Hipstamatic

It’s Hip to be Square….

by: Lauren Von Eper

Hipstamatic is digital iphotography gone analog. Well, sorta…

The folks behind Hipstamatic proclaim that their product brings back the look, feel, unpredictable beauty, and fun of plastic toy cameras of the past, on your iPhone. One of the most popular of all iPhone photography apps, Hipstamatic was Apples choice for App of the year in 2010. Currently rated 4.5/5 stars, and with over 1.7 million downloads in 2010 alone, Hipstamatic paved the way for the ” old school, analog like” photography apps.

The premise behind Hipstamatic, is that it color grades and modifies your photos with filters and film variants, which you can specify by selecting certain Hipstamatic original lenses and film. Additional “Hipstapaks” and add-ons are available within the app for 99¢ each, but they already give you a great selection for the original $1.99 price. While still lacking a front facing camera option, a large yellow button helps you, and others easily snap a photo. There are two different viewing options: Classic, and Precision Framing. Classic gives you a “chance” framing by randomizing where the photo will be centered. This setting comes standard, and personally is quite fun to use. If you are more into knowing how you will positioning your photo, you should use the latter, which can be changed by going into your iPhones settings, selecting the app, and changing its properties.

As a photographer, I have much experience in the use of actions and filters with programs such as Photoshop. Hipstamatic basically takes all the manual work, and does it itself, within predefined parameters. You are able to choose the “lens,” the “film,” and even the flash, which all three make up the final photo. end result can vary from “stunning” to “gag.” While this is a great option when you want to give up some control, or just have fun experimenting, I must insist it does not replace manual filters and post-processing.

I first bought the app when it launched in December of 2009. At the beginning, it was slow to render photos, had a great collection of lenses and film, but still was limited. Watching the app grow over the last two years has only made it better. Faster rendering, multiple resolution sizes, easier interface, etc. One key feature that they improved was the viewfinder. Originally, the small window you had was your only option. Now by double tapping your viewfinder, you are able to see your subject at a much larger and more detailed view.To take a photo, you just tap!

Like other apps for the iPhone, you can link your photos with multiple social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr to name a few. Being that your photos are not standard printing sizes, Hipstamatic offers a service to order and print your photos through their company. For those of you who are computer savvy, it is easy to just add width to your photographs, and print through a retailer of your choice.

Lets look at some examples:

You can combine the Hipstamatic lenses and film to create a multitude of variations in the image you create. They even offer a Shake to Randomize option, which allows you to switch between your available lenses and film choices just by shaking your phone. You have the ability now to turn off certain items you do not want to have active. Here, I have taken various images by using the shuffle feature on my iPhone. First is a shot of what image I am looking at, so you can see the variations with each new photo. As you learn more about your app, you can begin to pick and choose the certain features that you fancy.

Here are some of my favorites:

So you see… all in all, Hipstamatic is FUN. I personally vouch for it being one of my go to apps over the past two years, as it is something that closely emulates what I used to and still do to my photos with programs like photoshop. As an iPhone app, it is surely labeled as a must haven not only for its easy interface, but that it will indeed help you to understand lighting, alignment, and the basic beginner steps to create beautiful images.

ETA: Just found this awesome chart online via http://www.myglasseye.net. It is a lot like the one I created, and contains the basic lenses & films. It sure gives you a great visual of the mix & match!

Official Hipstamatic Website

Purchase Hipstamatic App on iTunes

Heres a video to sum it all up! Enjoy!