Playing with the FilterMania 2 App

I'm loving Instagram at the moment! For me, it's like the Twitter form of Flickr, but for photos. In following some really creative Instagrammers, I discovered the FilterMania 2 App for iPhone.

According to its description on the App Store; "FilterMania 2 Market is literally a dynamic playground of constantly updated photo filters." And that's certainly true after my experience of playing with it for the last week.

You start with a base photo, which you can select from your library or take with your camera through the app, and then start to overlay filters. There's a bunch of themed filters such as darkness, storms, tropical, sci-fi etc, and you can mix and match as endlessly as your imagination (or time) allows!

The app also lets you play with the opacity and luminosity of each filter, so you can blend effects.

I've had fun playing with the minifigs in FilterMania 2, and they're finding a whole new whacky world out there. I also like the spooky effects blended with some of my photos from last year's Cambodia trip!

For $4.49 (USD), FilterMania 2 is definitely worth it for the fun factor.

365 Challenge #350 - 360 Degree Pano's on the iPhone

I was reading about a new photography app for the iPhone, and had to give it a burl. Photosynth for iPhone is a free app developed by Microsoft, and lets you take 360 degree panoramas.

I didn't have a chance to play with it in daylight, so here's a low light (almost 360 degree) shot of my apartment - taken with Photosynth, then cropped on the iPhone in another app I love, ProCamera.

Photosynth takes a bit of getting used to - keeping the iPhone camera on a straight plane all the way around can be tricky. The low light conditions in my lounge room also made it a bit tricky - the app tells you to "pause occasionally" in low light.

Anyway, it will be interesting to see how Photosynch works in decent daylight, and in a setting that lends itself more to 360 degree panos. It's certainly good value :)

Cool travel app: My Shot Lists for Travel

I was reading a blog post on Digital Photography School earlier this week, with an enticing promise: The Only Tip You’ll Need for Creating a More Interesting and Well-Rounded Set of Images of Any Destination or Subject.

Given my lurve of travel, I had to check out the article. It was basically a big plug for an iPhone app called My Shot Lists for Travel (this links to the US iTunes Store, as I couldn't find the equivalent page on iTunes Oz).

I didn't mind that it was plugging an app, because having recently jumped on the iPhone bandwagon, I'm always looking for new and creative ways of parting with my money in the name of fun, efficiency or the potential for photographic brilliance!

So I bought the app for just a couple of Australian bucks, although I'm rather annoyed that the US version is $0.99 and the Australian dollar is stronger than the US dollar and we still twice as much...

Anyway...My Shot Lists for Travel was developed by travel photographer Ralph Velasco. According to his blog, "Ralph Velasco is an award-winning travel photography instructor and international tour guide who has photographed in more than forty countries on six continents."

The description of the app says, "Perfect for travelers of all photography skill levels, the My Shot Lists for Travel app for the iPhone and iPod touch is the ideal tool for developing and tracking a well-rounded collection of images that truly captures the essence of a place. It was designed to guide you towards creating an overall cultural portrait of any destination or subject and provides the basis for compelling and interesting images of which you can be proud. Incorporate the app into your daily shooting routine and you’re sure to have friends and family asking you to share your portfolio, website or slideshow, not the other way around!"

I like the concept of a shot list - I tend to shoot a range of categories of photos in whichever place I visit, but I like that this app lists some 50 categories of photos you could potentially take (plus you can add your own), and then gives sample photos (from Ralph's own global roamings) and some brief hints about shooting each category.

With a trip to Vietnam looming at the end of the year, I'm looking forward to using this app, and even in my wanderings around Brisbane. Here are a couple of the screen shots.

Incidentally, Ralph's Photo Walking Tours and Cultural Tours look pretty impressive....something to keep in mind for my next trip, methinks :)