Snap & Share

23/04/12 16:45

photo 1: Instagram, photo 2: Hipstamatic, photo 3: 645 PRO

Review on Instagram, Hipstamatic and 645 PRO.

Instagram is a fast and easy tool to snap and share and its for free. The interface is easy and practical, no submenus before taking the photo and only one step further to share. Open the app, take the picture, choose a filter (or not), check “ok” and the submenu to share opens. With three taps you decide what and where to share and its done. Not much thinking needed and lots of space for artistic playing. Just as easy as it is to handle, is also the result pretty. The filters create great retro looks and the results are often surprisingly interesting to share and keep.

Hipstamatic is also a free app, but in order to use the whole variety of the app you got to buy additional packages. This app requires more think-work. Hipstamatic allows the user to make combinations of different film types, flash types and lens types, all tools from the analog photography times. In order to do that, the user got do go through several submenus to choose the film, the lens and the flash. They can all be combined with each other, which give lots of possible combinations and possible results. There is a button for favorites, to save your favorite combination of film, flash and lens in order to find it easy the next time you want to use it. Helpful with the decision of “which combination” to use are the packages the films, lenses and flashes are sold in. They give a recommendation about what works best together and makes the choice a bit easier. Probably one gets faster when finding it’s way around in the app and having found the favorites, but then it’s probably a pity having bought also the other options. Sharing is easy. Just a tap and several options can be chosen. From my experience, sharing with Flickr didn’t work well.

645 PRO might sound complicated and demanding, but it is actually very easy and great to use and play. The interface is clear, no submenus to go through and the manual accessible with one “tap and hold”. Different ratios and films can be chosen easily and “live view” shows you what you are doing. If you prefer a normal “view finder” look, also this is possible. It works incredibly good and even night shots have a good quality. I had the impression that it works easier and better than my point and shoot camera. And just as easy is the sharing, tap and share.


Ute Sonnenberg, rohoyachui.com