The Mobile Camera Bag

Apps for the landscape photographer

It is probably stating the obvious, but every photographer has a camera bag, in fact some I know have a few. Filled full of glass, gizmos and high-end digital cameras that let's them weave their magic. However in this day and age, it is likely our most used camera bag comes in the form of a smart phone from Apple or Samsung, filled with two dollar apps.

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In my case, most of these APPs are a fleeting fad, an impulsive buy after being hooked by a tweet. To the left is a screen grab of my iPhone5 and the APPs that I use for photography. At a push, two maybe three are used regularly (645 Pro and Snapseed). The rest have been used no more than a handful of times, and are no more than space hoggers. Despite the many camera APPs on the market, the default iPhone camera APP remains the most used.

Snapseed, recently acquired by Google from Nik software is a photo processing APP for iOS and Android. Free to download, it is pretty amazing what this APP can do. Selective adjustments, automatic enhancements and a host of filters to play with, it comes highly recommended. In many ways it is the Photoshop elements of the smart phone world.

645 Pro by "Jag.gr" is the photographers APP , at present it is only available for iPhone users . The APP differs from many other photo APPs in that it offers high quality jpegs and Tiff files, along with histogram visibility, night mode, focus and exposure controls. The unprocessed files it outputs ( you need to connect to iTunes to retrieve them) are good if not just a tad noisy. 

In my opinion the GUI on the APP needs some tweaking, but after the default camera APP this is my most used APP.

TPE - The Photographers Ephemeris.

A must have APP for any photographer looking to plan a shoot. This APP is available for Android and iPhone and lets you see how the sun will fall on any part of the world at any time of day or year. In my opinion it is a must have, and is well worth the investment. One feature I would like to see the developers add, is the ability to view tidal times for any coastal locations. 

So that's my mobile bag, what have you got in yours?