final product single pages

Appy
Making life easY App 1, 2, 3
May 2017 - Photo Editing Issue

15 Photography The Hottest
Accounts you Editing Apps for
should be instagram
Following

IS VSCO The
next
Instagram?:
How this app
is taking
social media
by storm

10 Things You Didn’t
know your iphone
camera could do

3 Letter from the Editor

20 Expert Board: Worth the Hype? Breaking Down
the Top Grossing Photo Editing Apps

37 Before the Apps: Ten Things You Didn’t Know
Your iPhone Camera Could Do

45 The Best Photo Sharing Apps That AREN’T
Instagram

1 cover photo by HENRY MARSH

f Contents photo by MATT KLEIN

61 What’s Trending Now: The Hottest
Editing Apps for Instagram

67 Fakeup Makeup: The Best Apps For a Facefull
of Makeup With Just a Few Click

Cover Story

83 Is VSCO the Next Instagram?: How This App Is
Taking Social Media by Storm

2

Letter from the Editor

Welcome to Appy!

You’ve probably heard the phrase “there’s an app for that” more than a few times in your life.
Here at Appy, we believe this to be true and we have made it our mission to help you find the very
best of the best apps when it comes to any given category. Our incredible board of experts and
everyday individuals alike team up for each edition of Appy to bring you truthful reviews about the
hottest apps, from both sides of the table. Our staff also puts together full write ups covering the
positives and negatives about each featured app and the most effective ways to use them.
This quarter, for our premiere edition, we decided to focus on highlighting the best photo editing
apps that are out there. The best kind of editing can quickly turn a “good” photo into a “great“
photo. It is our hope that our research and referrals can give you that #NoFilter kind of confidence,
(even if you prefer to use a filter or two) when editing and sharing photos with friends, on social
media, and more. Happy editing & stay (h)Appy!
Best,
Megan Rogers-Reilley

3

AD

Before the apps: photo by KAIQUE ROCHA

Ten Things You Didn’t know your

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37

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38
9 Nulla eget metus diam. Sed vitae tortor vitae purus mollis

semper at id risus. Sed accumsan, ligula vel facilisis sceler-
isque, ante nisi vestibulum leo, eu maximus lorem ipsum vel
lectus. Mauris vitae sagittis nisi. Nullam fringilla odio a sapien

What’s Trending Now:

The Hottest Editing Apps
For Instagram

61 Photo courtesy of DesignYourWay.net

turpis. Donec ac posuere ex. Aliquam nulla nulla, fermentum
sed metus pharetra, porta vestibulum tellus.

SNAPSEED LAyout

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Vestibulum ac lorem sit amet ligula iaculis ullamcorper.

Facetune Afterlight

Aliquam tempor, libero a maximus vestibulum, nibh lorem iaculis Mauris volutpat cursus eros sit amet facilisis. Morbi rhoncus
lacus, viverra eleifend ex felis dignissim quam. Praesent ut odio quam nibh. Quisque rutrum tellus varius elit condimentum, ac
non augue tempus euismod. Vivamus blandit varius nisl, eu pel- facilisis tellus imperdiet. Nam ullamcorper in ante eget pellen-
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diam, in ultrices dui tortor eu ante. Sed ac enim suscipit,
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non tincidunt volutpat, sapien augue laoreet lorem, sed fringilla maximus, semper eros lacinia, rutrum tellus. Phasellus vitae leo
lectus justo ac erat. Aliquam et ligula magna. Nullam ornare mi eu sapien bibendum interdum. Suspendisse vel venenatis nunc,
eu accumsan mollis. Proin mollis lacus vel justo interdum, eget ut hendrerit tellus. Sed maximus ante ac metus luctus aliquet.
vestibulum erat congue. Mauris id arcu posuere, tempus nisl eu, Suspendisse imperdiet felis vel tincidunt volutpat. Pellentesque
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que ligula ipsum, porta quis augue laoreet, sollicitudin maximus Story continues on page 63

62

Is VSCO ThE NExt
Instagram?

How This Photo-sharing & Editing app Is
Bringing the focus back to making photos,

Rather than billions

By ELLIS HAMBURGER
photo by ZACH DISCHNER

83

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84Displayed above are of some of VSCO’s numerous filter options, some of which are free and some of which are paid.
(Story continues on page 71.)

