The always full-featured, once popular photo editor Iris Photo Suite for iPhone hasn’t seen an update in over 18 weeks. Even then, it broke on the modern iPhones — the 4S and the 5.
Iris Photo Suite just got a big new update. It’s now transitioned to the Laminar name in an effort to standardize this dev’s product lines. Laminar Express a free update to current Iris owners. I’m super busy at Macworld this week, but iPhone beta tester Patrick Timney wrote to let me know of some of the bigger changes to the app that aren’t listed in the App Store. Keep reading to find out more about the update. >>>
Mr. Timney writes:
Don’t update your Iris Photo Suite without saving the old Iris file.
They didn’t inform anyone that they removed 50% of filters & textures from Iris & that these are not included in Laminar. I used Laminar Pro (not the lesser Express) to compare and calculate what’s been removed.
Removed from Iris Photo Suite
– Filters: Dyna Range & Vignette
– BWFX: Red filter *also golden is incorrectly named SplitTone & you have 2 in a row named SplitTone.
– Art FX: Crayons is totally different, Blueprint, Colorsketch
– Vintage: Oldpaper 2, Burtpaper, Oldbook (fave), Oldbook 2, Memory (new hate it), Reminiscence (not same)
– Grunge: Cracks, Classic Grunge 1&2, Space, Rusty metal, Stone
– Surface: Poster, Wrinkled canvas
– Lo-Fi: Instant, WWII, Plastic lens (only change of an old effect that looks better), Pinhole, Old Snap (original), 80’s, Holga
Some of the same old effects were tweaked and are now quite weak in comparison.
While the filter names are now more consistent with the previously released iPad version of Laminar, Mr. Timney also says that the filter names now lack consistency.
“You can’t have an app you’ve had available for a few years and then change it and randomly decide to change the names of even some of the remaining effects & textures and then use the old name on a new filter/texture. That’s just confusing!”
I haven’t had a chance to test the new update to see how it stacks up both as a replacement to Iris and as an app on its own. If Iris Photo Suite is a favorite of yours and a staple in your production suite of apps, be aware of these issues in the new update.
UPDATE: By the way, the description for Laminar Pro, the Universal version of the app, is a little misleading. While it mentions Iris Photo Suite in the description, updating Iris for iPhone only gets you the lower-tiered Express version of the app.
If you’ve already updated and want to go back to the previous version, you can read how you may be able how to downgrade your apps here. Or, you could just use Snapseed….
Big thanks to Patrick Timney for sending this tip in.
If you’re not a user yet and would like to try the app, Laminar Express for iPhone is $1.99 in the App Store. Requirements: Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. Requires iOS 6.0 or later. This app is optimized for iPhone 5.
=M=
~~~~
