Best films to look forward to in 2016: Here are all the top movie trailers

The year 2016 is the year of the superhero movie.

Many of the biggest blockbusters are set to be focused on super-powered wonderment. Marvel and DC continue their respective expansions of both universes’ big screen outings.

But that’s not to say the year will be completely dominated by men and women in capes. There are plenty of other treats in store too. Movie versions of gaming giants, such as Assassin’s Creed and Warcraft, are also going to be unleashed on the world in 2016. So could there finally be a few genuinely good game-to-movie adaptations?

Then we’ve got the inevitable reboots with a potentially hilarious Ghostbusters due to land with an all female Ghostbuster cast. 

We’ve rounded up all the best trailers that are available so far, for you to glimpse at what’s coming in 2016. And in all cases we feature the best quality option currently available – often Ultra HD 4K, for those with a monitor good enough. We also occasionally have a featurette instead of a trailer.

We even have teasers shot on a mobile phone in closed-door events, but will replace either when the real deal arrives. Plus, we’ll update with new trailers as they arrive, so keep checking back.

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

Premiere: 16 DecemberDirector: Gareth EdwardsStars: Felicity Jones, Mads Mikkelsen, Alan Tudyk

Star Trek Beyond

Premiere: 22 JulyDirector: Justin LinStars: Chris Pine, Simon Pegg, Idris Elba

Captain America: Civil War

Premiere: 6 MayDirector: Anthony and Joe RussoStars: Chris Evans, Robert Downey Jr, Scarlett Johansson

Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice

Premiere: 25 MarchDirector: Zack SnyderStars: Ben Affleck, Henry Cavill, Amy Adams, Jesse Eisenberg

X-Men: Apocalypse

Premiere: 27 MayDirector: Bryan SingerStars: Michael Fassbender, James McAvoy, Jennifer Lawrence, Olivia Munn

Suicide Squad

Premiere: 5 AugustDirector: David AyerStars: Jared Leto, Ben Affleck, Will Smith

Deadpool

Premiere: 12 FebruaryDirector: Tim MillerStars: Ryan Reynolds, Gina Carano, Morena Baccarin

Doctor Strange

Premiere: 4 November 2016Director: Scott DerricksonStars: Benedict Cumberbatch, Rachel McAdams, Tilda Swinton

Warcraft

Premiere: 10 JuneDirector: Duncan JonesStars: Travis Fimmel, Paula Patton, Daniel Wu, Ben Foster

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

Premiere: 16 DecemberDirector: Gareth EdwardsStars: Mads Mikkelsen, Felicity Jones, Alan Tudyk

Snowden

Premiere: 13 MayDirector: Oliver StoneStars: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Scott Eastwood, Shailene Woodley

Pride and Prejudice Zombies

Premiere: 5 FebruaryDirector: Burr SteelsStars: Lily James, Lena Headey, Matt Smith

Independence Day: Resurgence

Premiere: 24 JuneDirector: Roland EmmerichStars: Liam Hemsworth, Joey King, Maika Monroe

Alice Through the Looking Glass

Premiere: 27 MayDirector: James BobinStars: Johnny Depp, Anne Hathaway, Helena Bonham Carter

The Jungle Book

Premiere: 15 AprilDirector: Jon FavreauStars: Scarlett Johansson, Idris Elba, Bill Murray

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows

Premiere: 3 JuneDirector: Dave GreenStars: Megan Fox, Johnny Knoxville, Will Arnett

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny

Premiere: 26 February (in select cinemas and on Netflix)Director: Woo-Ping YuenStars: Donnie Yen, Michelle Yeoh

Zoolander 2

Premiere: 12 FebruaryDirector: Ben StillerStars: Ben Stiller, Owen Wilson, Will Ferrell, Penelope Cruz

The Revenant

Premiere: 8 JanuaryDirector: Alejandro González IñárrituStars: Tom Hardy, Leonardo DiCaprio, Domhnall Gleeson

The Hateful Eight

Premiere: 1 JanuaryDirector: Quentin TarantinoStars: Jennifer Jason Leigh, Channing Tatum, Samuel L. Jackson

Fantastic Beats and Where to Find Them

Premiere: 18 NovemberDirector: David YatesStars: Ezra Miller, Eddie Redmayne, Colin Farrell

Watch the first trailer for ‘Rogue One: A Star Wars Story’

It’s been barely three months since Star Wars: The Force Awakens swept into theaters, showing the world what’s become of the far-flung galaxy since Return of the Jedi. Now that the film is available to purchase, the folks at Disney and Lucasfilm are turning their attention to Rogue One, starting with a brand new teaser trailer. Set before A New Hope, the film follows a group of Rebel rogues trying to steal the plans for the original Death Star. As such, you can expect plenty of throwbacks to the original trilogy, including classic stormtroopers, X-wing starfighters and Star Destroyers.

