Review: Pro HDR app for iPhone

One of the things that I love about carrying around my iPhone is always having a camera with me – and a pretty damn good camera at that.  One of the things that has always been a burden to cell phone cameras though is that dynamic range of the sensor has been pretty limited, therefore making it hard to capture cool scenes that have a lot of contrast.  If you’re an iPhone user, I have great news for you – you can kiss those sensor limits goodbye.

Pro HDR is an app that was recently made available and it takes advantage of the iPhone by way of blending multiple exposures together to create a cool photograph of a scene that has a lot of light contrast.  For a mere $2.00, you can be on your way to creating some excellent images with your iPhone that were not really possible before.

If you have an iPhone 3G, I’m sorry to tell you that you’re outta luck on this one.  The app requires an iPhone 3Gs or an iPhone 4 and iOS 4.  Sorry new iPod Touch users, but if you have a brand new one there is no support for your device as of press time.  I would imagine that there will be support for iPod Touch users soon, as it now has a camera.

I really love how simple this app is to use.  I can either operate it in Auto Mode or Manual Mode, giving me control over the exposures I choose to blend together.  From there, Pro HDR handles all the rest of the work and blends and aligns the images together to create the HDR image.  Once that process is complete, I can tweak brightness, contrast, saturation, warmth, and tint from within the app.  I can also choose to save it at full resolution or at a smaller 3MP resolution.  I can also choose to save my original captures if I so desire, in order to edit them later.  Pro HDR also features a Library HDR mode which enables the user to import images from their library to process as an HDR photo.

The folks who developed the Pro HDR app chose to stay on the conservative side of HDR processing, which will likely appeal to more users.  While I’m a fan of the surreal look of some HDR work, there are others who aren’t and I think eyeApps was trying to capture the largest part of the market they could with the app.

Performance-wise, the Pro HDR operates seamlessly on my iPhone 4 and I have yet to have the app crash on me.  That’s something I really appreciate these days – more than most people know!

Here’s the direct link to the app in the iTunes Store, so be sure and check it out.  It’s got all the screen captures of the app there, so I didn’t bother to post them here.  Pro HDR is WELL worth the $2.00 and all you’ll have to do is skip a half-a-cup of Starbucks to be able to afford it!

Self-Assignment: Stills and Video with iPhone 4

Over the weekend we made a family trip up to Legoland.  I wanted to be able to go on rides with the kids, have fun, and not worry about my camera.  So I decided to give myself an assignment: to only shoot stills and video with my iPhone 4.  I had been wanting to play around more with the iMovie app as well, so this was a perfect opportunity.

The video above was shot and edited solely on my iPhone.  I even added the music right in the iMovie app.  The app still leaves a lot to be desired though.  It doesn’t allow for titling and you only get one audio track which is kind of a drag.  Nonetheless, it’s not bad considering the platform that you’re working on and it’s well worth the $4.99 price tag.

I took the images below with an app called Hipstamatic, which is based off of the Hipstamatic 100 – a cheap plastic camera that used to be around in the 1980s.  They were a little plastic camera body with a plastic lens – and you never really knew what kind of print you were going to end up with.  You can read more about them here.  They were a lot of fun to play around with, much like the app.  It’s one of my three favorite iPhone camera apps – right along with The Best Camera and Camera Bag.

I had a blast shooting with my iPhone 4 because things were so simple, quick, and I have it with me all the time.  Just another reminder that you don’t need a fancy camera to make great photographs.  There will be more down the road on video with the iPhone 4, including using it on an upcoming project that I am working on that will be announced soon!

That’s it for today – I hope you have a great day and don’t forget to bring your camera with you!

How To Whiten Teeth in Aperture 3.0

A reader of the blog (Linda) asked if I could explain how to whiten teeth in Apple’s Aperture 3.0, and rather than type out a lengthy explanation I thought I would just do a quick video tutorial.  So check out the 3:23 video below for my method of making teeth look their best while using Aperture 3.0.  And while I’m at it, if you would like to see a specific technique (photography, Lightroom, Photoshop, or otherwise) please leave your suggestions in the comments or send an e-mail my way with your request(s).  Enjoy!

Aperture 3 – My Initial Thoughts

Many photographers are excited about Aperture 3 and all the new features. I am one of those people. I spent the weekend going through Apple’s new software wonder for photographers and I am quite impressed. Many of the new features help cut down the need to go to Photoshop for post production and the ability to import and edit video in the same application you edit photos is outstanding! But, there is a downside – Aperture 3 is EXTREMELY resource hungry.

As a Lightroom 2 and Lightroom 3 Beta user, it was really nice to see Aperture outfitted with some Brushes. You can do a lot of little retouching tasks right there and save yourself a trip to Photoshop. You can retouch skin, remove dust spots and blemishes, brighten eyes, dodge and burn, whiten teeth; basically all the same things you can do in Lightroom. It’s really great.

The import dialog is a little different than Lightroom, but all the same features are there. You can specify how and where images are imported, back them up to a second location, add metadata, and even add adjustment presets to images as you import them. That last feature alone can save you a TON of time in your workflow if you aren’t doing that already with Lightroom and have a common starting place for all of your photos.

One of my favorite new features is the Full Screen mode! WOW! Seeing your images fill your screen like that is just incredible! You can bring up the Heads Up Display (HUD) which allows you to make the adjustments you need and likens the Adjustment Panel in Lightroom. Imagine your whole screen being filled with your photo while you work your magic! The thought of it is pure excitement!

