The Simply B&W 1.1 update has just been submitted to the App Store and should street in a few days. The app is about to get a few cool frills. Click past the jump to find out more.

The update contains some cool new features wrapped in Simply B&W’s easy to use interface.

Version 1.1 gets a Vignette slider. While the vignetting option is very basic, in preview photos, it the gradient looks good and it seems to preserve the overall brightness of the image. If this feature works well, this addresses one of my notes on version 1.0 of this app where it’s missing the subtle vignette to fully recreate the look of the popular Vint B&W camera app.

Another great new feature is the ability to Keep Settings and allows users to choose if all settings should be reset to the default for every new image. This minor but cool feature will allow you apply consistent results across a series of images.

The new 1.1 update now preserves EXIF data when shooting or processing images. It will also have the option to save your original image when shooting within the app.

Here’s the list of all that’ new in the upcoming 1.1 Simply B&W update:

Settings Menu:

• The settings menu was modified to add a few options and now consists of:
  Save Original – Only applies to iPods or iPhones which have cameras
• Save EXIF(requires iOS 4.1) – This new option preserves EXIF data when imported from your library or adds EXIF data when taking new images with the camera
• Keep Settings – This new option determines if all settings should be reset to the default for every new image.

“Film” Settings:

Added an option for simulated “grain”

“Print” Settings:

• This new menu gives you the following options:
  Vignette Type – options are None, Black, or White
• Vignette – The strength of the selected vignette type. This control can be modified with the vignette set to none which allows you to set the strength before enabling Black or White Vignetting.
• Border Type – Relocated the settings option from V1.0.

If you’re worried about Vint B&W being end-of-lifed or the possibility of the app someday breaking in a future version of the iOS, give Simply B&W a look. Especially with this new update, it’s really easy to recreate Vint B&W’s looks and tonal qualities. Especially with this new update, Simply B&W is an excellent app in its own right and a great choice for any iPhoneographer to create gorgeous and rich black & white images.

Simply B&W is $0.99 and buying the app now will get you into the upgrade path when the new version is released. Requirements: Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. Requires iOS 4.0 or later.

=M=

~~~~

Simply B&W
Version 1.0
Price: $0.99

Bottom Line: A simple tool/camera app that creates great looking black & white conversions comparable to user favorite Vint B&W — but updated and with much more flexibility.

Simply B&W is a new black & white camera/processing app from developer Mr. B. Ware. It was written to fill the void left by Vint B&W, which hasn’t been updated by its developer for a long time (although it still works on the latest iPhones). Users of Vint B&W should give this one a shot — it has a better toolset and they may find this to be a good, newer, more useful replacement to the classic black & white camera app.

First, Simply B&W creates great looking black & white photos. You can either use it as a camera or load images from your iPhone’s photo library. In camera mode, you can also choose to save your original photo. The black & white conversion algorithms are excellent with nice contrast and deep, rich blacks. Simply B&W supports your device’s full resolution — over 5 MP on an iPhone 4. Unfortunately, it strips out most EXIF data including geotag information.

Simply B&W lets you optionally add either a simple white or black border — this feature is in the app’s settings. Even better, the app adds the frame outside the image — it causes no pixel loss. There’s also a Brightness/Contrast adjustment tool in the app which lets you make basic tweaks before saving your processed image. There’s an excellent color conversion filter where you can choose from six different colored lens filters to enhance certain colors and shades in a photo, similar to Photoshop’s Black & White conversion tool.

How does the photo stack up to Vint B&W? Pretty close for me. The black & white conversion is rich and full of nice-looking contrast, unlike the flat grayscale found in many other black & white conversion apps. I found that Simply B&W’s contrast was a touch softer than Vint B&W’s. That was easily fixed with a quick contrast adjustment in the app’s tools for users who want to replicate the look. Many users might prefer the additional details in Simply B&W’s shadows and 3/4 tones. Also, Simply B&W lacks the small, subtle vignette that’s added to the corners of images shot with Vint B&W. It would be great if this were an option in a future update.

I like the black & white look that Simply B&W creates. It’s like Vint B&W improved and MonoPhix Lite-Lite. It’s an easy utility that creates great-looking black & white photos. Unlike Vint B&W, you’re not tied to the image that you get. Simply B&W gives you much more flexibility in creating black & white photos quickly and easily. This first release of the app gets a lot of things right. I like Simply B&W.

Simply B&W is only $0.99 in the App Store. Requirements: Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. Requires iOS 4.0 or later.

=M=

UPDATE 07.04.11 @ 21:15: Changed post from a “focus” to a review. Added the four-star rating. =M=

~~~~

Erik Pettersson’s popular Vint apps, including the excellent Vint B&W, haven’t been updated in ages, either. Some of them will be getting an update soon.

