Feeling tense? Finding the back-to-work transition a little jarring? We have the app for you. New to the App Store this week is Sequin, a mesmersing ASMR triumph guaranteed to help you instantly recover your zen. The concept is based on those sequin-flip products that seem to be all the rage with youngsters right now, and the app comes complete with spine-tingling 'sensory audio' and soothing haptics.
For something more practical, see our roundup of the best calendar apps.
The sequins shimmer in response to your phone's movement, and you can use your finger to flip them up and down. That's about it really, but it's completely hypnotic. Hell, we've been watching this GIF for a good five minutes already, and we've never felt so chill.
"You can toggle through presets, choose your own colors for both the front and back of each sequin and even import photos, but my favorite feature is the simple act of flipping a sequin," says Robbie Tildon, the man behind the app. "I tried to connect the haptics, visuals and audio to give it the most satisfying experience possible on an iPhone."
Perhaps most intriguing feature for us is the ability to add a photo background... which opens up all kinds of exciting possibilities.
Our most highly requested feature is complete - you can now reveal Nicolas Cage by flipping the sequins!#nicolascage #design #madewithunity pic.twitter.com/5q8xK8kc9YJanuary 2, 2020
Tilton has designed for both Apple and Google and now runs interactive design studio Situated. He tells Creative Bloq how the idea came to him "out of nowhere" on the morning of New Year's Day. "There used to be a fabric store that I would go to that had a big sheet of it on display for folks to play with," he explains. "I then realised I could try to re-create this digitally." Tilton created a quick prototype on social media, and it took off.
He decided to turn it into a proper app, using Unity (see our guide to the best web design tools). "The code is very simple, but Unity's physical based rendering helped me achieve a refined look as there truly is a dynamic light hitting each reflective sequin (which happens to be a small 3D cylinder)," he says. "As you rotate your phone I use the gryo as input to dynamically rotate the scene in 3D space so the light adjusts as if it were connected to the real world."
Sequins is new to the App Store, but there are already some extremely enthusiastic reviews. Example: "It will drop you into a magical relaxation trip as you dangle your fingers upon the virtual threads," says sloppysteven. It costs 99 cents and is available for both iPhone and iPad. Download Sequin here.
Ruth spent a couple of years as Deputy Editor of Creative Bloq, and has also either worked on or written for almost all of the site's former and current design print titles, from Computer Arts to ImagineFX. She now spends her days reviewing small appliances as the Homes Editor at TechRadar, but still occasionally writes about design on a freelance basis in her spare time.
