ClassicTOY, Scarlet film, free Squara lens
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About a month after a big update to the excellent ClassicTOY, misskiwi has released the 6.2.0 update which adds new features and has many other changes, including film name changes and effect improvements.
There are other changes which effect the free version of the app. The new lens is part of the standard equipment, but four of the previously standard films have been improved and now moved to the premium in-app purchase.
The new Squara lens is now part of ClassicTOY’s free standard equipment. It’s a great lens for many reasons. It brings in-app square format photography to ClassicTOY, preserving the vignettes and other effects that would be lost by cropping a full-frame image. I particularly love the chromatic distortions in the outside of the frame. I really like this new lens.
One oversight, though, is that the viewfinder still shows full frame when using the square format lens. The app centers the crop, making it fairly easy to compose an image. Either a square viewfinder or at the very least square reticles would be handy to have in a future update.
The two new films are great additions to ClassicTOY and bring the number of authentic-looking retro film looks to 16. Scarlet film has the characteristics of a plastic toy camera, like a Diana. The new Sodachrome film is a classic-looking monochrome. According to the description, Sodachrome has sort of a hot spot in the center of the image.
Several of the previous versions’ films have been renamed and are now part of the premium in-app purchase. Here are the old and new names of these films. misskiwi apps are pretty consistent. My guess is that we will eventually see these name changes across all ClassicCAMERA apps.
- CLS Original 1 : Ann
- CLS Original 2 : 70sage
- CLS Original 3 : RichRaluren
- CLS Clear : Schnachrome
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If you already have the Lens Pak upgrade, this doesn’t effect you at all. These updates and changes are free to previous users. If you’re just using the free version of ClassicTOY, there are still plenty of excellent free films to use and the new free Squara lens brings the total to four free lenses. If you’re curious about the app, it’s one of the best toy camera apps available and it comes from a developer who consistently pushes out value-added updates to the app.
IMPORTANT! If you’re updating from ANY previous version of the app, be sure to export any prints you want to keep to your camera roll. All the images in ClassicTOY’s lightbox — the recent prints — will get wiped out when installing this update. This is due to a new “data structure” in the app. Regardless, save your prints before updating. Really.
ClassicTOY 6.2.0 adds a few great new filters and is another strong update to this popular toy camera app.
ClassicTOY is free, but to unlock six of the lenses and four of the films is a highly recommended $1.99 in-app purchase. ClassicTOY is compatible with iPhone and iPod touch (4th generation). Requires iOS 4.1 or later.
=M=
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