Photo App Review: Zitrr Camera Lands With a Resounding Meh
Zitrr Camera, Halo live effect and frame
Zitrr Camera
Version reviewed: 1.0
Bottom Line: I don’t like it. A good camera module crippled by medium resolution and an underwhelming filter set.
Who is the PR firm behind Zitrr Camera? They are getting some awesome buzz from several other established websites. It’s been called a lot of great things, including competition to Camera+
Is Zitrr Camera the second coming of iPhonegraphy? Not by a long shot. It’s not a terrible app, but keep reading to find out why I think this app is way overhyped. >>>
As mentioned here and in a previous review for a different overhyped photo app, one of the reasons we test hands-on every app we review here on Life In LoFi is because you can’t always rely on the App Store descriptions (and sometimes App Store reviews) to be completely honest or to tell how an app is really going to work in the hands of an iPhoneographer. Websites that simply copy-and-paste a pressie under the guise of a review are doing their readers a huge disservice by not fact-checking the developer’s claims. Granted, most photo apps are only $1-$3, but it adds up when you buy a lot of them and if you’re using a “trusted resource” as your basis to purchase the app, it’s much better that you are given an accurate, unbiased picture before you buy.
Zitrr Camera is not a terrible photo app. I just don’t think it lives up to its hype machine. It puts itself in the same league as Camera+, Camera Awesome and ProCamera. When comparing this app to those great established ones, I think Zitrr Camera falls way short.
Zitrr Camera does have some great features including a clean shooting interface. The camera is easily accessible from nearly every screen in the app — a convenient touch. Separate focus and exposure targets are easily toggled with a two finger gesture or a center screen tap. The targets are very easy to set and move. They are nicely responsive.
The camera is loaded with tools that are easily accessible and don’t clutter up the viewfinder. The app has an excellent selection of composition grid overlays, including Rule of Thirds and Golden Ratio. There’s a great selection of shutter release modes including timer, big button, and anti-shake. There’s also a convenient horizon level that’s easily toggled on or off. The camera only supports portrait orientation. None of the tools and buttons rotate for landscape mode. That’s an irritating omission for those of us who really love landscape mode.
In shooting mode, the app has a number of filters, effects, and lenses all with live preview. Many of the filters are good although not outstanding. They consist of a lot of color tweaks or retro film re-creations. Each filter has a frame that you’re stuck with. There’s no way to turn it on or off like Instagram and many other photo apps.
I’m not a fan of most of the filters in the app’s Effects and Lenses categories. I found most of the “Effects” and “Lenses” to be underwhelming, although I thought a few of them were well-done and useful. Haze adds a nice dreamlike Orton effect to your images. The Sketch effect does a pretty good job of making your image look like a charcoal drawing. The Toon effect is an interesting high-contrast, posterized black & white effect. Most of the lens effects, however, are of the cheesy, funhouse mirror variety. Other’s are just bad.
What bothered me the most about the in-camera effects in shooting mode — the Filters, Effects, and Lenses — is that you can’t stack effects while shooting like you can in many other photo apps. There is no way to apply a color filter, then stack another effect or a lens effect while shooting.
Zitrr Camera saves images to its own internal lightbox. Usually this is a workflow that I like very much. It helps reduce clutter in your iPhone’s camera roll. So far, the app holds its own with the big all-in-ones.
But Zitrr camera uses an unusual lightbox arrangement. There’s no way to edit any of the camera effects once images are saved to lightbox. Editing the image in lightbox opens up a ubiquitous Aviary image-editing module that’s found in dozens of other photo apps. Aviary is an excellent image editor, but there are absolutely zero filters here that are unique to Zitrr. Unlike the smooth integration the Aviary module has with some other photo apps, it just feels tacked on and disjointed here.
Lightbox has a frustrating bug. Simply opening the image to edit in the lightbox creates another copy of it whether and not you make any edits to it. This bug is incredibly sloppy and frustrating and leads to lightbox clutter very quickly. Camera+ and Camera Awesome don’t have this problem.
Zitrr Camera only supports 2.8MP saves on an iPhone 5 — that’s 1920×1439 pixels. Once you save an image from the app’s lightbox to your iPhone’s camera roll, most EXIF data including Geotags is stripped out. To play with the big boy apps, the first thing you need is full native resolution on the device you are shooting on. Camera+, Camera Awesome, ProCamera all support both native resolution and EXIF data. Zitrr Camera does not support High ISO low-light mode on the iPhone 5. All of the other high-end camera replacement apps do.
Shot to shot time is pretty fast, about two shots per second. That’s to be expected because the app is not processing the full 8 megapixels of an iPhone 5.
Zitrr Camera has a very good but incomplete toolset when compared to the other big camera replacement photo apps. It has a good interface and with the exception of a few bugs has a good workflow.
Its filters and effects are not original nor are they outstanding. The lack of full resolution and EXIF data support is inexcusable, especially when it wants to be compared with Camera+, Camera Awesome, and ProCamera.
There is room for improvement in Zitrr Camera and the developers seem eager to improve the app. But this first release is better in print then it is on my iPhone 5. It is not ‘the only photo app you will ever need’ as the App Store description would like you to believe.
Zitrr Camera is introductory priced at $0.99. Requirements: Compatible with iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPhone 4S, iPhone 5, iPod touch (4th generation), iPod touch (5th generation), iPad 2 Wi-Fi, iPad 2 Wi-Fi + 3G, iPad (3rd generation), iPad Wi-Fi + 4G, iPad (4th generation), iPad Wi-Fi + Cellular (4th generation), iPad mini and iPad mini Wi-Fi + Cellular. Requires iOS 5.1 or later. This app is optimized for iPhone 5.
