Drawing from Analog Camera for the Mac and the company’s user interface skills honed developing the popular Clear to-do software, this brand new iPhone photography app gets rid of the clutter to focus on just a few barebone features.
The camera
I love how Analog Camera lets me take shots in rapid succession, with the satisfyingly ascending tones as I snap a sequence of photos.
The image taking interface doesn’t occupy the entire screen.
Instead, as seen below, your last four photos are always visible behind the camera interface along the top of the screen. You can tap these to select them with the camera open.
To bring up your Camera Roll, just swipe the interface down – boom, you’re in your image library now. From there, swiping left takes you to your Photo Stream. Tapping the little camera icon at the bottom takes you back to taking photos.
This is an effective, natural and arguably the fastest way to switch between your camera and photo library, one somewhat resembling Facebook’s sleek Camera app. There are three camera modes to choose from, including handy manual exposure and focus controls.
Switch to manual mode is as easy as tapping anywhere with two fingers, which brings up a pair of draggable controls for setting exposure levels and focus independently of each other. Tap again with one finger to switch back to combined exposure and focus.
Analog Camera Features
• Three camera modes to set up the perfect shot, including Manual Focus & Exposure
• 8 stunning filters that make your photos look great!
• Beautifully minimalist, no-fuss no-clutter design
• Horizon line to help you take shots like a pro
• Share with Twitter, Facebook, Mail
• Easily access photos from your Camera Roll and Photo Stream
• Send your photos to Instagram and any other photo app
Check out this awesome video:
Touch ups
There’s some good news and bad news in terms of photo editing capabilities.
The good news is, Analog Camera’s filters interface is not only awesome, but incredibly fun to use. Upon snapping u photo or importing an image from your Camera Roll, the app lays out a grid of eight filter thumbnails (plus a non-filtered setting) with live previews of your image.
As for the bad news, there are only eight filters to choose from (Camden, Superior, Marble Arch, Brunswick, Pavilion, Honeycomb, 1978 and Inky), which pales in comparison with other photography apps that sometimes pack in a few dozen effects.
Sharing
Sharing in Analog Camera is incredibly frictionless thanks to a dedicated interface that occupies the lower half of the screen. This lets you quickly share any photo, right after applying a filter, just by tapping on the tiles with Facebook and Twitter logos on them.
Twitter and Facebook use native iOS Share Sheets.
Therefore, if you’ve previously set up these accounts in your device’s Settings, you won’t have to re-authorize the app with these services. By the way, I’m still stoked by how many App Store apps don’t implement native iOS sharing and instead forward me to a Twitter and Facebook login page.
