I'm delighted to introduce you to the Guardian's first iPad project: the Guardian Eyewitness app.
This free app has been created to coincide with the launch of what looks certain to be a hugely exciting new device from Apple.
For those reading this outside the US, you'll need to wait a few weeks to see it working on an actual iPad (much like the Guardian development team itself).
Our intention is to mark the launch of a highly tactile, visual device with a product that delivers a photographic feast, featuring the world's most distinctive visual content, as curated by our award-winning photographic team.
The Eyewitness series was launched in print at the time of the Guardian's switch to the Berliner format in 2005, and consists of a daily full-colour, double-page spread devoted to the most compelling news photography. The decision to dedicate so much space to a single picture was a revolutionary move for a newspaper.
The Guardian's head of photography, Roger Tooth, describes the philosophy behind the series as one that is devoted entirely to showcasing the world's best photos in superb detail: "We want to hold your attention for more than two seconds ... we want you to appreciate the work that the photographer has put into the image," he says. "We've been waiting for a chance to replicate the scale and impact of the newspaper's Eyewitness spread series on the web - and I think this is it."
The app was developed internally in rapid time and is available without charge wherever iPads are released. We're delighted to be partnering with Canon in bringing this product to fans of first-rate photography the world over.
The development process itself was fascinating and, like many of our products, a great team effort. The inspiration behind the development came from a wonderful side project created by our lead Interactive Technologist, Alastair Dant.
The concept was dramatically simple: how might we create a beautiful new interactive environment with which to display our photography content? The results were stunning.
Following the huge success of our iPhone application (over 100,000 sold in just four months), it was vital to ensure that anything we released for the iPad upheld the same sense of product integrity. This seemed to be a perfect fit.
We produced a rapid-fire demo, created in Flash, ensuring all along that we kept the scope streamlined to allow us to produce a product of true quality in a matter of weeks. We hope the full results speak for themselves.
The app provides free, rolling access to the latest 100 pictures in the series and downloading new images takes place via Wi-Fi only at this stage, to be certain of the best experience for the user. (See our full FAQs for more information on the app's features).
Each picture displays a caption detailing the source and context of the photo, while a "pro tip", written by our photographic team offers an insight into the work that each photographer has put in to the image.
A great byproduct of creating the app was that it allowed us to make improvements to the Eyewitness series across guardian.co.uk. So now, when you visit the series on the web, you will notice we have increased the picture size, as well as offering users the ability to expand the pictures even further to provide more detail for each shot. A new image will now appear in the series seven days a week and images will be tagged in the same way as articles and other content across the site.
For those lucky enough to purchase an iPad over the next few weeks and months please don't hesitate to let us know your thoughts or suggestions. Please leave your feedback in the comments below and, as always, we hope you enjoy it.
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