Felicity Jones’ character is the focal point of the trailer, painting her as a rebellious type that frequently breaks the law. She’s brought before the Rebel Alliance and described as “reckless, aggressive and undisciplined.” Clearly, they need her help though, as she’s later shown in the battlefield taking down Empire goons and running towards AT-AT walkers. We also get a glimpse of some secondary characters, including an Empire general that’s undoubtedly the main villain. It’s tense, exhilarating stuff, with plenty of explosions and blaster fire to keep you on the edge of your seat.

Rogue One is being directed by Gareth Edwards, who worked on Monsters in 2010 and the Godzilla reboot in 2014. It’s one of many standalone Star Wars films that include a Han Solo origin story and a (likely) exploration of Boba Fett. Rogue One comes out on December 16th, before Rey, Finn and the gang return to our screens for Episode VIII on December 15th, 2017.

Source: YouTube

First official look at GoPro’s ‘Omni’ VR camera rig

It was almost a year ago we learned that GoPro was planning a spherical camera rig for VR. Back then, that was pretty much all we knew. The announcement came at the same time that CEO Nick Woodman confirmed the rumors his company was working on a drone (that we’re still eagerly waiting for). We’d seen some prototypes of the rig before, but it wasn’t until February, GoPro gave finally it a name: Omni. Today, for the first time, we get to see what the final product actually looks like (hint, much like the last prototype as most of the updates are internal, but that’s it above). And we’ve got a sample of the sort of image you might expect from it below.

You may remember, this isn’t GoPro’s first VR-friendly camera tool. A day after we learned about the spherical array, GoPro unveiled Odyssey, a 16-camera rig designed in partnership with Google’s Jump VR platform. That beast (once you included all the cameras you needed) cost a budget-melting $15,000 and is only available in limited numbers. Omni, on the other hand, should be a little more accessible, and is an all-GoPro product.

Omni uses six GoPro Black cameras — a cost of $3,000 if bought separately. That said, pro, or pro-sumer users — to whom this should appeal most — are the ones most likely to already have a number of GoPros in their kit bag. If that still sounds expensive, that’s the name of the game it seems. Other spherical rigs like Nokia’s Ozo at the top end costs a whopping $60,000. Or unproven names like Orah at $3,600. Unlike Odyssey, Omni won’t record in 3D, but the company claims that hardware inside the rig will ensure “pixel-level” synchronization between the cameras. It’s also designed to work seamlessly with Kolor, the VR-video software company GoPro bought last April. Right now, though, it doesn’t look like it’ll work with cameras in the waterproof housing, as earlier images suggested.

There are similar 3rd party mounts you can buy right now, of course. These tend to cost a couple of hundred bucks upwards, but you’re on your own when it comes to synching the cameras, and stitching the video together. You can even 3D print a basic rig for less than a dollar’s worth of filament. Omni is the first all-official spherical offering coming to market from the camera-maker itself though.

GoPro hasn’t shared details of the price of the Omni rig just yet. But it has confirmed you’ll be able to buy an all-in-one bundle with cables and cameras, or just buy the rig and use your existing GoPros. The company is showcasing it at NAB (April 16-21) along with a slew of spherical content and “other professional solutions” — which include its HEROCast wireless transmitter for broadcast. Pricing and pre-order info should be available before then.

With Omni out in the wild, there’s just one thing left in the GoPro workshop that we haven’t yet laid eyes on, and that of course is its Karma drone. Details of that still remain a mystery, though we do know it’ll work with existing GoPro cameras, and likely come in a foldable design. It could even work with Omni, but spherical video from up in the sky isn’t usually that effective. There’s no confirmed date for Karma yet, but if we were pinning the tail on that calendar-donkey, we’d aim it for somewhere just after June 9th.

