One weakness of any camera is that exposure isn't flawless. To get some shots looking really good you have to doctor them. iPhone's camera in the new 3Gs is pretty solid, but you still have those times you'd like to get the exposure right. If you want to email these photos directly from your iPhone, you need to be able to fix these on the fly. This post examines some of the quick fix apps for the iPhone that allow you to improve exposure before emailing a photo on it's way. While there are a lot of apps that do this, these are simple apps dedicated fixing photos typically with the push of a button, like iPhoto's enhance button. Most work by automatically lightening the mid-tones without burning out the highlights, adjusting contrast, saturating colors, sharpening and modifying color, or some combination of these filters.
This photo really gives these apps a workout. Watch the faces closely. Both are in shadow with uneven lighting, but the lighting is very different on each. Only parts of each image are underexposed so the test goes well beyond just lightening the images.
Jade You don't even have to press a button and it modifies the photo. There's a slider to tweak the filter. Jade can handle some very dark images well, but can leave skin looking mechanically enhanced on these images.
BetterPix This correction app has a Flash button and slider to fix exposure and as well as a Focus button and slider. The effects of this filter can be a little more subtle. The Focus filter can come in handy.
PerfectlyClr has a patented filter. It corrects when you load the photo. It also has a five slider tweaking set to monkey with the image and well as a FixDark button that does some extra work on the deep gray tones.
iFlashReady has three buttons: Flash, More Flash and High Flash. It also can turn images sepia as well as black and white. This is the only app without a slider to control the filter. The three settings seem to be well chosen.
You can judge the results for yourself:
Jade
BetterPix
iFlashReady
PerfectlyClr
PerfectlyClr FixDark Mode
