Sony Arouje

I never enjoyed mobile photography before but now I really enjoying after I bought my Lumia 920. It’s a perfect mobile camera with low light imaging capability. Initially I started experimenting with the default Lens app provided with the WP8. But controlling different parameters like Whitebalance, Exposure compensation, Exposure, etc was a bit difficult. So I started searching for better camera apps and I tried different camera apps. In this post I will explain two camera apps that I fell in love with and used it in my day today life, ProShot and Camera 360.

ProShot

I stumble upon ProShot two weeks ago. First I tried the trial version and bought the paid version the same day. It’s a wonderful camera app with good control on your camera settings. Lumia 920 has a 26mm lens with f/2.0 fixed aperture so we can take shot only in Aperture priority mode, so you can only control Shutter not the aperture. That means I wanted the ability to control the shutter speed, exposure compensation, etc. With Proshot I can easily control all these required settings and the settings are easily available from the screen itself. I don’t need to go into any settings screen to change it.

Some of the settings I can control is

• Shutter Speed
• ISO
• White Balance
• Exposure Compensation
• Focus
• Flash
• Aspect Ratio
• AF Assist Lamp
• Grid Lines
• 3D Level Gauge
• Histogram
• Burst Shot (up to 5 FPS)
• Self-Timer
• Intervalometer (for timelapse)

Available Modes

In ProShot mainly three modes available Auto, Programmed and Manual. Most of the time I use Programmed or Manual mode.

I use Program mode to shot my naughty son 🙂 as I don’t get time to adjust the exposure when he runs around. So I let the camera to decide the exposure. I think apart from Exposure all other settings available in Programmed mode.

In Manual mode I have full control of exposure and all other settings. One feature I am missing in mobile photography is light metering. I am not sure whether it’s possible. It will be a big gain if I get it, so I can easily decide what exposure I should set. Other wise I have to experiment with different exposure for a scene and choose a perfect one. So it’s a trial and error method.

Note: If any one has better way of choosing exposure in manual mode, please update it in the comment section.

Grid Lines

By default Grid lines are turned off. We have several uses of grid lines. One I felt is help to apply rule of third. You can find more use with it.

I am not going into the details of other settings and features. If you own a DSLR probably you might have used those settings and very well aware of it.

Camera360

Camera360 is a very simple to use camera app, with great user interface. With Camera360 I cannot control exposure or other advanced settings but it has several prebuilt Programmed modes like Macro, scenery, Portrait, Night and Auto. All the different modes can be selected just by rotating the selection wheel. Also I can apply different effects by swiping the screen and I can see the effects in real time. With this real time preview of effects I don’t need to visualize it, I can see it in action.

Camera 360 comes with photo editing capabilities. In editing mode you can try applying different effects to the photo and decide which one to apply. That gives us more freedom while shooting, shot using any of the available programmed mode with any or default effect, later using edit mode change the effects. So no need to worry about effects and I wont miss my precious moments.

App also have a Photo calendar where I can see the photos in date wise. I would say the Photo Calendar UI is great.

Summary

In my opinion with these two cameras apps I can take great photos. Also Windows phone store has some great apps specifically for photo editing. With these camera apps and Photo editors my mobile can be used as a camera and a post production machine. I don’t need to get back to my laptop for post processing. I shot it, process it, share it.

In my next post I will tell my favorite Photo editor apps. Mean while have a look at some my photos taken using my Lumia 920.

Happy clicking and let me know your favorite camera apps for Windows Phone 8.