Candy In The Media

All this month on the Candy In The Media segment of the Candy Critic blog we're going to look at candy themed games for tablets.  All of the games will be tested on my Nexus 7 tablet running Android Kit Kat.  Keep in mind that I'm not really a gamer, so my past experience is pretty minimal.  I'll mainly be focusing on how easy it is to play, how it incorporates candy, and any tech issues that may come up.  We welcome your suggestions for games you think we should try out on future posts.

As far as candy themed games go, Candy Transport is fairly average.  It's the kind of game I can play for about 10 minutes, but after that I'm left bored or frustrated.  Theme wise it's pretty good, lots of mouth watering candies to look at and lots of fun characters to check out. The plot of the game is to load your truck up with all kinds of candies.  Each candy is a different size and shape, thus making it challenging to balance your load.  Then you have to drive over a series of bumps and hills without losing any of your candy load.  Lose too much and you're out.

The frustrating part of this game comes from the way the candy is randomly dumped into your truck.  Sometimes it falls into a nice neat pile, other times most of it falls out of your truck before you even start.  You can move your truck around when you're loading up, but I still get the sense that it's fairly random.  I was also kind of frustrated that after I saved up for a new bigger truck, the back end of it was tilted and it allowed candy to spill out of my truck when I went up hill.  The improvement was a little better, but considering I saved up for the most expensive truck, it wasn't worth it.

One of my favorite parts of this game came about whenever you finished a level.  At the end of each level you're given a congratulations from a random candy guy, and it was followed by a "Did you know?" candy fact.  These facts are utterly ridiculous, but really fun. Most of them would give very unrealistic praise to various candies.  I warmed up to this game fairly quickly, after a while I got bored of it, but I was still able to pick it up now and again and enjoy it for a short period.

CC

A Cool Candy Thing - Halloween Costume Eddition

When you type the words "Halloween costume" into Google, most of the entries that you'll find will consist of "sexy" versions of various costumes.  There's no difference when you're trying to search out candy themed Halloween costumes either.  The most popular sexy "costume" one finds when doing a search for candy costumes tends to be a small tight dress that vaguely looks like a famous candy wrapper.  I decided that I would search through all of the "sexy" costumes and find one that was still sexy, but kind of classy as well.  This is the best I could find.  While still being sexy, it's not over the top, it also has a simplicity to it.  Cupcakes are a fairly attractive type of sweet treat, and they lend themselves well to Halloween costumes.  There's just something very 1950s about this costume, and it seems a little bit innocent with a hint of sass.

CC

This Week In Candy

Halloween is coming, and it's one of the most important holidays on the candy calendar.  Have you picked out a costume yet?  I'm thinking this year I may go as an annoying tourist.  I've been traveling a lot lately and I have a great deal of experience with them.

Make sure to check out "Snack Facts" this week on our Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter Feeds.  Last week we started our daily Halloween fact countdown.  So far we've learned such facts as there's never been a case of random candy poisoning on Halloween, and candy corn used to be called chicken feed.  Sign up to any of our feeds to find out more Halloween facts this week, and other random snack facts in the future.

Finally, this week we're posting 3 Halloween candy review, instead of just our single Monday update.  Sign up to any of our social media feeds to keep up with all of this week's Halloween reviews.  Today's review is a real "screme"... Click here to check it out.

CC

Candy In The Media

All this month on the Candy In The Media segment of the Candy Critic blog we're going to look at candy themed games for tablets.  All of the games will be tested on my Nexus 7 tablet running Android Kit Kat.  Keep in mind that I'm not really a gamer, so my past experience is pretty minimal.  I'll mainly be focusing on how easy it is to play, how it incorporates candy, and any tech issues that may come up.  We welcome your suggestions for games you think we should try out on future posts.

I can't say that I have a great deal of experience playing games on my tablet, I have a few games that I like to play either alone or with Allison.  I also have a few games that I've played, but since taken off my tablet because I was either bored of them, or I finished them.  I can say that all of the games I've ever played on my tablet would probably amount to less than 30.  Even with such a small amount of video game playing, I can tell you that I don't think I'll ever see a game that I hate more than Candy Maker.

I played this game once, and then thinking that there's no way that this is the game and I must of missed something, I played it again.  I couldn't believe how boring, and of poor quality this game was.  I tried to tell myself that maybe this game is designed for children, so that's why it's so simple.  Then I realized that if you're a child and you are able to hold a tablet, than this game is way beneath you.  The basic principle of this game is that ingredients fly in over the pot, and you tap on them to add them into the pot.  There are several ingredients, some that I'm pretty sure don't actually belong in hard candy.  After all of the ingredients are added (and there is no "wrong" ingredients you just add them all) a spoon appears and you stir the ingredients.  This is the most complicated part of the game, and it's remarkably simple.

