Top 8 Photo Apps to make your images stand out

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Photo apps are an additional help to photographers. Some help in editing while others in capturing, organizing, and giving additional information. Pixpa has compiled a list of 26 photo apps covering a broad range of apps. These are the top 10 from that list. 

#1. VSCO: VSCO is one of the top apps used by photographers. It has an in-built camera, photo editor, and community sharing features. The app works wonderfully on both iPhone and Android and has a well-designed interface with a simple menu and icons. VSCO provides you with ten presets for editing and tools like contrast and saturation. While the paid plan includes more than 170 presets and advanced editing tools like HSL, Borders, and Video Editing. Other features which the paid members get are vintage film looks, photography tips and tutorials, and a chance to be curated by VSCO.

#2. Magic Hour: Magic Hour is an iPhone only app which tells you the timings of magic hours, i.e., the time around sunrise and sunset. The apps also determine how long the golden hour will remain. Golden Hour calculates the magic hour based on your location and even tells you weather forecast if available. The moon watch section in the apps will let you know when the full moon will appear. To find information other than your current location, you would have to buy the feature separately in the app.

#3. Pocket Light Meter: The app reads the light quality of the area it is pointed in, and tells you what settings to keep in your camera. Pocket Lightmeter can keep logs of various locations you have been to, during the day. The tool can be used with film photography and other manual cameras. It can calculate the settings (in which you need to take the shot), based on reflected light as well.

#4. Adobe Lightroom: Lightroom is a photo editing app that is used by anyone who needs some robust editing features. The app provides presets, which can be used with just one click to change the visual appearance of the photos. Lightroom can adjust the colour, exposure, tone, and contrast with Curves. Other editing features of the app include Clarity, Texture, Dehaze. You can also learn from the free tutorials provided by Lightroom when you are not clear on any concept. Lightroom has a built-in camera feature through which you can use manual settings and capture modes like RAW, HDR, etc. To organize your photos, you can add folders, albums, ratings, etc. in the app. Not all the features of the Lightroom app are free; some paid features include healing brush, selective adjustments, and more.

#5. Camera+ 2: The camera+ app has now been updated to Camera+ 2 app, which has even more powerful tools for serious photographers. The outstanding features of this app are focus peaking, which tells you which part of the photo is in focus, and action mode, which tracks the moving subject to keep it sharp. The camera+ 2 app has manual controls, through which you can independently control the shutter, ISO, and exposure in your mobile. The app can also capture in RAW format and can process the files in the same format as well. The paid app has some other strong features like the ability to selectively edit the depth in an image, captured using the portrait mode. The app can take photos in slow shutter speeds of up to 30 seconds, even in daylight. The camera+ 2 app is not only for taking photos; the app has editing features like filters, white balance, sharpness, curves, etc.

#6. Cortex Camera: Cortex Camera is a camera app which gives you full manual controls like a DSLR. The app also has priority modes like Shutter Priority, Aperture Priority, etc. to take pictures. The app is known to take good photos in extremely low light situations and is good at increasing sharpness and details. The app takes information from multiple shots and combines to remove noise and improve the resolution of the image. With Cortex, you can take long exposures without the help of a tripod. The app also works with the front camera and supports shutter timer and grid overlay.

#7. SKRWT: SKRWT is an app dedicated to correct image distortion and perspective. The app has an intuitive interface which is easy to use and can auto-crop images. The app works on images taken from DSLRs, GoPro, or Drone Camera as well. The app comes with paid extensions, which further increases the functionality of the app.

#8. Sun Surveyor: Sun Surveyor is an app which tells you the sun and moon positions at any time you want. With this app, you can plan for photos and videos, as you can predict perfect lighting situations, and see the lighting conditions of real-time as well. The app can tell you the times of the golden hour and blue hour, phases of the moon, center visibility of the Milky Way, and more. Sun Surveyor can tell you the sunlight and shade visibility for any site, at any time. The live view of the apps gives you a visual by placing you at the center of the sun, moon, and milky way path simulator. The interactive map feature creates the sun and moon overlays and calculates the distance and height of the objects. The paid app also works with street view and gives you a 360-degree interactive panoramic view so that you can plan accordingly. The photo opportunities section of the app tells you the upcoming photogenic events with the time and dates. 


This is a guest post by Gurpreet Singh. Here’s what he has to say –

My journey of studying architecture and then running my own design studio for over 15 years has indeed been the foundation on which Pixpa got built. With Pixpa, our focus has always been on creating an all-in-one platform that helps photographers and other creatives manage their complete online presence in one place.

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