Anyone here using an iPad for photo adjustments?

[VirtualRain]

Hi, as the title suggests, I'm interested in knowing if anyone's done any photo editing on an iPad, what app you've used, and what your thoughts are.

I could see using the iPad and camera connection kit on trips to import the odd RAW image, make adjustments, and publish to my photo sharing site or Facebook.

Longer term, I could see photo editing actually being a killer app on a touch tablet since there is little need for a mouse and keyboard when making photo adjustments. It's actually one task that is almost ideal for a touch interface.

 

[upsbrown]

It would be awesome to use. That's why the iPad should've been an actual computer instead of an enlarged iPod Touch. Unfortunately, there isn't anything available. What a waste Mr. Jobs.

 

[jampat]

Hi, as the title suggests, I'm interested in knowing if anyone's done any photo editing on an iPad, what app you've used, and what your thoughts are.

I could see using the iPad and camera connection kit on trips to import the odd RAW image, make adjustments, and publish to my photo sharing site or Facebook.

Longer term, I could see photo editing actually being a killer app on a touch tablet since there is little need for a mouse and keyboard when making photo adjustments. It's actually one task that is almost ideal for a touch interface.

I was hoping for pressure sensitivity and a stylus. As it stands, limited screen real estate, and lack of pressure sensitivity/stylus means I won't even bother trying using it for photo editing. I guess they could add a stylus and incorporate the pressure into it with a link via bluetooth, but that seems too unapple like.

I was hoping the iPad could be used like a cintiq (ie drop palletes onto it while editing on a real computer). If it was just holding selectable tools, it could even be an app that then controls the computer via bluetooth. I guess it could be possible, but I am not holding my breath.

The iPad may turn out to be a decent ebook reader/netbook substitute, but I doubt it will ever become something you would choose to edit photos on.

 

[munkees]

yep, I use my iPad,

the Apps I use are

Photogene,
Filterstorm (this one I like the most),
Pixel Perfect (iPhone app, but great app)
ColorSplash
Brushes
FlickStackr

I also use a PogoSketch stylus.

 

[emorydunn]

I think what's missing is a companion app for Aperture/ Lightroom/ Photoshop/ everything.

So instead of loading photos onto the iPad and then doing edits on there (which would be hard) you open your editing application of choice on your computer and launch the companion app on you iPad. This would give you the ability to view the photo full screen on a properly calibrated monitor and be able to make changes from the iPad.

Curves, colour correction, and so forth would be put on the iPad to free up the computer monitor for viewing.

But that's just my 2 cents and my dream.

 

[Ruahrc]

I think what's missing is a companion app for Aperture/ Lightroom/ Photoshop/ everything.

So instead of loading photos onto the iPad and then doing edits on there (which would be hard) you open your editing application of choice on your computer and launch the companion app on you iPad. This would give you the ability to view the photo full screen on a properly calibrated monitor and be able to make changes from the iPad.

Curves, colour correction, and so forth would be put on the iPad to free up the computer monitor for viewing.

But that's just my 2 cents and my dream.

Either this, or a companion app for Aperture/LR/whatever that lets you download images onto the iPad in the field, do some basic filtering/tagging/culling/(maybe even basic editing) and then when you get home and plug it into your computer, seamless integration of the imported photos into your current library/archives. This would probably be enough for most shooters to dump their laptops when going on photo trips, and would be a big selling point IMO for getting an iPad if you're an amateur photographer.

Honestly though I think that RAW demosaicing is just going to be far too slow to be of any real use on the iPad- hopefully you would be able to do enough with embedded JPEGs to make it work...

 

[VirtualRain]

I've done a bit of research, and I'll share what I've found out...

- You can import RAW images into the iPad using the camera connection kit and the iPad will convert them to JPEG's of max 2048 pixels on the long side.
- There are a number of good photo editing apps that will work with these large JPEG images... as munkees mentions, Photogene and Filterstorm are the most popular and support some very sophisticated levels, curves, and brushes in addition to cropping, rotation, exposure, etc. The touch interface is actually very functional both for moving sliders, cropping, and even doing brush work
- The iPad simply doesn't have enough horsepower to do a full RAW image workflow... at least yet, hence although the iPad will store your RAW's, you're stuck working with JPEG's.

It seems the ideal application for the iPad while travelling is to upload occasional images to your favorite photo sharing portal. This is how I intend to use it. I'll transfer over a few fav pics of the day to my iPad, do some adjustments, and then post them to my Zenfolio account or Facebook.

Another good use is to preview some of your shots either immediately or at the end of the day on the iPad's bigger nicer display and see how they respond to some adjustments.

 

[ManhattanPrjct]

Either this, or a companion app for Aperture/LR/whatever that lets you download images onto the iPad in the field, do some basic filtering/tagging/culling/(maybe even basic editing) and then when you get home and plug it into your computer, seamless integration of the imported photos into your current library/archives. This would probably be enough for most shooters to dump their laptops when going on photo trips, and would be a big selling point IMO for getting an iPad if you're an amateur photographer.

I think a lot of people who still use Photo Mechanic would probably like it if something similar came out for the iPad. If the ranking, sorting, folder structure, and filtering works like PM and synced up to Lr3 (or A3) at the end of my day, 75% of my post-shooting work would be done.