I contacted Erik and he will be starting to work on the update for Vint B&W as early as next week. He hopes to update Vint Shift afterwards. The apps will be updated for better compatibility with the new OS and device updates that have come out since the apps were last updated. Other features may include the long-requested ability to import images from the photo library on the device.

I use Vint B&W often and haven’t experienced any problems with the app on my iPhone 4 using iOS 4.1. Vint B&W still produces among the best color to monochrome conversions available. Images have a nice tonal range and very little noise in the darker areas. Vint Shift is his tilt-shift app. It isn’t as versatile as TiltShift Generator, but it’s free and saves at full resolution.

Both apps are currently free and work on any iPhone running iOS 2.1 or newer.

We’ll keep you posted on updates to these apps.

App Store links: Vint B&W | Vint Shift

=M=

~~~~

.

Taken with an iPhone 4.

Toolbox: Vint B&W, TiltShift Generator

=M=

~~~~

“Woodall Rodgers 02″

Photographed with an iPhone 4.
Toolbox: Vint B&W

=M=

~~~~

“Woodall Rodgers”

Photographed with an iPhone 4.
Toolbox: Vint B&W, CameraKit

=M=

~~~~

Toolbox: Vint B&W

The Ballpark
Arlington, Texas

=M=

~~~~

Toolbox: Vint B&W, New Glarus Spotted Cow

Soulstice
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
June 20, 2010

=M=

~~~~

All four of Erik Pettersson’s Vint iPhone series apps are FREE in the App Store right now! It doesn’t say when this deal ends, but freebies like this often don’t last long — sometimes only for a day, so get them now.

Included is one of my favorite cameras, the excellent Vint B&W app which creates outstanding black & white images. It’s especially nice in the 3/4 tones and shadows, where it produces less noise and fewer artifacts than other apps.

Other apps in this giveaway are Vint Shift (a tilt-shift camera), Vint Green and Vint Red apps which mimic fading in old photographs.

This is an excellent opportunity to pick up this series of vintage apps for free. Grab them now before the price goes up.

App Store links: Vint B&W |   Vint Shift |   Vint Green |   Vint Red

=M=

~~~~

Related link: Eric Pettersson website

The Dude's Abode

The Dude's Abode 02

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

The Dude abides.

=M=

~~~~

Bottom line: Poor image quality. Saves images at 300×400 resolution.

MonoCam

Monochrome Camera by TouchInside is a new app which saves images in monochrome. It has its own camera function or you can import images from your camera roll. I know it takes a lot of time, effort and coding skills to create any iPhone app, but with all that’s wrong with this one, I wonder how this ever got past beta stage.

Monochrome Camera saves any image it touches in super-low 300×400 resolution. That’s about 1/8 of a megapixel. It places a date/time stamp on every image. There’s no way to disable this. Landscape (wide) images don’t process correctly. The app distorts the image by squishing everything into a portrait frame.

The color-to-monochrome conversion is okay, but produces noise and other artifacts in shadows and midtones of the image. Just about any app that does a monochrome conversion will do better.

This is a horrible app and with all of the other free and inexpensive monochrome cameras in the app store, there’s no reason to download this one. I realize that sometimes version 1.0 of an app is more of a public beta and I’ll take into consideration that V1 is sometimes a work in progress. But there’s not a lot I can recommend to fix this app except to start over. There’s no excuse for a basic monochrome camera app to not support full the iPhone’s resolution.

Although it’s currently free for a limited time, reduced from $0.99 USD, it’s not worth your download time. Avoid Monochrome Camera.

=M=

~~~~

App Store link: Monochrome Camera

Related links: Vint B&W |   MonoPhix Lite |   CameraBag

Diner

Toolbox: Vint B&W, TiltShift Generator

Another image in this series, “Nighthawk“, also appears through March as part of my exclusive Featured iPhontographer series on Pixels at an Exhibition.

=M=

~~~~

Dinner With My Dad

Toolbox: Vint B&W

I suppose I should probably get a model release for this image. I’m not worried about a lawsuit. I’m concerned about being grounded.

