Smartphones have come such a long way in all regards. From the operating systems, to the graphics, to the cameras, the development of these gadgets is truly amazing. One of my favorite things about the advancement is how great these cameras are getting. For those who aren’t that photo savvy or for those who aren’t ready to commit to an expensive DSLR, these smartphone cameras are a great option. Plus, we live in a time where you probably have your phone on you 90% of the time, so you can capture all of life’s moments big or small. With the cameras getting better and better, comes a plethora of various camera apps that your smartphone allows. Trust me, the number of apps could get very overwhelming. That’s why I’m here to share with you my favorite camera apps for iPhone and Android.
Snapseed provides the basic photo editing features such as exposure, contrast, highlights, etc, but what I also love about Snapseed is the brush feature and lens blur. With the brush feature you have 4 edit options, and you can zoom in or out of your photo just about as far as you want, and pin point various aspects of your photo you want to edit. For example, this is great in photos where there’s a shadow that you would like to edit out. Pick the brush feature, zoom in on that shadow, adjust the exposure, and the shadow you wanted is reduced. The lens blur is also great when you want to focus in on an object, and your lens didn’t quite do the job you wanted. With this effect, you can choose the size and strength of the blur.
Below is a photo taken of a crepe in front of the Eiffel Tower.
Snapseed, like most photo editing apps, allows you to auto-adjust the exposure, contrast, etc. which gave the below result.
However, you can adjust each editing component individually as well if the auto-adjust wasn’t what you wanted.
Also, as I mentioned earlier I love the lens blur feature to really set the focus on one particular aspect.
You can adjust the shape to truly hone-in on what you want to focus on. You can also adjust the strength to whatever you want.
If there are also smaller parts of the photo you want to edit, Snapseed has a brush filter, and this works wonders for exposing areas that may be too dark, saturating certain areas of a photo you want to standout more, and whatnot. The photo below I enhanced the exposure on the inside of the crepe, because I wanted the viewers to be able to see all that goodness inside the crepe.
Google Photos is a great way to quickly upload and edit your photos. If you have a Gmail account, you can log into your Gmail account, and sync multiple devices to your Google Photos. You can upload albums, and you can also adjust the lighting, color and “pop”. If you aren’t a tech savvy person, and simply want to enhance your photos, you can adjust the general “light” left or right, and the app will automatically adjust the exposure, contrast, highlights, etc. for you. If you like to get your hands dirty in the world of photo editing you can press the down arrow for both the light and color editing features, and adjust each individual edit yourself. Aside from the easy to navigate editing, this acts as a great photo back up. You never know when your phone might break or your computer might crash, and the last thing you want to do is lose all those photos from your ten day trip to Europe. With Google Photos all you have to do is login to your Gmail account and the photos will be right there waiting for you.
Take this photo of a bruschetta plate.
Google Photos gives you option of a variety of filters. Personally, the filters aren’t my favorite. I wouldn’t suggest using Google Photo for filters, but they are there if you like!
Google Photos has an option to auto-enhance both the light and color of your photos
However, if you click those arrows, you can dive deeper into the editing process and adjust the photos how you like them.
Google photos is another easy way to edit photos between the auto-edit and the in-depth editing features. It is also a great way to store your photos, because as I said earlier, the last thing you want to have happen is losing all of your photos.
VSCOCAM is a great photo editing tool for lifestyle and landscape shots. Each filter is unique in the way it brings out the individual color hues of the photos. From warmer, more red overtones, to colder, more blue overtones, to black and white filters, if you are looking to really bring out the green in a forest shot, this is the app to do so. If you’re looking to make that ocean look blue as it can be from your beach photos, this is the app to do so. The nice thing about this app too is that you can adjust the strength of the filters as well as the exposure, contrast, highlights, etc.
For example, look at how the hues of this photo changes. You can especially tell in the color of that blue home in the middle.
This photo is the original
This filter brings out the red/pink hues
This brings out more green hues
And this one makes the blues truly pop
Finally, this one gives the photo a “fade” affect. The colors are still bright, but there is an overall fade to the photo to give it a cool look.
Aviary is nice when it comes to editing photos and adding text onto them. The app has your classic adjustments such as exposure, contrast, and also has various filters. However, what this app has that the other ones above doesn’t is the option to write text and draw on these photos. This makes for great title images, feature images, social media posts, etc.
To make the text truly pop, you’re going to want to use the fade feature that you can find under “adjust”
Once you apply the fade, you can then click “text” and add in whatever text you like. Let’s say the above photo is for a post about my favorite flower markets. I can choose from a variety of fonts, colors, and adjust the size. If you want to do multiple lines of text, Aviary allows you to add multiple text boxes. That way you are not restricted to the one text box.
Instagram, in my opinion, still takes the cake on photo sharing. Now, with the addition of Insta-stories, you can not only post to share photos but real-time share your experiences through your stories. Although the algorithm has changed and your timeline is no longer chronologic, this app is still my top pick for sharing your photos for the world to see.
