Laminar, a new desktop class photo editor for your iPad

Want a photo editing app for your iPad that provides you with a desktop like workflow, and uninspired by todays release of Adobe Photoshop Touch, then check out Laminar. From the developer of Iris Photo Suite, Laminar is described as "the perfect fusion of power and simplicity" that "offers over 65 amazing FX, features like Layers, Masks, One Touch adjustments, Brushes" that is "all wrapped into one complete package."

Laminar's full feature set includes:

OVER 60 BUILT-IN FILTERS & FX

• Polarizer, Retro, Vintage, Holga, Lomo, Cross Process, Bleach Bypass. Cross-Color, Plastic Lens, etc.
• Black & White effects including Sepia, Dramatic, Silver, Palladium, Dream, Infra-Red etc.
• Blur, Sharpen, UnSharp Mask, Radial Blur, Zoom Blur, Motion Blur.
• 12 Art Fx including Comic, Water Colors, Paint, Sketch , Poster Edges, Blueprint, Mosaic etc.
• 16 Amazing Vintage Fx.
• 9 high quality textures including Cloud, Cross Hatch, Graphic Pen, Half-Tone etc.

LAYERS & MASK

• No hard limit to the number of layers in a document.
• Dedicated Mask tool to create masks using Brush,Magic Wand tool, Gradient , and Text.
• Ability to Clone and Transform(Scale,Pan, Rotate) layers.
• Layers Demo:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r651kyc7bYY

BORDERS & FRAMES

• 7 Frames and 7 Borders included by default.

ONE TOUCH IMAGE CORRECTION

• Laminar includes state of an art AutoAdjust filters.
• Auto WB, Gamma correction, Auto Levels, Artificial Flash, 1980, HDR,and BW.
• Auto WB is a state of an art algorithm which adjusts auto white balance in the image, corrects the levels, performs gamma corrections, and brings back color even in images with almost no visible information left.

BRUSHES

• Complete implementation of brushes like with control like Variance, Jitter, Size, Softness, Blend.
• Included tools like Smudge,Clone, Symbols, Text.
• Check out demo of clone tool at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KLlPZ4pFzM4

ADJUSTMENTS & RETOUCH

• Access to individual Red, Green and Blue channels.
• Complete Histogram Controls.
• Curves
• Shadows and Highlight Adjustments.
• Exposure, Contrast And Gamma.
• Temperature, Sepia, and Saturation
• DeNoise.
• Crop and Horizon correction.
• Text Tool.

CUSTOM TEXTURES

• Laminar includes a dedicated tool to add textures to your images.
• Ability to add custom textures from photo library.

SHARING OPTIONS INCLUDE

• Email, Twitter, Facebook, Dropbox, FTP.

In addition to this app being significantly cheaper than Adobe's offering, in my test, Laminar had no problems coping with the 12 megapixels images from my Fuji X10.

App Store Link: Laminar; Offer Price: £0.69/$0.99/€0.79

Comments

[Michael]

99 cents is a steal. The histogram responds in real-time to your changes. Love it so far.

[Miege]

Is this just a landscape version of Iris?

[Rob]

"In addition to this app being significantly cheaper than Adobe's offering, in my test, Laminar had no problems coping with the 12 megapixels images from my Fuji X10."

BOOM!

It doesn't help that Adobe's new app isn't even coded natively for iOS. They used Adobe AIR, which means it'll be resource hungry and probably crash prone too,

Even at full price, even if Adobe's new app worked with full resolution, I'd choose this instead. At 99 cents? It's a steal.

I wish Laminar had a real person doing video demos instead of the cheesy music though. That would be more helpful.

This looks like an impressive app. Kudos to the developer, and thanks for the review!

[Glyn Evans]

For anyone interested, here are some promo codes for Laminar

AE9WPWAJT6TN - NEMM7YM97YJL - 4AXKFP9TPRTM - 6KN3LLEWMENH - WPR3X33WWKTN - XF9W4JLNALAK - AWAHM47TR336

[Skip Hunt]

Dang! I just bought this after seeing your post about it, then came back to comment and notice you've got promo codes. !@#$%%

Well, anyway... only $.99 and well spent. In my iPad2 this is superior to several other apps I've paid more for.

I just edited a few compositions layered with full resolution XZ-1 source images and the app is rock solid on my iPad2.

Yes, it basically seems like an amped up Iris. Seems they decided to release a new product instead of adding the cool new stuff to their current Iris for iPad product or fixing it's bugs.