After your mixture is prepared you pick a colour to add, then you poor your mixture into a mold that you selected when the game started.  You can see that the graphics of this game are really simple, and the animation is simply fades, and basic graphics.  There's nothing really entertaining at all.  It doesn't even represent a realistic view of how to make candy.  There are ingredients that don't belong, like large quantities of oil, and there's no thought towards tempering or heating properly.

 

At the end of the game your lollipop appears and you can decorate it.  You can pick one of 9 backgrounds and one of 9 stick colours.  Then you can add graphics to your lollipop, which consist of 9 random candy like images.  The thing is, once you've selected an image, you can't take it off.  You can move the graphics around, and you can add more, but you can't take them off.  Finally you have the chance to eat your lollipop, which consists of a shrinking/fading graphic that I learned in first year animation school. Maybe I am missing something about this game, maybe there's a detail that I didn't come across, and in that case I'm the biggest idiot.  But if this game is simply what I described, you're much better off just going out and buying yourself some candy.

CC

A Cool Candy Thing - Halloween Costume Eddition

There's something rather evil looking about this costume.  If I remember correctly, Willy Wonka wasn't really very nice to children, at the end of the story he even yelled at Charlie, who was nothing but the nicest boy in the world.  So the idea of a child wanting to emulate a character that's mean to children seems a little strange.  Maybe this could inspire a new book, maybe we could learn about Willy Wonka as a child, and find out why a man who really doesn't like children would get into the candy industry.  If you made a movie about it you wouldn't have to worry about hiring a designer to design his wardrobe, it's right here.

CC

This Week In Candy

This week has started off on the wrong foot.  As of Saturday evening I've been fighting a cold that snuck up on me and leveled me out.  I had grand plans to start this week off with all kinds of fun projects, but alas I've been stuck in bed most of the time.  I've decided that I should take a few minutes to let you know what we have planned this week, but please keep in mind that some of it might be posted a little later (such as today's "This Week In Candy" post) in the day.

On our Snack Facts feed (available on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook) this Wednesday, we're going to start off our count down to Halloween list of facts.  Also, many of you may not know that we also have an Pinterest gallery, on this gallery you can see all of the latest treats we've reviewed.  Finally, last week we started posting all of our newest link discoveries on Facebook, as well as Twitter. So far we haven't had any complaints, so we're going to continue, please let us know if any of our social media changes drive you nuts.

Today's new review is brought to you by the creators of Codhoppers, one of my favorite Canadian made snacks ever.  Did they improve on their already awesome candy, you'll have to click here to find out.

CC

Candy In The Media

All this month on the Candy In The Media segment of the Candy Critic blog we're going to look at candy themed games for tablets.  All of the games will be tested on my Nexus 7 tablet running Android Kit Kat.  Keep in mind that I'm not really a gamer, so my past experience is pretty minimal.  I'll mainly be focusing on how easy it is to play, how it incorporates candy, and any tech issues that may come up.  We welcome your suggestions for games you think we should try out on future posts.

This week's candy themed game was one that is fairly popular with many people, but one I've never actually tried myself.  Actually the Hidden Object Candy version of the game may not be the most popular, but the "Hidden Objects" style of game is very popular right now.  That would explain why there are hundreds of variations to this game, with all kinds of themes.  This is but one version of this game, and as you'll read later on, I don't really understand why they even bother.

The object of this game is to find random stuff.  A picture comes up on your tablet with a pile of random things loosely attached to the picture and you have to find (and click on) specific objects hidden amongst the clutter.  A few of the objects interact with the background, or at the very least are themed appropriately.  Most objects are completely random and are just floating within the picture for no particular reason.  You get a time limit to find the objects, and then you get a bonus round to fine even more.  I can see how the concept of this game may work, but I don't really think this version works at all.

My biggest problem with this game is the randomness.  The randomness of where the things are sitting on the screen, as well as the randomness of the objects themselves.  Most of the objects that you search for have no relation to candy whatsoever, they're just random objects.  While the backgrounds are candy themed, the hidden objects don't really belong in the pictures for the most part, and when they are integrated they're nonsensical. To me it seems like the candy theme of this came is just thrown in with no effort.  I'm guessing if the candy theme was pulled off a bit better, I may have enjoyed the game a lot more. As it stands I've played it 3 times, and that's probably it for me.

