Although the built-in camera of a cell phone is adequate, there are apps available which can provide extensions or even new features.  On my iPhone 7+, I currently have four photo apps for the camera and editing:

• Camera Genius
• ProCamera
• Camera+
• Moment.

Here are screenshots of the menus of those apps.

In planning this post, my intention was to prepare a table of available features and options for each of the apps.  However, as I began to make the table, I realized that many of the apps had the same features so here’s an overview of each app.

Camera Genius

Camera Genius costs $2.99.  The current version is 4.8.  It has 6 ratings with an average of 3.8 out of 5.  In addition to the camera features, Camera Genius includes a video mode and can do simple editing.   Controls and operation are very simple.  Camera Genius does not include RAW mode, HDR, adjustable white balance or allow for switching between the 1x and 2x lenses on my iPhone 7+.  I’ve rarely used it.

Procamera

Procamera costs $4.99.  The current version is 11.2 and it has 139 ratings with an average of 4.2 out of 5.  In addition to the camera features, Procamera includes a video mode and can do editing.   Although it may seem a little intimidating, Procamera seems to include everything you might imagine including RAW mode, HDR, adjustable white balance and support for dual lenses.  This is the app that I use.

Camera+

Camera+ costs $2.99.  The current version is 10.10.12 and it has 1100 ratings with an average of 4.4 out of 5.  In addition to the camera features, Camera+ includes a video mode and can do editing.   The editing features are extensive including “clarity”.  Camera+ supports RAW mode, HDR, and adjustable white balance.  I really liked the Camera+ implementation of white balance.  Although Camera+ claims to support the dual lenses of the iPhone 7, lens selection is very non-intuitive and, for too long a time, I could not do it.

Moment

The Moment app is free; it was developed primarily to support the Moment auxiliary lenses (which I just bought and will report on later) but works without the add-on lenses as well.  The current version is 2.7.7; it has 31 ratings with an average of 3.4 out of 5.    Controls and operation are very simple.  The Moment app does include RAW mode and manually adjustable white balance but not HDR.  It is simple to switch between the 1x and 2x lenses of my iPhone 7+.  In addition to the camera features, the Moment app includes a video mode; however, it cannot do editing.

What do I do?

Typically, when using the iPhone camera to grab a snapshot, I also use the built-in app.  But when trying something a bit different or difficult, I use the Procamera app to tweak the settings a bit.  Camera+ and Camera Genius have been moved to the back page of my iPhone apps.  Jumping ahead a bit, the Moment lenses are very good and using them is simple with either Procamera or Moment apps – and the Moment app is simpler.  I very much prefer to do my editing in the full computer version of Photoshop.

The next blog post will be about macro lenses.