4 Free iPhone Apps for Making Home Movies
Posted: 30 May 2011 05:39 PM PDT
It's summer: Time for outdoor festivals, picnics and anachronistic celebrations of our fading youth (see: crochet matches, clambakes and ironic sock hops). And what better way to capture those memories than video?
While winter's chill might impel us to put away the camera — lest chapped cheeks and running noses be immortalized forever in digital celluloid — summer is undoubtedly a time for rosy-hued posterity. Which is why we've compiled a list of video-sharing and -creating apps to help you document this, the best summer of your life (or at least it will look that way with a filter or two).
Super 8
Yes, it may be a promotional app — launched to hype J.J. Abrams's upcoming blockbuster, Super 8 — but this iOS offering is a wonderful throwback to '60s-'70s home movies of old.
The app [iTunes link] boasts a gorgeous UI complete with a camera "case," which contains an instructional manual as well as your camera. When you pull up the camera — by tapping it — you can rotate it, swiping to the front to add an array of lenses (black and white, sepia, chromatic, color, x-ray, negative and infrared). You can then swipe to the viewfinder, where you can add more scratches to the film (to get that vintage look) as well as increase the shakiness and add a camera light.
After filming your movie, you can click a button on the side of the camera graphic to "eject" the film, which will allow you to add credits and a title, as well as edit. You can then develop the film to add it to your library. Sadly, you can only share via email; Facebook would have been a nice option.
The coolest part of the app, however, is the projector, which you pull down with a swipe to watch a film — a la home movies in the den.
iMotion HD
If you spend a lot of summer afternoons lying in the tall grass, watching the clouds amble by, then iMotion HD [iTunes link] is the app for the cinematographer beating at the walls of your soul.
This iOS app basically lets you take time-lapse, stop-motion films with your iPhone quickly and easily. Just choose the interval you want the app to snap photos, whether you want to do so manually, and record — all in HD. You can then share the video via YouTube or email (those options will cost you $0.99), or save it to iTunes or the iMotion gallery.
Use it to create a film depicting just how quickly those summer days flip by.
Viddy
Imagine the most epic of stage dives: careening off the lip of an outdoor platform, twisting in the air, and landing in a glistening sea of concert-going revelers — an air ballet that takes place in a mere handful of seconds.
Now, imagine that someone has caught that collection of seconds on video and made it all the more epic by adding color treatment, music and transitions to create a mini-production to share with all your friends. Well, that's Viddy [iTunes link].
If you can use Instagram, Viddy should be a snap to navigate. Simply create an account, connect with friends via Twitter, Facebook and your phone's address book, and start shooting. Click the "Share" button in the middle of the navigation panel to pull up a video from your gallery or to shoot a new one. Trim the clip as you see fit using a film strip timeline at the top of the screen (as in iMovie).
After you finish trimming, you can apply effects using what the Viddy team calls "production packages." These are like Instagram's color treatment filters, except with music and transitions. You can choose how much the film is treated by using a slide bar.
After choosing your package, you can add a title, location and tags, and share the video on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Foursquare and Tumblr functionality are coming soon.
As in Instagram, users also have a feed of other users' activities, the ability to comment on and "like" posts, and an option to see what videos are trending or popular.
Download and document your summer-inspired flashes of brilliance (or idiocy) for all your faraway friends to see.
BlipSnips
Ever had a party during which a veritable carnival of grotesques (a.k.a. your friends) execute all manner of amusing capers? Don't you wish you could capture those events on film, and tag each and every one of your pals the moment they appear on the reel? Enter BlipSnips [iTunes link].
This iOS app boasts the unique ability to tag friends using their Facebook and Twitter accounts at specific points in a video, as well as to add comments to particular time stamps (much like in SoundCloud's mobile app). Users can then post those videos to Facebook and Twitter. One can also tag a video using geolocation — you know, so everyone know's where the party's at.
Photo courtesy of Flickr, poohka
More About: blipsnips, iMotion-HD, iphone, mobile apps, Super 8, viddy, video
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