My iPhone photos are all Perfectly Clear again

If you've been shooting photos with your iPhone as long as I have, then you will probably own (if not heard of) Perfectly Clear from Athentech Imaging.

In the early days of iPhoneography, Perfectly Clear was everyones (including mine) go to app for improving the cameras poorly exposed images, with just 1 click. Then about 18 months ago, disaster struck, as due to developer issues, a seriously buggy version 2.0 of Perfectly Clear hit the App Store, and this once 5 star app rapidly fell to a 1/2 star app.

Well, it may have taken 18 months, but yesterday version 2.4 of Perfectly Clear for the iPhone hit the App Store, and the King of the "Automatic Photo Correction" apps is back, and here is what is new, improved and FIXED :)

• Fixed crashing bug from previous version
• Memory optimization to prevent running low on memory
• Optimized preview for faster loading
• Optimized correction speed by over 100%
• Updated save size to accommodate 8MP camera (4S)
• Optimized file size for faster workflow
• Made Tint correction more responsive
• Captures and preserves EXIF data when taking photo through Perfectly Clear
• Captures and preserves location data when taking photo through Perfectly Clear
• Preserves EXIF data when importing image
• Preserves location data when importing image
• Identifies Perfectly Clear corrected image in EXIF data
• Fixed image orientation data
• Improved share abilities with Facebook
• Improved share abilities with Twitter
• Improved share abilities with email
• Increased response from correction sliders
• Fixed unusual behaviour of slide-out panel

If you already own Perfectly Clear for the iPhone or iPad, then you can download version 2.4/1.4 for FREE, but if you've never heard of/seen/tried this app before, then until Friday both apps are on sale for £0.69/$0.99/€0.79/£1.49/$1.99/€1.59, and I can honestly say, having played with the iPhone version, whether you have an iPhone 4 or 4S, "Perfectly Clear is once again a must have app."

Above: Taken with my iPhone 4. Before and after Perfectly Clear.

A word about Perfectly Clear for the iPad: Disappointedly, version 1.4 will not save above 8 megapixels, so if you edit your digital compact/DSLR photos on your iPad and hoped to be able to add Perfectly Clear for the iPad to your workflow, then you will be sadly disappointed. I have raised this issue with Athentech Imaging, and I have my fingers crossed in hope that they will address this, but until then I can not recommend the iPad version for anything other than lower resolution photos :(

Above: Taken with my Fuji X10. Before and after Perfectly Clear.

App Store Link: Perfectly Clear for the iPhone; Sale Price: £0.69/$0.99/€0.79

App Store Link: Perfectly Clear for the iPad; Sale Price: £1.49/$1.99/€1.59

Focus on Imaging: It's Perfectly Clear

Above: Brad Malcolm, President of Athentech Imaging.2 weeks ago today, I attended the "Focus on Imaging" Expo at the Birmingham NEC, here in the UK. Whilst there, I met up with Brad Malcolm, President of Athentech Imaging, the people behind the iPhone/iPad app and desktop plugins Perfectly Clear. Now as many of you know, Perfectly Clear has had a turbulent past 6 months, which started when the app was updated from version 1.x to 2.0, which brought us some new and improved features, but also some bugs and major stability problems. As some of you may know, I had the chance to work closely with Brad and his development team, trying to help them resolve some of these crashes, by beta testing both the iPhone and iPad versions prior to their releases, so this meeting was a good opportunity for me to catch up with Brad, and ask him what had gone wrong.

During the meeting we talked about the app, the problems, that I and many of you had been, and still are experiencing, and we shared ideas and thoughts. Brad was very open and frank about the app and the problems, and whilst I can not disclose the content of this part of the conversation, I am now fully understand what happened, what went wrong, but most importantly what Athentech are planning to do to resolve the issues. What I can say is that Brad and his team are 100% committed to these apps, and that version 3.0 of Perfectly Clear will bring this much used and loved app back to the top of its league, and whilst there are no timescales on a version 3.0 release, I am sure it will be sometime before the end of the summer.

Now for those of you who do not have a copy of Perfectly Clear, I have some good news, I have a small number of promo codes for both Perfectly Clear for the iPhone and Perfectly Clear for the iPad. Now you wont find these promo codes anywhere else on the web, these are exclusive to the iPhoneography blog, so if you don't already own a copy of Perfectly Clear, and would like the chance of bagging yourself a free copy, then post in the comments section, which version you would like, and why I should give you one of these rare promo codes [keep it clean please ;)] and over the next few days I will select what I think are the best comments and email the lucky winners a promo code.

Update on Saturday, March 26, 2011 at 1:23PM by Glyn Evans

*** OFFER HAS NOW ENDED ***

Due to the limited number and high demand for these promo codes I have ended the offer early, so those lucky enough to have been selected will have received an email from me with their promo code.

Well done to those who won, better luck next time for those who didn't.

App Update: Perfectly Clear & Perfectly Clear for iPad

"With this update, Perfectly Clear has finally found itself back on my iPhone" - editor

After a turbulent past few months, most of the bugs in Perfectly Clear and Perfectly Clear for iPad have finally been resolved and the app updates are now available.

Click to read more ...