=M=
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Zitrr Camera, Turquoise filter
Zitrr Camera, Sketch effect
Zitrr Camera, Oval Shift lens
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Marty is a self-employed graphic designer in the Fort Worth/Dallas Metroplex. He is an avid Rangers baseball, Chicago Cubs, Packers and Highbury Arsenal fan. In addition to capturing random moments with whatever camera is close by (usually his iPhone), his other interests include coffee, film, music, and traveling in seats 5E and 5F with his fiancé.
19 Comments »
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Thanks for the thorough review, Marty. There, certainly, are a few cues for the improvement – as mentioned in the article.
A few of them that are shipping in the next few updates, within 3 weeks from now:
“Lightbox has a frustrating bug. Simply opening the image to edit in the lightbox creates another copy of it whether and not you make any edits to it”
- This has been fixed in 1.0.1, which goes out by end of this week
“Zitrr Camera only supports 2.8 MP saves on an iPhone 5″
- Coming v1.2, it’ll support full resolution (eg. 8 MP for iPhone 5) for Filters & Lenses. 2 weeks for this
- An option to disable borders will be included in the next update, within a week
“Once you save an image from the app’s lightbox to your iPhone’s camera roll, most EXIF data including Geotags is stripped out”
- Will be fixed within 2 weeks
- “Zitrr Camera does not support High ISO low-light mode on the iPhone 5″
This, again, will be included in v1.2, within 3 weeks
Taking this opportunity, we’re here to listen to any grievance/suggestions for improving Zitrr Camera, and we’ll respond to the calls in the best possible manner & as soon as possible. Thank-you
Hi, there! I’m glad you stopped by.
I read all of the press and buzz that were presented as “reviews” that Zitrr got on other, high profile websites — one site in particular. Were we reviewing the same app? Did they even test the app before writing about it?
I’m glad you are addressing these issues. I’ll definitely keep an eye on Zitrr and if the app improves enough, I’ll be happy to revisit this review.
One more suggestion…. The edges on the tiltshift lenses absolutely need some sort of blur. The dropoff on those is too sudden and the effect looks bad and is mostly unusable.
=M=
Hi Marty,
The site you’re pointing to, here, had a pre-release copy of the app. We’re not sure if their review was as thorough as yours, but they did test it alright.
The press-release copy-paste is an ubiquitous activity of the websites that don’t want to invest their editorial resources – so they’re no one’s responsibility. Obviously, they do it for the sake of content on their website.
We, sure, are addressing the key issues with urgency – that should make our existing customers more satisfied, and earn good graces from serious iPhoneography lovers like you! Besides, the point about tilt-shift has been duly taken by the dev team & will be corrected ASAP.
Thank-you for engaging with us, Marty. We promise the improvements be done at the earliest.
I appreciate that and your engagement as well. Again, I’ll keep an eye on this app. It’s obvious your are very vested in its success.
When a developer takes the time and resources to fix the very things that I complain about in a review, it’s only fair to revisit that review. i hate to leave a bad review out there when an app has been fixed.
Thanks!
=M=
Hello, thanks for the review.
When I saw the photos on Flickr I immediately thought wow!, but I guess it was, because I was viewing them in my iPhone :p.
Thank you zitrr studio also, for the heads up.
Looking forward for the review within 3 weeks.
Thank-you for joining, Lucas. We sure will make the app more robust. Looking forward to be hearing from you as well
Thanks as always for a thorough review marty!
And a +1 to the dev for listening to this great feedback from Marty, and for posting their update plans.
It would be nice if all devs would listen to the feedback they get on their apps, both postive AND negative.
Noel Chenier
http://www.learnphoto.ca/apps
Thanks, Neil!
=M=
I am sorry to have read a review about an overhyped camera app. I am especially frustrated to the first response from Zitrr Studio. How can you release an incomplete app that require that much of updates and fixing with the next few weeks?
Hi Jackson! Just a question: Have you used the app yourself?
Hi there, obviously not, after reading this thorough review by Marty.
Especially when your app is so similiar to Camera+ and ProCamera (I have both doing different tasks). I am loyal reader of Marty and I trust his honest review. Thanks!
We respect your loyalty. Nonetheless, would you like to try Zitrr Camera for free? If yes, give me your email id (here, or at zitrr[at]rootwork[dot]co), and I’ll ship a promo code to you. We can take this discussion further, then.
Thanks Zitrr! This is very kind of you, I must say.
But I think other people deserve your promo code than me
It’s a matter of spirit, Jack. Carry on
Hi Marty n Zitrr,
Good review and great response. I also hesitated on the download but visit LifeinLoFi daily (sometimes several times a day, ahem
) and as soon as there’s a good update, I’ll be pleased to try the app – always looking for new good app’s to share with my students.
best to all,
Cat
Hi Cat,
We’d glad if the our app could come of any use to you
You can definitely count on the update.
Cheers!
I’ve purchased Zitrr Camera because I’m a compulsive AppShopper and because the feature showed were appealing.
I use an iPad Mini as personal extension of my creativity and the result with Zitrr Camera was a tiny picture (around 1024 px).
I’m looking for the new releases not only for fixing bugs but for see how this product is comparable to Camera+, Camera Awesome and Procamera.
Please. No more sketch o toon FX or other Chino-Rubbish EyeCandies.
Innovate with something strange, new, crazy.
Try to do what Kris Collins has done with jewels like Decim8 and Satur8: make some innovations.
Awaiting the new release
Thank you
Hi. I purchased Zitrr for my iphone 4. was enjoying playing around with it. But, when I tried saving a picture, it got stuck on that save mode, and has been on it for about an hour now. any help with how to fix this?
sincerely,
Dave
Hi Dave,
We have addressed your ticket raised on http://zitrr.com
Thanks!