screen.These photos also take up roughly twice as much storage as a normal photo, and you can only view them if you're using an Apple device running the latest software. A few third party apps support Live Photos too (Facebook, Getty Images, Weibo), but it's unclear exactly when that support will roll out. It's a fun feature, and since it's automatically turned on it's extremely simple to use. But, like 3D Touch, I don't feel like it's a feature I'll necessarily miss when I switch back to using my iPhone 6 Plus.What I will miss, however, is the much improved front-facing camera on the iPhone 6S. Not only has Apple bumped up the sensor from 1.2-megapixels to 5-megapixels, but it's added a flash too. The iPhone 6S uses the screen on your phone as a flash when you take a photo with the front camera. It works by default - all you have to do is turn the flash on the same way you would if you were taking a photo with the main camera. It's incredibly clever on Apple's part.The results are impressive to say the least. These are the best front-facing photos I've taken on a smartphone, period. Here's a look at how it compares with that of the iPhone 6S Plus in a dim setting:<h3>iPhone 6S</h3><h3><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">Lisa Eadicicco</div></div></div> iPhone 6 Plus</h3><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">Lisa Eadicicco</div></div></div><h2>3D Touch makes things easier, but that's not enough for me yet</h2>During my time with the iPhone 6S , I found 3D Touch to be helpful in general. But since it's so new, it's not something that's intuitive to me just yet. Also, in a few instances I found that it didn't save me too much time.3D Touching the Apple Maps icon (yes I've been using Apple Maps since iOS 9 launched), saves a few steps if you want to get directions home or send your location. But in other scenarios, such as using the alarm clock, launching the app and tapping "Create alarm" is probably just as quick as actually launching the app and tapping that button.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">Lisa Eadicicco</div></div></div>3D Touch is more useful in other ways, though. The new feature that Apple calls Peek and Pop, for example, lets you preview content without being directed away from whatever you're currently doing. 3D Touching a link in a text message in Safari pulls up a preview of that website without taking you out of the conversation. This also works with dates, flight information, and other types of data. One of the most useful 3D Touch features I've come across is the ability to turn the keyboard on your iPhone into a touchpad. If you 3D Touch the keyboard, you'll be able to use it as a trackpad for controlling the cursor - which makes it a lot easier to place the cursor exactly where you want it. 3D Touch works with third party apps such as Instagram, Pinterest, and Dropbox, too. With Instagram, you can jump straight into your activity feed by 3D Touching its app icon. <div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image">Lisa Eadicicco</div></div></div>While 3D Touch makes things a bit faster, it's doesn't really play that big of a role in the way I use my iPhone. I think that could change in the future, though, as more third party apps make use of 3D Touch. I'm more interested to learn about the new things 3D Touch will enable me to do in apps other than just making tasks quicker and easier.For instance, the app Magic Piano allows you to change the volume of your tune by pressing the keys harder with 3D Touch. Apple also showcased how 3D Touch lets you accelerate faster in the game AG Drive by pressing harder on the gas.It's clear that Apple wants 3D Touch to be just as seamless and natural as multitouch - now that we've had it for years, it seems crazy that we've ever lived without it on our phones. I imagine developers will brainstorm creative ways to make their apps so compelling it'll almost feel empty to use them without 3D Touch, but it may take some time to get there. <h2>Other things to know</h2>The new iPhone is a lot faster, too. It runs on Apple's A9 chip, which brings general improvements to the whole device. This combined with the iPhone 6S' new TouchID sensor make it extremely fast to unlock your phone. When I tried unlocking the iPhone 6S and my iPhone 6 Plus at the same time, I noticed the latter lagged noticeably behind the former.Apple's latest iPhone is also said to be more durable. The aluminum Apple uses for the phone's body is the same type it uses to create the Apple Watch Sport casing, which means it should be able to handle bumps and nicks with more endurance. The glass is also said to be tougher.You can also turn on Apple's "Hey Siri" feature when you're phone isn't plugged in. This means you can speak to Siri naturally without having to hold down the home button. I found this worked well - I asked Siri what the weather was going to be like the next day from across the room, and she answered instantly. However, in the few days I've been using the phone, I didn't notice any change in battery life. The iPhone 6S lasts just about as long as the iPhone 6, which means if you're using your phone moderately throughout the day you'll probably get a full day's worth of battery life.