This developer practice of just releasing a newly named product instead of rolling new features into an update of a current product REALLY angers me. Fortunately, I only have the iPhone version and hadn't bought the iPad version of Iris until they'd updated to fix the reported bugs.

[kaphinga]

I love this app! Kudos to the developer!

Although I usually prefer it when developers roll new features into an existing app, I think that in this case the developer was right in creating a new app. When I teach beginning iPhoneography courses, the students can handle Iris from day one. The interface is easy for beginners to grasp, and they can get results quickly. Laminar, on the other hand, is better for more experienced folks. They are both great apps, but I think they serve two different audiences.

[Marc Roman Bravo]

Yikes! I was just about to buy ps when I saw this article. Thanks for posting this. I snagged it. For a buck I got nothing to lose. And it looks great! I've been itching for something more powerful than my go-to snapseed, & if Laminar is good as it looks I can hold off on trying ps til they allow editing higher-res photos.

[Skip Hunt]

Wanted to add or clarify that although in general, I don't like the developer practice of creating new apps to sell instead of supporting the app their loyal customers have already purchased, etc. I DO think this is a stellar app. The control is very good and on an iPad2, very stable. Lots of options and reasonably intuitive.

If I'd just bought Iris for iPad and then this came out, I think I'd be pissed off. But since I got lucky this time and hadn't bought their iPad version yet, I think $.99 is a must have purchase.

I'd even go as far as this is definitely a solid $5 app and on par with the best 2 or 3 available right now.

[David Roccato]

but I don't understand one thing. I uploaded 2 images: the first 3264x2448, cropped square I got 1830x1828. The 2nd upload was 2448x2448, I didn't do anything and I got 1536x1536. (!)(?)

[Skip Hunt]

When you read the Layers guide, they reference Iris textures in the text. Does this app connect to Iris somehow? Or, was this indeed originally intended to be an Iris update before the developer decided to make a new app instead of including it as an update to Iris users?

My guess is that it was originally written as an Iris update and the developer decided to release as a new app at the last minute and forgot to edit the text in the guide.

Also, if the developer reads this, you misspelled \\\"Erase\\\" as \\\"Eraese\\\" on the brushes page. ;)

[Mac]

I bought this app based on this article and on the positive comments. While I agree that this app offers a great deal of functions and is very good value for money, I'm less convinced by the UI. The user interface is cluttered and difficult to figure out. The buttons are too small and dark and very unconfortable to use. In addition to that, there's a bug when using textures - or I didn't figure out on how to use it. The main principle of iOS apps should be their ease of use. Remember, thinking simple doesn't mean a lack of functionality.

[Pranav Kapoor]

Thanks for all the feedback and really appreciate everyone taking time out and posting out their experiences here!.
Just to clarify one question which a lot of people have asked, is this Iris Pro, or is this Iris with a new UI....and answer is NO.
It took me almost 6 months to rewrite the app from scratch, most importantly the processing engine that powers the App. I had a small beta program with a couple of Iris users, and feedback I got was that, the app had a significant learning curve compared to Iris, and that made a lot of them a little un-comfortable. That's the biggest reason for the not making this app a part of Iris.

Iris 2 is already in almost done, and would out sometime around late March or April.


Please do feel free to reach out to me at pranavkapoor@ventessa.com...Thanks Again!

[design826]

I bought this, but I wasn't impressed. Snapseed and Fotoforge2 are still the best photo editors. The interface is cheap looking, clunky and cumbersome to use. The buttons are so small and close together that it's hard to fine tune the adjustments. Even when you do, they don't turn out as good as in the other two apps mentioned above.

[Giovan]

It's hard to understand why people try to undermine stuff for nothing.
Same UI can be CLUNKY for some, and for some it's really professional.
Best part of iOS ecosystem is that you can have so many different tools to empower your work!...

Don't get me wrong, but I find Snapseed and Laminar to be on par with each other!.. with both being of completely different school of thoughts...Laminar wins for the workflow offered, Snapseed being more intuitive..
Comparing with Photoforge, I feel Laminar has better implementation of layer and masks..

Laminar had no problem working with 9 layers each being 12 mp import...Hope that says it all!

[Miege]

It is the landscape version of Iris.

[David Roccato]

Just for saying the formats I posted above were from 2 resizes, using the photo stream, and even with all the other pics resized via the iTunes cable transfer (geeez!!). So, I emailed the pic and full res was supported. Great app!

[design contest]

A good review. It looks like an impressive app. Thanks for the description.