I haven’t yet taken the video processing and editing for a spin yet. I’ll have to get to that at a later time. From watching the videos on Apple’s website it looks to be pretty promising and you can export them to Final Cut Pro for serious video work.

There are some challenges considering my Lightroom workflow is so engrained in my brain, but overall I am incredibly happy and satisfied with Aperture 3. There is one little thing that perturbs me, and that’s the fact that Aperture 3 is very resource intensive and my MacBook Pro lags while making Brush adjustments with my image at 100 percent. That drives me nuts! My MBP has 4GB of RAM and 512MB of dedicated video memory (VRAM) so I shouldn’t have any problems, but Aperture 3 sure sucks up resources. Don’t get me wrong, Lightroom certainly isn’t “light” on resource consumption either but it’s not this bad.

If you have gotten to check out Aperture 3 (there is a 30-day Free Trial), feel free to drop me a line in the comments and let me know what you think. I don’t think the resource issue is going to go away anytime soon, but you just can’t beat working on your images while they fill your whole screen!

Photo News and Other Happenings

Thursday is here and the week is almost over. Rather than waste time, lets get right down to what’s going on around the industry:

• Nikon has announced two brand new lenses, the 24mm f/1.4G and the 16-35mm f/4 VR. You can read all about ‘em here, and I don’t know about you but I think that 16-35mm lens is gonna sell like crazy. It’s Nikon’s update to the much older 17-35mm lens and while this new version isn’t f/2.8, it’s got VR baby!
• I listened to Gary Vaynerchuk’s audiobook called “Crush It” and if you are in business and haven’t read this book or downloaded the audiobook from iTunes then you’re missing out. I’ll have a review up here before too long.
• Don’t forget that my ‘Winter’ themed photography contest kicks off right here on Monday! For more details be sure to check out my original post. Good luck and thanks to BlinkBid for sponsoring the contest!
• I was the host photographer for Don Giannatti’s Lighting Essentials workshop last weekend, right here in good old San Diego. We had a great time, the attendees learned A LOT, and we made some great images. If you’re interested in learning how to light, I highly recommend his workshop! Here’s the link.
• Last but not least, Apple released Aperture 3 and it really looks awesome! I haven’t had a chance to do much more than examine the interface, but so far I REALLY like what I see! More on that coming soon… after a solid test drive.

That’s it for today. I hope you guys have a great rest of the week and weekend too! Don’t forget to go backup your images and clean your cameras! Have a great day!

The iPad Is Here: My Thoughts and Yours

So Apple announced the iPad yesterday and already I have seen photographers all over Twitter ready to buy. I’m not sure that this was the tablet that everyone thought Apple was going to release though. I think many had visions of a device similar to the ModBook, which is what most of us think of tablets thanks to PC.

But I don’t really think that the difference is a bad thing. I watched the keynote and Steve Jobs presented some really cool things about the iPad that got me thinking. The iPad is really a mobile device and not a mobile computer so it’s going to do things that we expect out of a mobile device like: browse the web, check e-mail, listen to music, watch movies, view photos… you get the idea.

So where could the iPad fit in the photographers life with no camera built in? My answer is pretty simple: a completely mobile portfolio solution. Imagine being able to had a client your iPad with a kick-ass slideshow that you put together for them to view samples of your work or even proof images from their shoot with you. You can take it anywhere! As thin as it is and weighing in at a mere 1.5 lbs makes it hardly a hassle to carry around. That’s just one of many ways that photographers can put the iPad to work.

What are your thoughts? Let me know in the comments section below.

Image above courtesy of Apple.com.

Weekend Updates

Well, the weekend’s here again and I wanted to let you know what’s going on and what’s coming up next week on the blog.

• I’m planning on posting my review of “The Hot Shoe Diaries: Big Light From Small Flashes” by Joe McNally. The review will be a little lengthy but I’m going to break down each section for you. If you haven’t read this book yet, you’ll want to after you read my review.
• In these times of economic uncertainty, it’s hard for us to part with our hard earned cash for new gear. Wanna know my solution? Buy used gear! Check out websites like Craigslist and eBay for awesome deals on glass, flashes, and the like. I recently picked up a Nikon 85mm f1.8 lens for less than half of what it costs new! You can’t go wrong with that and I’ll be buying a couple more lenses the exact same way. Of course, I’ll have a full review up after I’ve put it through it’s paces.
• My Lastolite Ezybox came in on Thursday… I’ll be engrossed this weekend shooting with it. So far I’m really jazzed about this thing… the quality of light is amazing!
• I’ve been shooting a lot more photos with my iPhone than usual. (See photo above.) I was inspired by Chase Jarvis and his collection of iPhone photos. I process them with native iPhone apps like CameraBag and Cool FX by Tiffen. This further proves that the best camera is the one that’s with you.
• I’ll be out and about this morning in Carlsbad for a Mentoring Session. You can read more about this right here.
• Last but not least, I hope to have photos and gel kits up and available in my “store” on Monday. I’ll post a little more about them and how you can make them yourself. But if you’re not much of the DIY’er you can buy them in my store for cheap.

That’s it for me, so I hope you all have a great weekend and I’ll see you back here on Monday! Keep clickin’ the shutter release!