One of the most popular photography apps for the iPhone just got a massive update. We get up and close with the new Instagram.
Such is the popularity of Instagram that many people categorise iPhone photographers as “those who use Instagram and those who do not.” Although basically an image editing and sharing application, Instagram has won a huge following for itself because of its easy to use and intuitive interface. And now it has gone in for what seems to be one of its biggest makeovers with the developers claiming to have rewritten a lot of code.
We have LIVE filters!
First off, you can get the updated Instagram app from the iTunes App Store. It is a 10.9 MB download and can run on all iOS devices running iOS 3.1.2 and later. However, we reckon you would get best results with the iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS and the new iPod touch. And the biggest difference in the app can be seen the moment you get into camera mode using it – yes, you have the normal plethora of filters to play around (including some new ones), but the biggest change is the fact that these are now live. In simple terms, in the past you could add filters to a photograph after clicking it. Now you can do so even while you are clicking it – you can actually select a filter and see how a picture would look BEFORE you took it. Pretty cool, we think, especially because it worked very smoothly. The time lag that used to occur between switching filters has also gone, so we think there is some nifty coding. And while on live shots, you can also now blur part of the picture while keeping a part of it in focus using the Tilt-Shift feature. Clearly Instagram’s developers were looking at the “live shot editing” part of the iPhotography community when they came out with this update.
You can also rotate pictures after taking and also turn borders on and off a lot more easily. Significantly, unlike in the past, you can now save relatively larger resolution images in your photo library. The ones that get uploaded from the app remain low resolution ones but at least now one has high-res copies of the shots with all the effects one had added to be used elsewhere. Speaking of sharing, all the usual sharing options remain untouched in the new Instagram. What we have here is an Instagram that gives you more control over the image you are shooting even as you shoot it. And just in case you wondered, yes, you CAN use filters and effects and borders after you have taken a photograph. And unlike some updates that seem to slow down a device, this one actually seems to work faster than its predecessor.
All of which seems to us to be more than enough to maintain Instagram’s pre-eminence as one of the most popular photography apps on the App Store. Yep, we recommend a download. Android still has not anything close to it.
Get it from: iTunes App Store
Price: Free
