Notes from the Studio

4
14
2010

Top 10 iPhone Camera Apps

I’m obsessed with camera apps on the iPhone. I love running a photo through different apps and seeing how different they can become. No one camera app works for me. I need several in order to find the one that will work best for that situation. Here’s a list of the top ten camera apps that I keep coming back to.

Here’s the original unaltered photo from the iPhone.

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Hipstamatic
I use Hipstamatic all the time, it’s my number one camera app. I love the very original images it produces. Great borders, color and contrast….what else can I say, I love it.
On the other hand, I do wish I was able to import a photo previously taken.

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ShakeitPhoto
What makes this camera app great is it’s lack of options, point and shoot at it’s best. When I need a great looking photo fast I use this app.  Another nice thing is that you can shoot an image with the app and it also saves an original version of that image in your library.

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TiltShift Generator 
When I don’t want to drag my 4X5 around, I’ll use this app to produce a similar selective focus effect. The interface on this app is really well done and a pleasure to use.

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lo-mob
I love the selection of retro film border in this app. The newest version now lets you turn on borders and effects. This is great when you want to use an photo processed in another program and use a border from lo-mob.

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TrueHDR
HDR is always fun to play with. TrueHDR does a great job alining the photos and keeping the detail.

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PictureShow
What makes this app unique is you can add type to your photos. It’s like sending someone a postcard. The interface is nice and simple to use. It has standard pretest like Lomo and some unique ones like multi exposures.

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SwankoLab
This app is made by the creators of Hipstamatic. There are endless possibilities for effects, which is why I’m glad you can import a photo. I take a photo with the iPhone camera app then bring my pick into SwankoLabs for processing. Unlike Hipstamatic I can try out different effects on the same photo until I find one I like.

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CameraBag
This is another simple and fast camera app. The options are simple, straight forward and render nice results. They also make a desktop app for the Mac which is fun to use.

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Pano 
Panoramic images are awesome and this app is great at stitching everything together. It works best with things at a distance. You can see in the photo below that the car in the foreground didn’t stitch together well.

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QuadCamera
When just one photo won’t tell the store I use this app. The downside is even when the capture rate is set to slow, it’s still a little too fast for me. I need more time to think about the next photo.

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Comments

  1. Avatar

    Nice comparison of your favorite camera apps.

    I agree with you on Hipstamatic, it would be nice to import photos (that tiny viewfinder is a bit of a gimmick). However, after using it for a while, I’ve begun to appreciate that cool accidents that can happen when you don’t have full control.

    It reminds me of what it use to be like when you had a limited number of shots on an old 35mm. It makes you think before you take each shot.

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    I own a few of these, a few others are pleasant surprises. Do you have any recommendations for post-processing photos? For instance, I love Mill Colour and Tiffen’s Photo FX.

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    Michael for post-processing I like to use PhotoForge and Photogene.

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    You totally need to spend some time with Plastic Bullet.
    http://jfletch.posterous.com/more-plastic-bullet-shots

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    Jeremy Le Fevre

    Thanks for your recommendations.
    I’d add PhotoStitch to your list of Panoramics – one of it’s features is that it stitches vertically as well as horizontally so you can create large Hockney-ed images (which, if you stick with the low-fi flow, look great uncropped!)

  6. Avatar

    Hey Jeremy I looked for PhotoStitch and didn’t see it in the app store. Is that the right name?