CC

A Cool Candy Thing - Halloween Costume Eddition

I generally dislike the idea of dressing a baby up for Halloween.  It probably stems from the fact that I don't really like dressing up for Halloween, and I believe that stems from bad childhood memories.  I'm not really sure the specifics for my dislike of dressing up for Halloween, but it leads me to find most babies costumes to be kind of creepy.  The saving grace of this costume is the double meaning, Sugar Babies being a real candy (for those outside of the US).  While I don't have any children, and if I did I wouldn't dress them up for Halloween until they were old enough to eat the candy themselves, I do appreciate the humor in this costume. So if you really feel the need to dress up your baby this Halloween, I think ironic candy costumes are the new thing, or at least they should be.

CC

This Week In Candy

Happy Canadian Thanksgiving!  To me Canadian Thanksgiving is really the first official day of fall.  Fall in Canada is truly a beautiful time of year, the harvest is in, leaves are changing colour, and Tim Horton's is offering pumpkin everything (as pictured above with the pumpkin pie donut).

This week on the blog we're going to continue looking at some awesome Halloween costumes, as well as review another candy related tablet game.  On our Instagram feed "Snack Facts", all this week we're going tell you some fun facts about artificial flavours.  As always you can keep up with the latest candy news by following our Twitter feed, also this week we're going to start sharing the latest news on our Facebook page as well.

This week's review is a classic Canadian treat, the Caramilk Bar.  I figured since it's a Canadian holiday I might as well  go with a Canadian review.  Click here to read this week's review.

CC

Candy In The Media

All this month on the Candy In The Media segment of the Candy Critic blog we're going to look at candy themed games for tablets.  All of the games will be tested on my Nexus 7 tablet running Android Kit Kat.  Keep in mind that I'm not really a gamer, so my past experience is pretty minimal.  I'll mainly be focusing on how easy it is to play, how it incorporates candy, and any tech issues that may come up.  We welcome your suggestions for games you think we should try out on future posts.

This week we're looking at the first candy themed game that I ever downloaded for my tablet, Cut the Rope.  I have to be honest, when I first downloaded Cut the Rope I didn't even know that it was a candy themed game.  I just saw the cute little picture of the monster that eats all the candy and thought he (or she) was really cute.  Fortunately for me the creature was not only really cute, but the game was kind of fun and candy related as well.

The best part of this game for me is the theming.  Most puzzle games have a theme, but it's rarely more or equally clever as the games themselves (unless the games are really, really lame).  I can assure you that the Cut the Rope game is also really clever and fun, but so is the story that follows them.  You're basically trying to feed this little monster that comes in boxes delivered to your doorstep.  You have to complete puzzles that collect stars, and eventually feed the little monster a piece of candy.  The sound effects of the little critter are great, and the look of the game is perfect with the theme.  And the thing that drew me to this game, the cute little monster, is very cute and likable.

The basic design of the game is fairly simple, yet each puzzle varies in difficulty.  I found that the order of each puzzle didn't really reflect the difficulty of the puzzle.  In other words the puzzles didn't really get progressively harder as you move on.  Some of the puzzles at the beginning were very challenging, and some later or were very easy.  I did have a few puzzles were I gave up on trying to collect all the stars, and one that I even used one of the free firefly cheats to win.

As a game I found Cut the Rope to be a lot of fun, and I really enjoyed the way candy was integrated.  Candy wasn't just used as a decoration, but it was part of the storyline.  My biggest problem with this game is the advertising.  It's pervasive, constant, and interrupts game-play a lot.  I have never been so disturbed by advertising while playing a tablet game before.  It's physically impossible to ignore the advertising.

CC

A Cool Candy Thing - Halloween Costume Eddition

All this month we're going to look at a different candy related Halloween costume every week on our "A Cool Candy Thing" post.  This week I thought I would start with a costume that I might consider wearing, not because it looks particularly cool, but because it's kind of ironic.  To me there's something really interesting about wearing a costume that celebrates another holiday for Halloween. As a kid I'd always thought about dressing up as Santa Clause for Halloween, but if I was to go with a candy theme, this would work just as well.  I  have to admit that the costume itself is fairly uninspired artistically, but I'm sure you'd attract some attention, and a few questions.

CC

This Week In Candy

Things are really getting back to a routine here at Candy Critic.  Our Instagram feed called "Snack Facts" is once again posting regularly.  This week we'll be looking at fun facts about gummies.  We're still posting regularly on the blog, and even irregularly with some new long format posts dealing with projects, editorials, and all kinds of fun candy stuff (including last week's post about how we shoot candy on the go).  This week we hope to start a new project that will eventually lead to a post all about the trials and tribulations of trying to eat a giant jaw breaker.  We'll be posting regularly on Twitter and Facebook with our daily progress, and once it's all done we'll post the full blog article.