Hermés will offer more straps for the Apple Watch

Apple and Hermés have revealed that the pair will introduce a raft of new strap options for the Apple Watch. According to Elle Australia, the new bands will launch on April 19th in a variety of pretentious-sounding color options. Users will have their pick of Bleu Paon, Bleu Saphir, Blanc and Feu — more commonly known as Green, Blue, White and Orange. At the same time, the pair will begin selling the bands separate from the smartwatch they connect to, enabling wealthy users to swap their strap to match their outfit. AppleInsider is reporting that the standalone bands will retail for $340 and $490, depending on if you want a 38 or 42mm band.

Source: AppleInsider, Elle Australia

Lutron adds Alexa support to its connected home devices

While Amazon’s Alexa-enabled devices get more and more features to play music and order goods from the online retailer, it’s IoT that’s making it the must-have device for the home. With it, instead of reaching for a smartphone and launching an app, you can simply say, “Alexa” and control an increasing amount of connected devices. Now Lutron’s Caseta Wireless lighting system is ready to be told what to do.

Lutron joins Philips Hue, WeMo, Nest, Insteon and Samsung’s Smart Things with Alexa support. Users can add Lutron devices via the Alexa app.

Once set up, in addition to turning the lights on and of with their voice, users can adjust the brightness of Lutron bulbs by varying percentages.

Hasbro and Indiegogo want your board game ideas

Despite the ever-growing number of screens at our disposal, there’s still a desire for traditional board games that rely on paper, card and plastic. Hasbro, an industry titan that owns Monopoly, Trivial Pursuit and other tabletop classics, is now looking to the community for fresh ideas. The company is teaming up with Indiegogo for the “Spring 2016 Next Great Game Challenge,” an open competition to find and publish a user-created board game. Any enthusiast designer from Canada, the US, France, Germany and the UK can submit their ideas online, up until May 15th.

Once the deadline closes, Hasbro’s game designers will review each submission and choose 15 favorites based on their visual style, “narrative” and mechanics. The shortlist will then submit prototypes, which, after careful consideration, will be whittled down to five finalists. Hasbro will give each contestant $2,000 and help them set up an Indiegogo campaign, designed to raise funding and awareness. Hasbro will mentor them throughout the process and the winner will receive an extra $25,000, a trip to Hasbro HQ and, of course, the chance to have their game published.

A similar competition was held last year, but it was only open to designers in the US. The winner was the Mr Toast Card Game, developed by Dan Goodsell, which will be released by Hasbro later this year. Indiegogo’s involvement might raise a few eyebrows, given that Hasbro has enough funds to publish any game that’s submitted for the competition. However, it’s not uncommon for companies to use crowdfunding sites as a means to test public interest in a product. It’s also led to some phenomenally well-funded games, including Exploding Kittens and Zombicide: Black Plague.

Source: Next Great Game Challenge

Group of 10- to 14-year-olds win $15,000 playing ‘Minecraft’

If your kids are going to play video games anyway, then you may want to make sure they’re really good at it. Why? Well, take for example this group of grade and middle school kids from Maryland who got a $15,000 shared college scholarship for winning the second Super League Gaming World Championship in Minecraft. Super League Gaming is a four-week league wherein participants play games in theaters. The 10- to 14-year-old players calling themselves Live2Craft bested 450 other groups of all ages (mostly grade- to high school-aged, though) from 68 cities across the US.

While the 5-person team won the scholarship prize, the top-scoring player in the league is from another team in California: a 10-year-old kid named Julien Wiltshire. He was also the first season’s top scoring player and even took home a $5,000 scholarship prize. This time, he defeated almost 2,000 other gamers — twice the number of the first season’s participants — earning him the right to brag that he’s now a two-time Minecraft champ. He might also be gearing up for the third season starting on April 30th, so if your younglings want to join, it may be wise to start training them pronto.

Source: Super League Gaming

Stream Android games to Twitch without a smartphone

Twitch committed to mobile gaming in a big way by sponsoring a Vainglory tournament and it’s making streaming easier by partnering with Bluestacks. As a reminder, Bluestacks makes an Android emulator for PC (or Mac) that lets you run most any mobile app or game on the desktop. The new venture, called Bluestacks TV, goes both ways. First off, you’ll be able to watch selected Twitch streams on Bluestacks, as if you were watching a Twitch Stream on mobile. At the same time, mobile game broadcasters will be able to stream directly to Twitch via the Bluestacks emulator without using a smartphone.

