Feeling Polaroid
Posted on | January 5, 2010 | 5 Comments
My new favourite app for the iPhone is ShakeItPhoto which allows you to turn your photos into splendidly crappy and brilliantly retro Polaroid images. I mean, look at these (click for bigger images at Picasa):
Aren’t they cool. You can convert images already on your iPhone or, more likely, you can take a photo using ShakeItPhoto and watch as it spits out a virtual Polaroid. If you shake your phone you can speed up the ‘development’ process. Shaking and waiting for the image is something that’s really only fun the first time you do it so – thankfully – there’s an option to turn that off.
It has a very nice way of making pretty ordinary and mundane things look really rather pretty (in a polarised, saturated, colour-shifted, grainy sort of way). The picture format also forces you to think differently. Normally when taking a photo, most mortals are used to thinking in rectangles but thinking in squares makes you look at things differently.
ShakeItPhoto cheered me up immensely on a snowy morning trip to the shopping centre. It’s not quite perfect – as it crops the standard rectangular iPhone image, it could use a screen overlay to show what will be included in the final, Polaroided photo. Other than that, though, it’s really excellent. If you’ve an iPhone, try it.
You can see the full gallery over at my Picasa.
Comments
Gerry Hayes
I mostly sit around all day and drink tea. Occasionally, I write stuff and send it to strangers so they can humiliate me and deride my efforts. Other than the self-harm to dull the shame of failure, it's not a bad life. Like I say, there's tea.
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Ooh, sounds cool! Will have to go and try immediately. Are you on commission? ;-)
Ah, if only.
For reference though, I’ll happily shill for anything if there’s some cash in it.
I loves that. I was gutted when Polaroid went kaput. I now have two differing Polaroid cameras, one of which I can’t get the film for anymore and the other is too damn expensive. Harrumph.
More expensive than an iPhone?
Hush you.