We're also considering re-working the way we use Facebook.  Right now we post a few articles and pictures there, but in the future we're thinking of posting even more articles, similar to our Twitter feed.  I'm not sure if 4 or 5 link posts a day to candy related news articles would be considered obtrusive on Faebook or not.  I'll think about it some more before I go ahead.

This week's review comes to us from a stopover flight in Germany.   I couldn't resist picking up a few bags of gummy treats, and this week's review is one of them.  Click here to read this week's review of Haribo gummy turtles.

CC

Candy In The Media

All this month on the Candy In The Media segment of the Candy Critic blog we're going to look at candy themed games for tablets.  All of the games will be tested on my Nexus 7 tablet running Android Kit Kat.  Keep in mind that I'm not really a gamer, so my past experience is pretty minimal.  I'll mainly be focusing on how easy it is to play, how it incorporates candy, and any tech issues that may come up.  We welcome your suggestions for games you think we should try out on future posts.

 

The first game we'll look at in this series is probably the most well known of all candy related tablet games out there right now Candy Crush Saga.  Many of us have either enjoyed this game, or been plagued by Facebook spam related to this game.  This is really the kind of game that if you're playing it, it's fun, but if your friends are playing it, it's a pain in the butt.

 The game itself is a fairly simple (and common) puzzle swipe game.  All you have to do is swipe the various candies around in order to line up 3 in a row.  Each level presents a different layout, as well as a different way to win.  In some cases you win by achieving a certain score, in other levels you have to "pop jellies", and so on.  There are also special candies that can be earned when you align the same candy into certain patterns.  For example, if you line up candies in a T formation (instead of just 3 in a row) you get a special bomb candy that destroys all the candies around it.  The instructions for the game are very straight forward, and the training levels are very clear.

Theme wise this came is pretty good.  The graphics are simple, and fun, I particularly like the fact that all the characters look like puppets.  The candy graphics themselves are really simple, but that's OK since most traditional candies are also fairly simple.  The music is a little annoying, but the sound effects are really great.  I can't really describe the sound effects, but I can say that they are very candy like.

The fault of this game ties directly into the reason many people will never even try to play this game.  If you fail at too many puzzles, eventually you run out of do overs, and you must then either wait a certain amount of time to try again, or get people to sign up for the game via social media.  This is why friends have sent you invites to play this game so much.  I think you can also buy do overs with real money as well.  I have to say that the fact that I can't just keep playing this game annoyed me to no end.  Even worse is the fact that one of the ways I can continue is to annoy my friends.  It's a fun game, great concept, but the music and the do over rules really got on my nerves.

CC

How I Photograph Candy On The Go

I travel a lot, and when I travel I always find new and exciting treats to review.  The problem with many treats is they're not really easy to transport.  Treats like ice cream, chips, and bulk candies will rarely make the trip back home in good condition.  This often means that I have to do the review while I'm still traveling, this includes not only the writing, but also photographing the candy for the site.  The writing part is fairly simple, but with limited resources photographing the candy can be a really big challenge.  I've decided to share with you a few tips and tricks that I use to  shoot candy on the go.  Keep in mind that I like to travel as light as possible, so set up equipment and tripods are not a consideration. The set up described lets you shoot a package with a plain black background, but you can always change the colour if you want.

The most difficult, yet most important thing I deal with when shooting on the go is light.  This is also something I notice many other food bloggers don't really think about when shooting food.  The best source of light you'll get is the sun.  If you're lucky enough to have a place with big windows or a balcony that gets direct sunlight, this is the best.  If you can't get this kind of sunlight indoors, don't be ashamed to go outside to a park, or even on the street.  I've found myself shooting candy in front of a building on a busy street because it had a great strong beam of sunlight.  Hotel room lights are often a last resort for me, these lights are designed to make the room cozy, and not really well lit. This will make your life really difficult, particularly if you don't have a tripod or anything to steady your camera. Also, hotel rooms tend to use warm lights to light up their rooms, or bright florescent lights, both of these can really mess with the colour.