The latter feat is by far the most difficult of the two, according to Bluestacks, and will be a boon to mobile game broadcasters. Normally, you need a phone or tablet, wires to connect to a PC and a webcam. “A lot of people have tried to crack mobile game streaming, but the multiple-device issue makes it really hard,” says Bluestacks VP John Gargiulo. “This consolidates everything onto one PC, which is the device of choice for gamers anyway.” To show off the tech, Bluestacks TV will host a mobile Hearthstone tournament on Twitch that kicks off today at 9 AM ET.

Purists might argue that streaming mobile games from a PC via emulation isn’t exactly in the spirit of things. Nevertheless, Bluestacks reportedly has 130 million users, so the partnership exposes a lot of those folks to Twitch and vice-versa. It will also make things easier for mobile Twitch broadcasters and developers alike. “We’ve been approached to put an SDK in our games, but that’s bandwidth we don’t have,” developer Mark Zhang told Bluestacks. “The fact that millions of people can stream Castle Clash to Twitch without us doing anything is massive.”

ICYMI: Pollution concrete, EV wireless charging and more

Today on In Case You Missed It: Scientists at UCLA have made concrete by first extracting greenhouse gases from power plant smokestacks. An EV prototype to wirelessly charge cars is making the rounds, and the group’s big plan is to design a 50 kilowatt charger that can juice up cars as they drive. You could put that future charger inside your garage where a new opener comes with extra modules that can detect obstacles and about 10 other things.

Finally, we were tickled by the idea of a robot that can best you at Settlers of Catan, so please check that out. As always, please share any great tech or science videos you find by using the #ICYMI hashtag on Twitter for @mskerryd.

Reddit Launches Official iOS App With Free Gold for Early Adopters

Reddit today released an official iOS app for browsing, searching, commenting, and upvoting within subreddits on iPhone or iPod touch.

Reddit for iOS replaces Alien Blue, which has now been removed from the App Store, as the website’s official mobile app for Apple users.

Alien Blue previously served as Reddit’s official iOS app after the company acquired it from developer Jase Morrissey in 2014. Alien Blue Pro users recently received four years of Reddit gold for free to help bridge the transition.

The new app is split into four tabbed sections:

– Timeline: Browse and comment on the latest stories from the front page and subreddits that you are subscribed to. Photos appear in line, while videos and external links open in a new window when tapped. There are also upvote and downvote buttons and options to share or hide posts. Tap on the three dots in the top-right corner to choose between compact or card view, or sort posts based on Hot, New, Top, or Controversial. Tap on the pencil icon in the top-left corner to submit a text, image, or link post. Swipe down to refresh.

– Subscriptions: A list of subreddits that you are subscribed to, along with a Discover option to find new subreddits based on a number of topics: animals, art and design, ask, books and writing, business, comics and hobbies, DIY and crafts, driving and vehicles, entertainment, fashion and style, food and drink, funny, gaming, health and fitness, interesting, life and advice, local, meta, military and survival, music, news and politics, philosophy, pics and GIFs, relationships, science, shopping, sports, stories, technology, trades, travel and outdoors, videos, and more.

– Inbox: View your private messages, comment replies, post replies, and mentions. Tap on the pencil icon on the top-left corner to compose a private message to another user. Swipe down to refresh.

– Profile: View your user profile, including an overview of your account karma and creation date, browsing history, saved posts, personal posts and comments, upvoted posts, friends, hidden topics, and image uploads. Tap on the settings icon in the top-right corner for account management, customizable themes, a safe for work browsing toggle, option to clear local history, and quick links to Reddit’s content policy, privacy policy, user agreement, help FAQ, and bug reporting.

Reddit is automatically gifting users that download and sign into the new app with a free three-month Reddit gold subscription during its launch week.

Reddit gold provides perks such as turning off ads, custom themes, custom avatars, new comment highlighting, subreddit filtering, saved posts and comments categorization, and more. A subscription normally costs $3.99/month or $29.99/year, or you can mail Reddit a postcard to receive a one-month subscription for free.

Reddit for iOS [Direct Link] is free on the App Store for iPhone and iPod touch. The app does not have universal iPad support, and availability appears to be limited to the U.S., U.K., Canada, and select other countries upon launch.

Tag: Reddit
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