Halide Camera App Sees Big Spike for Wildfire Sky Photos, Donates Sales

The popular iOS camera app Halide says it saw a huge increase in downloads this week by people needing a better way to capture orange skies from wildfire smoke. In response, Halide has donated a day of sales toward wildfire relief.

As wildfire smoke blankets the West Coast of the United States, many smartphone users have been frustrated to find that their default camera’s auto white balance can’t properly capture apocalyptic orange skies overhead.

The solution is to use a camera app for your phone that allows you to choose your white balance. Set it to “Daylight” or “Cloudy” and you’ll be able to capture the sky’s color more accurately.

One of the apps iPhone users have apparently turned to is Halide, which gives you more control over everything from focus and exposure to white balance and RAW shooting.

“We saw a lot of attention yesterday as people used Halide to take photos of the eerie orange skies in places hit by wildfires,” Halide Tweeted on Thursday. “We got significantly higher downloads. It feels wrong to benefit from this, so we are donating yesterday’s sales to our local Wildfire Relief Fund.”

The move has been very well received.

Halide costs $9 in the Apple App Store and is currently the #9 ranked app in the Photo & Video category.


Image credits: Header illustration SF photo Christopher Michel and licensed under CC BY 2.0

Discussion