Ohio has a number of useful free mobile apps for travelers, enough to require more than one post!
Here is the first batch of useful Ohio apps I found online:
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Toledo Museum of Art-I found the museum's app nicely organized, timely, and easy to use.
I liked the clean and simple front page, which offers Tours, Happenings and Visit choices.
Clicking on Visit gives users basic information like location, phone numbers (with a link that allows you to directly call the museum from the app), museum hours, admission for special exhibits (basic museum admission is free), and parking.
Choose Happenings to access museum news, exhibitions and a calendar of events. Click on listings of individual exhibitions for a short description of the exhibition, its gallery location and dates.
The Calendar link has a day-by-day listing of events that allows you to click on individual events for more information about it.
I particularly enjoyed checking out the Tours link.
The Sculpture Gardens Tour leads to a page of small thumbnails of two dozen art works on the museum grounds. Touch the picture of an individual artwork to learn about the object, its artist and to check out related links or see short video/audio clips about the piece
The Ancient World tour links to various eras and provides quick links to one-to-three-minute video or audio tours of individual items. I particularly enjoyed the short videos I found in the Classic Architecture choice that told me more about the classic influences on the design of the museum's Beaux Arts style architecture.
The latest update for the app was December, 2013.
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Cleveland Museum of Art-I was pretty excited to find this mobile app, derived from the CMA's revolutionary iPad app.
We visited the museum very early last year and saw a few elements of their then-newly unveiled ArtLens program, Gallery One and other new technology tools for visitors. Experts hailed the programs as the most comprehensive use of popular computer technology by any art museum in the country at that time. The technology upgrades were impressive enough, even without using the iPad app at the time, so I was thrilled to see the museum unveiled ArtLens for the iPhone early this year.
You'll see a warning that it may take a bit of time to launch the app the first time you use it.
This is no exaggeration!
It took 40 minutes to install the app and upload the 12,000+ images when I first opened it, so be sure you have plenty of time and space on your phone to completely load the app before starting your exploration. And, yes, as the warning says, it will be worth it!
The app opens to a basic menu of three choices: Galleries, Tours and You.
Galleries give you maps of both floors of the museum. Click on the individual gallery numbers for the name of the gallery and photos of artwork there. Click on the individual photos for information about specific pieces and links to related pieces or video clips. Users can favorite artwork by clicking on the heart icon and share or save the image via text message, email or Twitter with others.
Tours at the app's main page takes users to suggested gallery tours by theme, duration or popularity and allows users to create their own tour of favorite pieces or see tours submitted by other visitors. Each tour has a list of stops, a map showing gallery locations, and clickable thumbnails of the artworks on the tour that allow visitors to learn more about each piece.
I clicked on the heart icon to favorite few pieces I particularly enjoy and intend to use my bookmarks to create a tour for the next time I visit the CMA.
There are other interactive features I'm anxious to try out on my next museum visit. The iPhone version of the ArtLens app allows for one-handed use, has a scrolling function, and allows visitors to use the phone's camera function to "recognize" specific artworks and instantly display information about them.
The latest update for this app was February, 2014. The museum expects to launch versions of the app for Android devices this spring.
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University Circle Inc. (Cleveland)-The University Circle organization markets the square mile of Cleveland as a premiere urban district and the city's major center for educational, cultural and medical institutions.
You can check out many attractions in this area four miles from downtown Cleveland like the museums, parks, and shopping areas, as well as medical facilities, residential areas and other services like dry cleaning, hair salons and auto repair, making the app useful for visitors or those who considering moving to the area.
Menu selections along the bottom of the app's pages include Places, Events, Pics and Videos, Favorites and About.
Selecting Places allows users to access a list of categories where they can find what interests them and find pages for individual places with information like addresses, phone numbers and a description of the place or business.
Events gives users the choice to find events for Today, This Weekend, This Month or to browse by category like Child-Friendly, Outdoors Activity or Arts and Entertainment.
You can mark your favorite places or events by pressing the heart icon at the top of the individual page for the event or location.
The app contains the most useful information from the University Circle's Web site for those on the road and looking for a quick bit of information about the area and attractions.
The latest update for this app was September, 2013.
© Dominique King 2014 All rights reserved
These look really useful--especially the Cleveland one. We got turned around near the museums where there are the sculptures from the different nations. Really cool to look at but an app would prove to be handy!
Posted by: Melissa | March 04, 2014 at 07:43 AM
If you're in Cleveland a lot, you might want to check out an app called Cleveland Historical. I've written about this one elsewhere. It has a lot of sites of historical significance in Cleveland and is really great for navigating around the city.
Posted by: Dominique King | April 28, 2014 at 09:26 AM