=M=

~~~~

Bob's Broiler Before Bar Close

The Big Moon

On the 30 Bus Going the Wrong Way

Street scene from a bus window

Toolbox: Vint B&W, Photogene, Format126

=M=

~~~~

Blue Train to the G Stop

The F Train

Powell Street Station

Toolbox: Gorillacam, CameraKit, Format126, Vint B&W

Three trains in San Francisco.

People going somewhere. People going nowhere. People moving or waiting to move.

=M=

~~~~

Some of my other camera apps. Page 4 on my iPhone

The best camera is the one that’s with you and the one that’s with me nearly all the time is my first generation 8 GB iPhone 2G.

I don’t use one app exclusively to shoot with. I have several and try to match up the image with the app. One of the features that makes the iPhone camera unique is the availability of thousands of photography-related apps. For less than the cost of a DVD, you can basically get a whole new camera experience.

iPhone apps are constantly being created, updated and improved. Since I first wrote my original Camera Bag post, several new apps have been released and several apps have been improved to the point where they have leapfrogged ahead as far as functionality and performance.

I find myself shooting with many different apps than the first time I wrote about my iPhone’s camera bag. Here’s my updated toolbox — the go-to apps I’m currently using.

1. ProCamera

It’s now my default camera app. ProCamera has had several awesome updates recently and is the camera replacement app to beat for serious iPhoneography. Adjustable image stabilization, full-resolution 5X digital zoom, and fast reload times make ProCamera my iPhone cam of choice.

2. Hipstamatic

It’s slow. It doesn’t save at the iPhone’s full resolution. You can’t apply filters to images in your camera roll. There are a lot of reasons not like this app. But Hipstamatic isn’t about reason — it’s about reconnecting with the analog experience of shooting a camera. I love this app. Bottom line, shooting with Hipstamatic is fun. It doesn’t hurt that it also has the most awesome filters to make your photos look analog.

3. Vint B&W

Glyn Evans from iPhoneography.com turned me on to this overlooked gem of an app. A simple black & white camera app for your iPhone. It produces the best black & white images on the iPhone. It’s especially nice in the 3/4 tones and shadows, where it produces less noise and fewer artifacts than other apps.

4. Camera HD

All this app does is allow you to shoot in-camera with different aspect ratios. Yes, you could achieve the same results by cropping in post-processing, but I really like the ability to compose my shot to the frame in-camera. I use this app a lot.

5. 5.0 Megapixel Camera

Resamples images as you shoot. This app has its limitations (read my review here), but sometimes you just need more than 2 or 3 megapixels. 5.0 MPX produces good results in “rezzing up” images — without the need to carry around a laptop and Photoshop.

These are the apps that I use most often for post-processing:

6. Perfectly Clear

One button image scrubbing — improves the sharpness, exposure, saturation and contrast. I usually run my images through Perfectly Clear before doing anything else to them.

7. Photogene

Sure, PhotoForge is more powerful and has more features, but I use Photogene for about 75% of my image processing because it does what I need it to most of the time and it does it quickly and easily. When I need more, there’s…

8. PhotoForge

Big and powerful. Loaded with filters and effects, and it can edit RGB images in a CMYK color space — something Photoshop doesn’t even do. The downside is that it’s slower than Photogene. The upside, it can do a lot more. I have both on my iPhone and use them. If I had to choose only one, I’d get PhotoForge to do some serious work.

9. MonoPhix
Converts color images to monochrome. Makes photos look like they were shot with a very fast black & white film. Multiple sliders unique to this app allow me to really fine tune the look of the conversion.

10. CameraKit

Another darkroom-oriented image processing app. It even uses the word “Develop” instead of “Apply.” I use it often to add vignettes, to convert images to black & white, and to tweak the saturation and contrast of an image through the app’s Push/Pull Processing feature.

11. TiltShift Generator

More than just an app to apply a TiltShift for a toy effect, it’s a great app to create shallow depth-of-field in an image or to apply a focus effect. It also adds really nice saturation and contrast to an image.

12. CameraBag

It’s still a nice set of filters that add mood and texture quickly and easily. My faves are the Helga and Magazine filters. Helga is their implementation of the classic Holga lo-fi camera. Magazine adds some great film grain to a vintage effect. Both filters are classic lo-fi.

—-

Your camera bag will probably look a lot different than mine and there are new apps being released all the time that push the envelope of what you can do creatively on the iPhone. Find what works best for you and have fun!

Unless indicated, nearly every image you see on this site has been shot with my iPhone and processed on my iPhone with one or more of the above apps.

=M=