<h2>Overall thoughts</h2><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">Lisa Eadicicco</div></div></div>All of these various improvements combined make Apple's latest iPhone more powerful and easier to use than ever before. The overall experience is better, but it hasn't changed substantially enough to warrant an upgrade from an iPhone 6. However, if you have an older iPhone such as an iPhone 5S or iPhone 5, it's a great choice and it'll feel like a huge change. <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/animated-map-global-fiber-optic-internet-cables-2015-9">Animated map reveals the 550,000 miles of cable hidden under the ocean that power the internet</a></h3> <div> <div> <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="1iNHI3dzr1l7P_ZGDpqWJC3kUle6Dsan" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div> </div> </div> </div>

Apple's iPhone 6S is one of the best smartphones I've ever used - but here's why I wouldn't buy it

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image">The Drive</div></div></div>Down deep, most car people are magazine people. Even in the digital age, the majority of auto journalists now working revere a pre-digital time when Car &amp; Driver, Road &amp; Track, and Motor Trend created a world of motor-heady enthusiasm mixed with stylish writing.Times change, however. Media has moved online decisively, and automotive journalism needs to adjust.The Golden Age of print-auto writing may have faded, but the U.S. car market is better than it has been in a decade. That's why Time Inc. just launched a new site, <a href="http://www.thedrive.com/">The Drive</a>.It's a risky proposition and a big bet on new media by and old-media company. Previous digital ventures in the auto-journalism space have been scrappy: Jalopnik started out with a small group of oddball car guys and some modest support from Gawker Media. Autoblog was equally bloggy and small-time until it was bought by AOL, but even now, it retains its bloggy, obsessive spirit.The Drive, by contrast, is launching this week with a roster of heavy hitters from the media and auto-writing world, including Lawrence Ulrich, who made his bones behind the wheel for the New York Times; and A.J. Baime, who wrote a great book about a legendary race, "Go Like Hell: Ford, Ferrari, and Their Battle for Speed and Glory at Le Mans."The site will also, in contemporary startup fashion, be occupying space in Brooklyn, far from the Time-Life citadel in Manhattan. There will reportedly be a garage, optimized for video production and seeking to create the kind of automotive content that appeals to a generation not raised on Motor Trend's printed comparos but on Motor Trend's YouTube channel - and re-runs of "Top Gear."<h2>New York state of mind</h2>I dropped by Time-Life this week to chat with both The Drive's editor, Mike Guy (formerly of Maxim, and on the phone from the Frankfurt Motor Show) and Matt Bean, SVP of Editorial Innovation at Time Inc. There were two big takeways.First, The Drive is going to have a strong New York flavor. This is a micro-trend in the car business: the resurgence of New York as a place where people care about cars. Cadillac recently moved its sales and operations to New York and has be re-branding itself as a luxury car maker closely connected with New York in all its fashionable, gritty glory. The Driver is aiming for something similar, defying the long-held belief that car publications need to be based in either Detroit or Southern California (the former for the industry, the latter for the weather and the roads).This links The Drive with the Car &amp; Driver on the 1960s and '70s - they're packaging what Car &amp; Driver did during the heyday of writers and editors like Brock Yates and P.J. O'Rourke for a much younger audience. Car &amp; Driver was a very cool car magazine that was written by people who were under the sway of the New Journalism, which was headquartered in New York (Car &amp; Driver decamped for Michigan in 1978 and no one has ever forgiven them). The Drive is designed to explore the New Journalism of now: dynamic digital storytelling.Jalopnik tried to do something like this when it started out in the mid-2000s, blending snappy sentences with an compulsive desire to embrace the Internet's meme-making machine. Jalopnik continues to feature very stylish and opinionated writers in the auto-blogosphere, but The Drive is pushing the revival of this type of car writing in a much better capitalized, less outsider-y direction.Second, The Drive is going to stress a throwback affection for words.Will it work? Well, The Drive does check some boxes. It has a feed for up-to-the-minute automotive news, and it also isn't shying away from big, high-impact visual features. In digital car coverage it's extremely important to show the cars. And the showing won't be limited to photos. There will be video and lots of it.