Filed under: Multimedia, Software, iPhone, Graphic Design, App Store, iPod touch
A Splash of color from Colorsplash
I'm continually amazed at the high end functionality being displayed by various photo apps for the iPhone/iPod touch. We've seen panorama creators, and image sharpeners, just to name two.A good example is ColorSplash [App Store link] a $1.99US app that brings some of the sophisticated controls you'd find in Photoshop right onto the iPhone. ColorSplash can take a color image from your camera roll, or any image uploaded to your iPhone/iPod touch, and desaturate the photo selectively. You can have the photo all grayscale, except for a face, or take they sky to grayscale while leaving the rest of the landscape in color.
You can zoom into the photo using the usual finger controls, and paint color selectively on an image, leaving a very striking effect. You do all this with your finger on the touch screen, and with a bit of practice and judicious zooming you can really be very accurate. We're used to seeing images like this come out of high end photo programs, but doing it on the iPhone is a bit of a stunner.
The app allows unlimited undo, and brushes can be semi-transparent, so the amount of color can be varied. A palette gives you the option of hard edge or soft edge brushes, and you can save your work at any stage and go back to intermediate versions of your image if you want to. You can work in portrait or landscape mode, and there is detailed, built in help.
The program author, Hendrik Kueck. is a computer scientist from Vancouver, B.C. who contributed to the creation of Adobe Lightroom 2.0, so he's no slouch when it comes to imaging theory and practice. He previously did Juxtaposer for the iPhone and iPod touch.
The best way to see what the program does is look at some of the simple images I did in the gallery below, or click over to the author's web site for some more information.
Gallery: ColorSplash Samples
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
papsonette said 5:53PM on 2-17-2009
On iPhone, I use "Magic Touch" app for selective colorization this since November 2008
What is more, "Magic Touch" is just 0.99$ + plus much more features (clone stamp smudge etc).
So Colorsplash is just a repetition of the idea, for 1.99$ instead of 0.99$. Go and try Magic Touch for yourself to see what I mean
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snave said 6:08PM on 2-17-2009
This is a great app. Check out the full review over at the iPhoneography blog, see http://www.iphoneography.com/journal/2009/2/16/iphone-app-review-colorsplash.html
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Jamie said 6:37PM on 2-17-2009
Is there an OS X equivalent for this?
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hkk said 9:29PM on 2-17-2009
Wow. What an ill informed article. You guys really should try to check some facts before writing about something.
Apple does allow developers to choose the same name for an app. And I count 3 Sudoku apps with the name "Sudoku".
"And who determines which "pro" app really deserves the name?" Short and only answer: The developer. I have not heard of a single case where Apple refused an app based on its title. Of course you can't use offensive words in your title, and they might object if you are actively misleading people (calling your flashlight app "Photo editor pro" or something like that). But please do provide references to cases in which Apple refused a developer the "pro" suffix for the app title. I'd be very interested to learn about that.
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hkk said 9:33PM on 2-17-2009
Oh boy. How annoying and embarrasing. Sorry. 1Password once again filled in both password and unappropriately angry comment on some old article. Thats karma I guess. :)
Somebody please delete that.
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Ryan M said 8:26PM on 2-20-2009
Open 1Password, find your TUAW login, and turn Autosubmit off NOW!
:-D
Then whilst you're in there, create another TUAW login with autosubmit "ON" for entering comment-based contests ;-)
hendrik said 9:53PM on 2-17-2009
Hi, I am the developer of ColorSplash.
Thanks for the geat review!
papsonette: I actually hadn't tried Magic Touch before. But I just did. It is impressive how many functions it includes. But I also was impressed by how poor the UI is. I am sure it is perfectly usable once you figure it out, but it sure isn't intuitive. (It also crashed on me twice in about 5 minutes.)
With ColorSplash and Juxtaposer I focused on a single function but spend a lot of time, thought and effort on the user interface, trying to make it as intuitive and responsive as absolutely possible. You can give Juxtaposer Lite a try for free to get an idea of the style of user interface.
snave: Thanks!
Jamie: No, sorry. This app (and Juxtaposer) are really all about the multi touch interaction. In terms of functionality they don't do anything that you couldn't do with the Gimp or other image editors on OSX.
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FoundInTheFlood said 10:50AM on 2-18-2009
This has to be one of the coolest apps ever.
The idea is simple, the app intuitive, the effects stunning.
I just edited a few pics of a tradiontal tee-can in a tee-store when taking a break, and one of those lucky-golden-cats that you see in chinese restaurants.
Really amazing.
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FoundInTheFlood said 10:50AM on 2-18-2009
OFF TOPIC:
How do you guys use avatar pics? i tried to find a way to register here at TUAW, but there doesn't seem to be a commenter-account-registration.
So is this that kind of "one avatar all over the internet" service and if yes, what was the name again, i registered there once but it's been a long time.
I really like when people use Avatars and you can recognize them later without remembering their usernames.
So this should be made easier :/
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xx.vicky.xx_2007 said 7:15PM on 3-18-2009
could some1 please tell me how to transfere the saved pics from colour splash from your ipod to your computer????
thank you
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