Review: Instagram app for Android makes you an addict
The Instagram app for Android is my new drug. It makes me frame everything as a potential snapshot to share.
Beet sprouts in my garden. Dust bunnies in the hallway. Newspapers obscuring my view. A dead cockroach at work. Click, click, click. And the filters make it all look like “art.” Or at least photos that came from my childhood.
Apparently, I wasn’t the only one jonesing to get the app. Instagram for Android was downloaded a million times in less than 24 hours, CNET reports.
Although I’ve had Instagram on my iPhone since the app was released, strangely enough, I can’t remember ever using it. And I’m a snapping fool on my iPhone. I used the app on the Samsung Galaxy S Blaze 4G that I’m trying out.
On the surface, the Android app looks, feels and plays just like the iPhone app. The pieces that are missing don’t feel like they’re missing -- unless you know.
The tilt-shift is a sweet little feature that needs to come soon for Android. It’s what makes Instagram more than a photo-filter app. The absence of the live feed, in particular, for me made it feel like a lesser product, as well. Sharing on Flickr and these others can easily be added in an update, though.
Otherwise, the app includes a simple flash, front and back camera switching and cropping that’s restricted to a predetermined square. Simplicity at its finest.
Once you get going, you start to photograph every mundane thing in sight. But with the app, the mundane becomes a solitary moment of nostalgia or mystery and intrigue by applying a simple filter. What it does best, like many of these photo-focused apps, is turn everyone’s eye into a better lens to see the world differently.
While there’s been a lot of excitement about most Android-phone users getting the app, it seems some iPhone users are less than thrilled with the invasion of newbies, according to Kevin Parrish at Tom’s Guide.
Come on, iOS users. Sure, having tilt-shift functionality gives you depth, but that’s only physically in your shot. Don’t let it go to your heads.
Can’t we all get along?
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