When you think “Instagram competitor,” the first app that comes to mind is Flickr’s new offering. Having released just in time for Instagram to royally annoy its users with the proposed ToS changes, disgruntled Instagrammers flocked to Flickr in droves.
But there’s a new kid gaining popularity on the lo-fi block that does exactly what Instagram does, only more… German. It’s the EyeEm app, and it’s been climbing the charts so fiercely that it has established itself as a legitimate Instagram competitor in little more than a week. Read more…
It was about this time last year that the world was introduced to the Holga iPhone case: a strange-looking gizmo complete with a rotary wheel packing 9 separate lo-fi filters for the toy-camera, retro lover in you. Well, much like the Swivl we reported on yesterday, Holga has decided that bigger is better, and is attempting to break into the DSLR market with a new rotary wheel lens for DSLRs. Read more…
The Negative Effect is a documentary film by Malaysian director Dick Chua about a group of youngsters obsessed with film and lo-fi photography. He followed the group of about 40 photo-enthusiasts back in 2008 as they traveled to Penang Island in Malaysia to shoot and put on a photography exhibition without any sponsorship or support. The film premiered in Malaysia in 2009 and Singapore in 2011. Hopefully it’ll start showing internationally soon, or at least become available as a DVD.
If you want to play around with lo-fi photography, you don’t have to venture into the world of analog or hack together a DIY lens for your DSLR. There’s cheap plastic lenses you can buy for a toy-camera look, and one of them is the Holga HL-N lens available for both Canon and Nikon mounts. Read more…
The Flashkus by Art Lebedev is a cheap, disposable, and environmentally friendly cardboard USB stick that might one day make sharing event photos with friends much easier and cheaper. While many websites are geared towards photo sharing, transferring gigabytes of data to friends is still difficult to do via the Interwebs, so people often choose to burn DVDs or use pricey USB drives. The Flashkus would make the process easier by allowing people to simply tear off a USB drive, dump photos onto it, scribble a note onto the front, and hand it off to their friends. Once the photos are downloaded, the drive can be reused or thrown away.
It’ll be available in 4GB, 8GB, and 16GB but currently seems to be in the concept/design stage. Hopefully Art Lebedev adds it to their online store soon.
If you’d like to take “lo-fi” photographs with your DSLR, but don’t want to spend money on a pricey specialty lens just for this purpose, you’re in luck. In this tutorial I’ll be showing you a simple “mod” with which you can get a similar effect for no money at all! You’ll need a piece of scotch tape, scissors and a lens. Read more…