O nce upon a time, Instagram was a vibrant dropped out of the top 15 in the App Store’s Photography
community of mobile photographers taking and Video category since launch.
consistently great photos. The app’s meticulously crafted
filters could make anything look good, it seemed. Years “VSCO IS THE COMPANY
later, all of your friends and maybe even your parents use COMING CLOSEST TO
Instagram, which means it’s filled with photos of REPLICATING THE LOOK OF
not-so-pretty things like oversaturated cloudscapes, blurry FILM WITHOUT MAKING IT
selfies, and group photos washed out by an iPhone flash. GIMMICKY.”
Seeing the same shade of Sutro or Kelvin grading the hun-
dredth photo in a row has made the app’s heavy-handed Before it had a hit app on its hands, VSCO, which
filters feel a bit stale, and videos, while useful, have detract- stands for Visual Supply Co., built filters and presets for
ed from what was once the defining mobile photography Adobe Lightroom and Apple Aperture — “the gold standard
experience. of film emulation,” according to the company. Using one
of said filters, which are sold in packs, you can effectively
However, one corner of Instagram remains a simulate the effects of different kinds of film in your photos.
sanctuary of excellent mobile photos. There are more than One filter, C3, emulates modern negative Fuji film stocks
4 million of them, and they’re all tagged #vscocam. using contrast and gritty green tones. Another, LV1, was
built in partnership with Levi’s and emulates classic slide
The photos were posted directly from VSCO Cam, film. “VSCO is the company coming closest to replicating
which has quickly emerged as the premier mobile the look of film without making it gimmicky,” says William
photography app on iPhone (and soon, on Android). The Wilkinson, a photography enthusiast and designer at
app, which launched in version 2.0 this past June, bundles software studio MetaLab.
in a variety of tremendously good filters (which VSCO pre-
fers to call “Presets”), granular yet accessible editing tools,
and minimalist user profiles called Grids. The new app was
downloaded over a million times in its first week, and hasn’t

VSCO will release special collections of filters such as those pictured above.. Image Courtesy of The Verge

85

“WE’RE NOT INTERESTED IN CREATING ANOTHER SOCIAL NETWORK.”

With VSCO Cam, the company brought its your photo to any social network or post it to your 86
trademark filters and editing tools to mobile. Whereas Grid — each of which feels like a more modern, svelte
Instagram set out to make your mobile photos look Instagram profile — but VSCO insists that’s not the
good, VSCO hopes to make them look real — which is intent. “We’re not interested in creating another so-
arguably the next step for mobile photography now that cial network,” says VSCO co-founder Joel Flory. “We
phone cameras are sharp enough. No longer must we wanted to create a platform that honored the art [our
overcompensate for poor low-light performance and users] created without likes and comments.” Yet, eager
noisy post-processing. for feedback, many VSCO Cam users are posting their
work to Instagram, as shown by the sheer
“The concept that a good photo is one that has volume of #vscocam tags hitting the service every day.
lots of textures or colors is something that we wanted to “They are utilizing Instagram for what it’s great at:
dispel,” says VSCO co-founder Greg Lutze. “The com- connecting,” says Flory. “It’s a great communication
position, the lighting, and the subject matter are what’s tool, and VSCO is focused on photography tools.”
interesting, as opposed to if there’s 10 layers of filters
and light leaks in it.” There’s no doubt that popular apps Flory and Lutze are dead set on building
like Afterlight can generate some pretty cool effects, but “the standard” of mobile photography tools, but in the
VSCO is aiming for something more authentic. “They’re hands of its users, Grid could help VSCO Cam evolve
taking the film stocks that photographers still widely into something else entirely. If the company added a
use, like Kodak Porta, and replicating its tones and simple news feed of photos from your friends, which it’s
color rendition beautifully,” says Wilkinson. “When you considering doing, the app could go from an effective
use their filters you can tell they spent the time to match mobile editing tool kit to a hip network where mobile
it accurately, without losing your photophiles mingle and share their work, now that
image’s dynamic range to destructive editing.” On Instagram has lost some of its luster. What was once
Instagram, conversely, photos are compressed and a platform for avid mobile photographers has become
frequently oversaturated, making the news feed quick the next Facebook, and that’s okay, but what’s left is a
to load and the photos flashy, but removing some of the gap VSCO Cam perfectly fills. In doing so, it’s building
photo’s original detail and character. the next Instagram — not the next billion dollar social
network, but the next app that truly moves the state of
Once you’re finished editing, you can upload photography forward.