For music we have iTunes. For photos we have iPhoto. For movies we have… also iTunes? Hold that thought. I’m not saying that iTunes is bad at doing videos — it’s just that when it comes to managing them, it leaves a lot to be desired. It’s just that it’s not as efficient with the movies when compared to music. There has to be a better alternative, right? That’s where yFlicks comes in.
Design. When you first take a glance at yFlicks’ user interface, you’d probably mistake it for one of Apple’s iApps — it’s clean, beautiful, and efficient. And if the default look is not your thing, you can change it into others like Aqua, Leopard, Glass, Wood, and more. By now that you’ve taken a good look at it, you realize yFlicks goes beyond an iApp.
Functionality. You can keep your video library organized in Groups and Smart Groups (which you may know as Folders). The sweet deal is that when you add new movies, they’re automatically placed in the Temporary group. Once you’re finished watching them, you can prompt for the Temporary items to be cleared from your library. But if you liked the movie, just drag it into the library, and there it will be saved from Temporary oblivion. yFlicks is also able to think outside the library — it can work with your web browser to save movies from video sites (such as YouTube) and adds them to your library. And from there, you can even export any movie from your library (MPEG-4 only, though).
Video playback. yFlicks worked with whatever movie format I threw at it: from QuickTime, to AVI, to FLV (shown below: an HD video in all of its glory). And when playing, the window is capable of automatically resizing to fit the video’s size, you can set it, or have it play in full screen mode. The app also worked perfectly when controlled via an Apple remote.
Limitations. There was only one thing that truly disappointed me: it’s unable to play videos bought from the iTunes Store. And even though the search function really works, some kind of tagging system would’ve been nice.
Final thoughts. If your video collection was all bought from the iTunes Store, you’d better stick with iTunes. But for everything else, yFlicks is the best video library app that I’ve tried to this day. Even if you don’t have such a large video collection, yFlicks allows for it to grow thanks to the web video integration. Just think of yFlicks as the real iTunes for your videos, even though it may not be free at the price tag of fifteen euros — but it’s totally worth it.
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[tags]Apple,Mac,Software,yFlicks[/tags]
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