<h2>Creative car writing</h2>What's interspersed with that is a slightly mixed bag at the moment. <a href="http://www.thedrive.com/article/144/cadillac-ats-v-checkmate-for-bmws-bahn-burning-m3">Ulrich's review of the Cadillac ATS-V</a>, a 464-horsepower sports coupe intended to steal share from BMW, is punchy and thrusty and authoritative, if not really groundbreaking. But there is this line: "Once you've snuggled into the Caddy's rib-sticking Recaro buckets, caressed the faux-suede steering wheel and toggled that shifter, you're fresh out of interior talking points." Those are fun words to read, for sure.<a href="http://www.thedrive.com/article/198/the-ford-shelby-gt350-mustang-is-an-8-cylinder-kick-in-the-nuts">Baime's </a>take on the new Ford Shelby GT350 Mustang is ripped from the track - Laguna Seca in California - but a tad workmanlike in execution. "There are but a few perfect moments in life," Baime writes. "All your senses become electrified, and you feel like you can see the world and where you fit into it with immaculate clarity. This moment is called ecstasy."Guy <a href="http://www.thedrive.com/article/144/cadillac-ats-v-checkmate-for-bmws-bahn-burning-m3">shows off some chops at the keyboard</a>, with his investigation of the new Mazda MX-5 Miata. "[T]he Mazda eagerly pursues its limits at speeds that don't threaten your license, life or limb," he writes. "It's a glider, not a fighter. As it does on track, where skilled owners routinely embarrass rookies in more powerful cars, the Mazda rewards those who can carry momentum through curves."Writer-large-Brett Burke deliveries some elegant comparisons, <a href="http://www.thedrive.com/article/161/heavy-breathing-in-the-ferrari-488-gtb">in response to a drive of the new Ferrari 488 GTB</a>. "Flooring a Bugatti Veyron pulverizes your senses. Flooring a Lamborghini Aventador terrorizes them. Flooring the 488 releases a flood of endorphins, fight and flight.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">The Drive</div></div></div>And <a href="http://www.thedrive.com/article/208/how-to-get-dumped-and-crash-a-bmw-5-series">Max Prince's post </a>about wrecking his 1997 BMW contains this: "Just before winter, I had a drag-out argument with my then-girlfriend, mostly because she didn't realize we were dating. On the drive home, I listened to Tom Waits and thought about buying a piano. Unrequited love is a bitch. So are dump trucks." Prince is a senior editor at The Drive, and that kind of prose mainlines what senior eds at Car &amp; Driver routinely produced, lightly gonzo with a healthy dash of self-deprecation.But the real tell that The Drive is spiritually connected to the car writing of the '60s and '70s comes from <a href="http://www.thedrive.com/article/195/mario-andretti-and-the-brutal-magic-of-monza">a standout feature from racing legend Mario Andretti</a> about the tragic glory of his first Formula 1 World Championship in 1978 (he was the last American to pull this off), when he won the Italian Grand Prix at Monza, but lost his friend Ronnie Peterson to injuries sustained in a crash. The best car publications always reserve space to remind us that the men and women who race cars are miles above anyone who merely writes about cars. The Drive is no different.<h2>Bucking a trend</h2>The site is bucking at least one online-media trend, simply because it's so big (its launching with dozens of stories, after being in stealth mode for months). This makes it a fully fledged play for a large audience, rather than an attempt to capture a niche readership, something that enthusiast sites like Hodinkee have done for watch nuts and that numerous men's style blogs have done for classic menswear and heritage made-in-USA products. Guy and Bean are optimistic that the readers will come and come in force. And at launch, they've certainly made good on giving those readers something to read. It remains to be seen whether that aspect of The Drive will survive. Car &amp; Driver was always my favorite of the so-called "buff books," so I'm psyched to see its style reborn for a new generation that cares about cars but has moved well past magazines. <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/most-extravagant-vacations-in-world-2015-9">The most expensive and extravagant vacations in the world</a></h3> <div> <div> <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="tvMzRndzpNrgBqxHb0FavvEnwVT1v50q" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div> </div> </div> </div>

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