Jen Goode asks…
The best part thing the iPhone is not it’s quality for taking photos, especially not the 2G, which lacks the resolution and auto-focus that the 3G has.
The best thing is that it is always in your pocket. If you embrace it for what it is and learn what it does do well, you can take some really fun photos, especially by leveraging some of the apps that are available.
Since Jen also asked if these apps will work on a 2G iPhone, I tested them all out this morning on my old phone (now owned by my 3 year old). That means boring non-artsy pictures of my me and my kids. Sorry. 
Here are my current favorites:
Tilt Shift Generator
I think this is my favorite app. It is very simple in that it applies a depth-creating blur in the shape and size that you want in your photo. (iPhone pictures are very flat with everything in focus.) When applied to a landscape photo, or a far-away photo of a busy scene, it looks like a miniature model of the subject. This “Tilt Shift” effect is a trick done with camera lenses with real camera equipment, but can be simulated with some blurring effects.
See how the blurring effect (along with some vignette) gives this picture depth and focuses on the subject. I’ve also saturated the colors.
Here’s a better example of the miniaturization effect you get from this app applied to photos: Old Riverton Inn
Tilt Shift Generator: $0.99 at iTunes
ColorSplash
This app does one thing and does it well. It allows you to desaturate a picture to black and white and color in only what you want. Same picture as above with just Jason’s shirt colored.
Colorsplash: $1.99 at iTunes
Toy Cameras
Hipstamatic and Format126 are both apps that simulate some vintage cameras, the Hipstamatic and Kodak Instamatic 126 format respectively. Format126 allow you to load existing photos as well (which I strongly prefer). Hipstamatic takes the pictures only in a single format, so you need to choose your format ahead of time and take a chance. Just like the real thing! (I’m not that much of a purist. I’d rather be able to experiment with the effects.)
Here’s a self portrait taken with Format126 and its MonoHi style. Blur is the photographer, not the app, but it works no?. This is just one of several effects. You can see them all in my review of the Format126 app.
Here’s the Hipstamatic camera with the default lens. There are several lenses and film effects. many of which you must purchase as add-ons.
Format126: Free at iTunes
Hipstamatic: $1.99 at the itunes store.
CameraBag
Last but not least, Camerabag is a great post-processing app. Again, I prefer to take photos just with the standard iphone camera with no effects and then process it afterwards. That way I can play with the dozens of effects available. CameraBag has some great effects for creating toy camera effects (such as Holga and Lomo) as well some great color, brightness, and saturation manipulation.
Here’s the picture already edited with the tilt-shift generator with the 1972 effect added. What’s also great is that you can apply more than one effect from more than one app.
Camerabag: $1.99 at iTunes.
Sharing on Flickr
You can simply email these pictures to the various services, but since I don’t have email configured on the old 2G iphone (it’s the kid’s movie watching, game playing device now), I used the Mobile Fotos app. It’s a great app for connecting to Flickr and gives good control over titles, descriptions, tags, sets, etc. It just works.
Mobile Fotos: $4.99 on iTunes
I hope you agree, these are some pretty fun pictures that would have otherwise been very, very average and not even worth looking at. I might order a print of that Hipstamatic shot of Jason and try to pass it off as a 40 year old picture of me.
