What Apps Are We Using This Month? with Jaz Oldham

I am Jaz Oldham and I live in Yorkshire with my husband and children. I’m currently self employed but in September I will be attending university to study for a degree in creative writing.

All my images are shot and edited on an iPhone 11. I use just a few editing apps , SNAPSEED being my favourite because of its wide range of tools.  I have used it in some way or other to edit most of the images here. Quite often I will begin by using TouchRetouch to refine the image by removing anything I do not want in the picture. My photos are always shot in colour but if I’m converting to black and white, I use either SNAPSEED to desaturate them or use the Black and White tool. HIPSTAMATIC can also be used for this purpose. Both Apps give great results.

Leeds Lights was taken using the HIPSTAMATIC double exposure setting – it’s a great way to get a double exposure instantly, as opposed to applying one post shot,  as you can do  in SNAPSEED. I wanted the image to be more vibrant in a few specific areas – I did this in SNAPSEEED using the brush tool,   there are a selection of brushes performing different editing tasks. The image also required a little straightening up using the rotate tool.

 I have set  HIPSTAMATIC to shuffle the lenses and films after each shot, I have also chosen ‘save original’ – so that I get a version of my image without any edits applied, this enables me to play around and build up an image of my own choosing.

HIPSTAMATIC is great for when I want a little more creativity or artistry in my image. ‘Rose’  was shot using the phone camera and edited in HIPSTAMATIC. I settled on applying the Jane lens and the BlacKeys XF film, I really like the mood which they have created, I altered the brightness and the texture until I was happy with them, there are a number of ways to do this – some of the lenses and films allow you to adjust their strength by means of a slide button and if you require further adjustment there are  many  tools available via the editing menu. It’s great to be able to see all the details about the image in the ‘Photo Info’ and, like SNAPSEED, if you create a look you like, you can save the effect and  try out on other images. HIPSTAMATIC gives me the opportunity to be experimental with the look of my photos.

I have tried iColorama recently-  it is a ‘must have’  for the creative photographer, I am still getting to grips with the basics but am sure it will be fun exploring the many options for creating art images. There are lots of tutorials available. I’ve only attempted very simple edits and really like the look achieved for  ‘Thinker’ which was shot in portrait mode and edited in iColorama. First, I chose ‘Style’ and from the options , I chose and applied ‘Toon’ followed by ‘Flat 2’. Flat 2 details were adjusted by opening the slide buttons in the bottom right corner. It’s a simple start to experimenting with the App, but very effective. I will definitely be exploring this App further.