Category Archives: filter

Third-party photo apps edging to new frontiers

computational imaging, content, Content Recognition, editing, filter, mobile, Mobile Photo Connect, photo sharing, Social Media August 5, 2015 Paul Melcher 1 Comment

Native smartphone camera apps – those provided by Apple and hardware manufacturers on their respective phones – now do much more than enable basic camera functions. They include features such as HDR, burst, dual focus/exposure points, exposure compensation and panoramic image capture that were once the exclusive domain, and the main value proposition, of third party camera apps. While this might appear to doom prospects for these third party camera apps Reinventing the Camera App Market, the latest study from mobile photography research firm Suite 48…

10 Questions to a founder : PicsArt

content, editing, filter, interview, investment, mobile, Mobile Photo Connect, phablet, photo merchandise, photo sharing, tablet, UGC July 31, 2015 Paul Melcher 2 Comments

The world of photo apps is a crowded place. With thousands of different photo-taking/editing/sharing apps to choose from and more being launched every day, it is a surprise when any of them break off from the pack and gather a strong following. 3 years old PicsArt is part of that privileged group, gaining impressive traction and recently raising in the process back to back significant funding. While its co-founder Hovhannes Avoyan is no stranger to successful company building, we wanted to learn more about the…

Survey Reveals Photo Editing Habits of Men and Women

content, editing, Facebook, filter, Instagram, mobile, photo sharing, Social Media July 17, 2015 Paul Melcher 6 Comments

PicMonkey, the leading photo editing website, in conjunction with LEWIS, recently conducted a survey with over 2,000 respondents about the photos they edit and post on social media. Respondents were asked questions regarding photo quality and personal preference and use. Not surprisingly, 91 percent of all respondents said they have posted pictures to social media within the last year. However, when it came to gender, it turns out that men have posted photos nearly as often as women within the last year (87 percent vs.…

10 Questions for a founder : Shutta

content, editorial, filter, finance, Funding, Interface, interview, investment, mobile, phablet, photojournalism, Social Media, tablet June 9, 2015 Paul Melcher 3 Comments

We might have some of the most amazing cameras in our phones, but we never seem to capture the right moment. Either because of camera lag or speed of life, we are left forever frustrated by the images we never got. When we discovered Shutta in the cramped and crowded alleyways of the 2015 Techcrunch Disrupt, it was almost love at first sight, for a few reasons : One, the app sits somewhere between photo and video, it has one of the smartest and easiest…

The second generation photo storage : Google Photos

Artificial Intelligence, big data, content, filter, flickr, google, mobile, phablet, research, Social Media, tablet May 28, 2015 Paul Melcher 3 Comments

That’s it. It’s official. Google photos is now free from G+ and starting a life of its own. For those who subscribe to our weekly newsletter, you might have noticed that we called what would be the key differentiator: free unlimited storage. With so many of the other features ( with variations) available via competitors, it was the only true unique play Google could make. And while a major draw for any mobile user, it is not the only attractive feature. Let’s review. Not really…

A requiem for Photoshop Touch: the app that users loved or hated

Adobe, content, filter, imaging, Interface, marketing, mobile, PhotoTech, tablet May 23, 2015 Hans Hartman 2 Comments

Adobe announced that they will discontinue Photoshop Touch, its comprehensive photo editing app, as part of a strategy to release apps with narrower use cases, such as Photoshop Mix (compositing), Photoshop Sketch (drawing), Adobe Shape (bitmap-to-vector conversion), and soon-to-be-released Rigel, for retouching. Before I share my take on this, it might be good to share some data about what Photoshop Touch users thought of the app. We did a qualitative analysis of 125 iTunes reviews in March of 2013, back in the heydays of Photoshop…

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TechCrunch Disrupt NY : A quick tour

content, e-commerce, filter, Instagram, Interface, marketing, Marketplace, mobile, PhotoTech, Social Media, UGC May 7, 2015 Paul Melcher 5 Comments

While it might still be called disrupt, it’s probably just by habit than real meaning. As we walked the aisles of TechCrunch Disrupt NY, we didn’t see, at least in photo space, a start-up that would fit this epithet. Certainly some great ideas, lots of passion, and definite sense that the space still shows a lot of potential. Disruption? well, you be the judge.… Held at the Manhattan center in mid- town New York, a space better suited for a stage performance rather than a…

One trick pony economy

content, filter, finance, Funding, Instagram, investment, Marketplace, mobile, PhotoTech, Snapchat, Social Media December 15, 2014 Paul Melcher 1 Comment

Let’s face it, VC’s artificially sustain businesses before they are profitable, delaying the inevitable market confrontation giving founders more reasons to convince investors than users. In fact , and this is more prevalent in the phone app world, we see founders solely focused on seducing investors, hoping to figure out the business model later in the company’s cycle. And investors willingly playing the game, if only to beef up their portfolios. They are, what we call them the One trick pony apps. Someone, somewhere figures…

From snapshots to narratives

advertising, computer vision, content, filter, Instagram, mobile, PhotoTech, Snapchat, Social Media, technology, UGC November 15, 2014 Paul Melcher 5 Comments

We are entering what seems to be the next phase in image management. Taking a cue from the formidable amount of images taken each day by individuals, photo hosting sites are realizing that storing and displaying images one by one as they arrive is no longer enough. Because it has become so easy to take pictures, people photograph too much and have no time, or desire, to edit them making viewing them later a somewhat painful experience. Organized, curated, re arrange, and packaged, they can…

10 questions for a founder : Clarifai

big data, Brands, computer vision, content, filter, interview, PhotoTech, Search, technology September 24, 2014 Paul Melcher 9 Comments

During last Spring’s LDV Visual Summit, there was a company whose name came up over and over during panels and side conversations: Clarifai. Still navigating under the radar, it has managed to quickly gain major recognition and recommendations from its peers in what is probably the hottest segment of photo tech : computer vision. Whoever cracks the last mile code to making computer recognize and understand the content of images will dominate the internet for the next decade, if not more. Yahoo, Facebook, Microsoft,…