Apple has managed to translate their popular GarageBand and iMovie apps into impressive iPad experiences, and now it’s iPhoto’s turn to get the iOS treatment.
Mobile photo buffs should get quite a bit of functionality out of the new app, if only because it’s capable of multi-photo comparisons with images as large as 19 megapixels. All of a user’s images are organized into “shelves,” which allows for quick and easy browsing though their photo libraries.
Tapping a photo brings up the editing interface, and as expected, iPhoto for iOS is is chock full of multitouch gestures. Grabbing and moving corners will crop images for example, while touching images with the brush interface allows users to get very precise with their edits, and a downward swipe removes photos from a group. Once all those desired photo tweaks are in place, those photos can also be quickly beamed from device to device, or published directly to iCloud, Flickr, or Facebook.
In typical Apple fashion, users can also add effects to their photos — think black-and-white and sepia filters, along with more complex tweaks like a tilt-shift effect. Perhaps the coolest addition to iPhoto for iOS though is the new Journal functionality, which can be used to create digital scrapbooks of sorts. Photos can be organized and resized on the “page” as desired, and users can throw in notes and maps to personalize the final product. I
Like GarageBand and iMovie before it, the new iPhoto app also plays nicely with the iPhone, though it remains to be seen how precise one can get using a smaller screen. iPhoto will be going live in the App Store today, and for $4.99, it’s probably a no-brainer for anyone looking for a solid iOS image viewer/editor.