In my case I want to shoot the candy with a black background, to go with the theme of the site.  I chose to use a black background because candy packages are often brightly coloured, and the black background helps these colours pop.  You can of coarse use any colour you'd like, but for consistency sake, if you're a food blogger, I recommend keeping a theme about your photos.  It doesn't have to be the same background, but I really think a theme is important.  To achieve a nice black background I always try to pack a few black things in my luggage.  I always carry around a Moleskin sketch book for taking notes a doodling, this can work as a background, however depending on your light it can also be fairly reflective.  As you can see with the picture above this can make your black surface look white.  My go to surface for shooting is clothing, so I always make sure that I pack a black shirt with me.  The fabric absorbs the light giving you a pretty dark black background.  The only challenge with using a shirt is the wrinkles, but most hotel rooms come with irons which will flatten your shirt perfectly.

What camera I choose to shoot my candy depends on why I'm traveling.   If I'm traveling for work than I'll have my SLRs with me as well as my macro lens.  My SLR cameras of choice are Nikon over Cannon.  While Cannon cameras have great features and great quality, I find that Nikon lenses are great for low light.  In this case we're dealing with a situation with no lighting gear, so a good low light camera is perfect.  The lense that I use depends greatly on the size of the package that I'm photographing.  I'll use a macro lens to shoot gummies or any small bulk candies.  However if I'm shooting bags of chips or larger packaged candies I find any 50 to 60 millimeter lens works fine.  I often carry an 18-135 lens that can pretty much cover any of the medium to large candies that I have to shoot.

Having said all of that, don't think that you have to spend big bucks on a camera to shoot your favorite snacks.  When I'm traveling for vacation/fun I don't always bring the big camera gear with me.  In fact Allison will often forbid me from bringing the big cameras because she knows I'll starting shooting stock stuff (in other words working).  Any point and shoot camera today (and even most phones) really has the ability to shoot some great food shots.  If you pay attention to lighting, background, and composition, you'll find that you can regularly get great shots with any camera.  The two things you have to keep in mind are how your camera works under dark light (if that comes up), and what kind of lens you have.  Some cameras work really well in dark light, other do not, it doesn't mean you can't take great pictures, it just means you have to pay attention to your light.  Lens wise you'll find that for larger packages you'll often have no problems at all, since most point and shoot cameras are designed to take pictures of things about the size of most larger candy packages.  The problem you'll find comes when you're trying to take pictures of smaller candies.  First of all make sure your camera is set to Macro (this is often marked with a little flower symbol), this tells your camera that you're trying to take a picture of something really small.  Next take your time, and take several pictures from different angles, this will allow your camera's auto focus to work properly, and will hopefully get you a great shot.

When it comes to touching up your photos, people are on two sides of the fence.  Some people argue that photo retouching is cheating, others say that it's an artistic tool.  I fall right down the middle of this argument.  I do use photo retouching tools on my photographs, but I use them as sparingly as possible. My goal when I take a photograph is to take the best picture I can so I don't have to touch it up.  With Candy Critic photos I often find that it's almost impossible to  get them perfectly black, particularly when I'm shooting on the  go.  The photo above  was shot on a T-shirt with fairly good lighting.  I did everything I could to get the shirt smoothed out, but being too lazy to iron the shirt, you can see a huge wrinkle at the bottom and a few small ones on the right.  There's also the problem of the package not being cropped in perfectly.  This is very common shooting candy packages since none of them are a standard dimension.

To fix the shot up I simply used a magic wand tool and selected the black background.  The selection tool did grab a bit of the clear cellophane part of the package, so I had to adjust it a bit.  However, because I took the time to shoot it on a proper black background the selection tool had no problems.  I then feathered my selection a little and then I filled in the background with black.  Because I shot  this on a black background, the areas where the package was transparent didn't require any touch  up work at all.  Also, any reflection on the package from the background was also black, so I didn't have to alter the colours either.  The cropping got rid of most of the wrinkle on the shirt, and also made the package nice and centered.

While this seems like a lot of work to get a simple package shot, once you have a system you'll find that shooting packages and small bulk candies can be very quick.  The biggest challenge with shooting on the go is always going to be lighting.  The trick is not to be afraid to find the perfect place to shoot, and take advantage of well lit places, particularly outside.

CC

A Cool Candy Thing

With Halloween approaching it's time to prepare yourself for all of those trick or treaters.  I used to live next door to a guy that would decorate his front lawn full of all kinds of spooky manikins, coffins, and other creepy stuff.  The strange thing I noticed is that he didn't have a themed candy bowl.  You'd think after going through all that effort and expense of decorating your front lawn to look like a graveyard that he would also have a creepy bowl to go with it.  I looked around and frankly this bowl was one of the creepier ones that I came across.  I like it because it seems fairly cheesy on the outside, but inside there's a creepy robotic hand moving around.

CC