Mobile Photography & Art – My Top Five Apps by Luis Rodriguez from Madrid

Regardless what I’ve just said at the beginning, I do use Hipstamatic to shoot, when it comes to street photography. I always use a combination of lenses and B&W films depending on the light, because I love what B&W pictures shot using Hipstamatic look like. I love to use BlacKey SuperGrain film combined with Jane lens if the sky is cloudy, or the light is not very bright, or else combined with JohnS lens if sunlight is strong enough and there is dark shadow.

Sometimes, when the pic has been shot with the native camera and I think it´s worth being editing in colour, I import it on Hipstamatic and edit it using Hornbecker lens + Blanko film. I loved that Hipstamatic developers introduced the option of post editing pics just by importing them onto the app.

$/£2.99/download

This is a great app to blur the background. I often used it when I´m editing street pictures. I like it much better than AfterFocus, because you can zoom much better and it is more accurate. It has many other editing tools, but I only use it to blur. Easy to use, great results. The only problem (and I always wondered why the developers didn’t work on it) is that it lowers too much the pic´s resolution, once applied.

$/£3.99/download

I know most photographers do not mind about the distortion of lines, they think it gives the picture a dramatic sense, but as an architect, I hate distorted lines, especially the vertical ones. If I´m editing on an Android device, I use the Perspective tool of Snapseed to correct them. But if I´m editing on an iOS device, then I have to use SKWRT, because the iOS version of Snapseed is more limited than the Android one.

I´m perfectly aware that by using it to correct vertical lines part of the pictured is cropped, but I don’t mind. I´m an architect , sorry about it 😉

$/£1.99/download

This is only an iOS editing app, but it´s very complete and one of the best ones till Snapseed updated to its 2.0 version. I use it mainly when I have to work on a precise part of the picture. In order to do that, the zoom and the brush options are simple perfect. Easy to learn and easy to use.

$/£3.99/download

And last, but not least, the best editing app in my opinion, especially since its 2.0 upgrade. I often say it is so good that Google decided to buy it and put it at the disposal of every operating system for free. You can practically do everything needed with Snapseed.

Every now and then it adds new features: you need to correct perspectives, Snapssed adds this new feature. You need to write on a pic, Snapseed adds this feature. You need to delete certain things on a pic, Snapped adds this feature. You need to use double exposure, Snapseed adds this feature. Snapped is a sort of summery of all features needed in just one app.

All my pictures, and when I mean all, I mean every single picture I edit, will sooner or later be opened on Snapseed, even if I just need to rotate it.

Why do I like it so much? Especially because you may always go back to any of the previous steps taken during the edition and correct it, delete it or act on certain parts of the pic. You may even copy all the steps of one pic and apply them directly on a new pic.

Free/download

There are other apps that I use now and then, especially when I want to apply certain filters: VSCO, Mextures, or when want a beautiful B&W: BlackieApp.

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