Life in LoFi: iPhoneography | iPhone Photo News, Showcases, App Reviews

Photographed with an iPhone 4
Toolbox: Perfectly Clear, Best Camera

Dayton, Ohio
July 17, 2010

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Updated: 01.07.11

The new iPhone 4 brings a better, 5MP camera to iPhoneography. How do your favorite iPhone photo apps work with the new hardware and the new iOS 4? I found that many of them work surprisingly well on the iPhone 4.

Some apps have already been updated to take advantage of the auto-focus camera introduced with the iPhone 3GS and many apps have recently been updated for iOS 4 compatibility.

Life In LoFi has created this searchable chart which lists how many of the popular photo apps (and even a few obscure ones) work with the new iPhone 4 and the new OS. The table also lists the maximum output resolutions and if there are any other known issues with the app. This isn’t necessarily an indication of how the apps will perform in iOS 4 on an older device, but how they perform on the iPhone 4.

See how your favorites fared below, after the jump.

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Toolbox: Hipstamatic, Perfectly Clear, FilmLab

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Photomizer is a new Dynamic Range Correction app from Engelmann Media GmbH. It’s the iPhone/iPod Touch version of their DRC software for Windows, so they definitely have knowledge and experience in this area for creating an app that should do a good job of photo enhancement on an iPhone.

Photomizer is in the same class of apps as Perfectly Clear, imphoto, and TruSight Pro.

However, the description that accompanies this newly released app in the US Store is in German with no English translation. I don’t speak German myself, but Google does. Below is the Google translation of Photomizer’s App Store description.

I won’t be reviewing the app here. Although it’s attractively priced at $0.99 USD, it also does its magic off the iPhone and on the Photomizer’s servers. An internet connection is required to use the app. Although the fast 3G network speeds may minimize the delays in transfer time, I prefer all of my processing to be done on my iPhone. This app would not be usable in Airplane mode and I do a lot of my post-travel image processing while in flight. Your workflow may vary and the connectivity requirement may not be an issue for you.

Until an English version of the description is posted, read on for the translated version:

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Trusight Pro
Version 1.2
Price: $2.99

Bottom Line: Now an excellent full-res app for all first-line exposure enhancements.

Trusight Pro

When shooting on my iPhone, I rely on exposure enhancing, Dynamic Range Correction (DRC) apps such as Perfectly Clear, SmartCam and AutoAdjust as a first step in nearly all of my iPhone photo processing. These apps help remove the gray cast sometimes found in raw iPhone photos, help improve shadow detail, and restore brilliant color, luminance and contrast to an image. A good DRC app does a superior job of bringing out the detail in 3/4-tones and shadows while not blowing out the details of the highlights in an image.

Trusight Pro by Trusight, Inc. is now one of the better DRC exposure fixing apps. On any iPhone, the app restores color and dynamic range to an image. The most recent update, version 1.2, fixes the app’s biggest flaw and now Trusight Pro saves photos in full resolution — up to 2048×1536 pixels.

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The L, monochrome

The L

Toolbox: Perfectly Clear, Film Lab

A taxi, a bus, a train, and one MD-80 later, we are back in DFW from our trip to Chicago.

Chicago is one of my favorite cities on the planet period and as many Windy City iPhoneographers will attest, it’s a gorgeous city to photograph.

Many of the images I found myself taking this trip lent themselves to processing in Film Lab. One of the things that I liked about using the app was the surprising ability to stack effects. For instance, the high contrast monochrome of the L above was achieved by layering Fuji Neopan 1600 over EPP High Contrast – Blue. The surreal, grainy colors of the bottom L were acheived by stacking EPP High Contrast – Blue over itself.

I’ve got to get caught up on some deadlines for the day job. I’ll be posting more photography from Chicago throughout the coming days.

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Related links: Film Lab

The Dude's Abode

The Dude's Abode 02

Toolbox: Vint B&W, Perfectly Clear, CameraBag, FocalLab

The Dude abides.

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Rear View Mirror

Toolbox: Perfectly Clear, TiltShift Generator

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On I-30. This was a perfect Spring evening and we were driving from Fort Worth to Dallas with the sunset in my rear view mirror.

They say I shouldn’t drive and text. They said nothing about drivin’ and shootin’.

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imphoto (Standard version)
Version 2.0

Bottom line: Requires a pricey upgrade to save at full-res or remove copyright mark.

imphoto for iPhone is an exposure enhancement app from imsense. Although the Standard version normally sells for $1.99 USD, from reading the App Store reviews, it’s often on sale (or free) and I picked it up for $0.99. The standard version has too many annoyances and disabled features to be really useful. It feels like a try-before-you-buy demo app and should be priced for free or at least allow the option of removing the annoying copyright mark.

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Flash Hero
Version 1.2

Bottom line: Two of the three filters work poorly.

Flash Hero is a new “flash fixer” app from Asasa Software which uses three different kinds of exposure enhancements to fix the lighting of a photo.

No two images are the same and many times an exposure enhancement app that does a great job on one image works poorly with another. That’s why I keep several exposure enhancers in my iPhone. Flash Hero attempts to give you three different types of exposure enhancement in one app. The idea is that of the three, one of them will work best to fix your image. It’s a great concept. Unfortunately, two of the filters work poorly and the third is redundant and unnecessary if you already have another slider-based flash fixer, such as Perfectly Clear, Auto Adjust or FlashPhix. All three of these apps produce better results more easily.

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