ColorSplash for iPad by Hendrick Kueck (iTunes Link), who now operates under the name Pocket Pixels, Inc., is an app that allows you to make some very dramatic changes to your photos for its meager $1.99 price tag. The software uses a process called desaturation to convert your photos to black and white while letting you leave behind color within areas you select. The results are astounding.
It’s a shame that the iPad doesn’t have a camera, but even if it did the large form factor would make it practically impossible to use, let alone aim. However, if you happen to be the lucky owner of Apple’s elusive iPad Camera Connection Kit then your iPad is a great photographer’s accessory. The Kit gives you the ability to load pictures directly from your camera or an SD memory card into the Photo app library on your iPad. That doesn’t sound all that exciting — until you realize that your iPad is a great platform for photo editing.
ColorSplash is one of our favorite iPhone apps. The new version for the iPad takes advantage of all the benefits on that platform — especially the larger screen. If you haven’t used it before then you will enjoy the nice, built-in tutorial video to get you going quickly–spend a few moments with it and you’ll be a ColorSplash expert in no time. Once you’ve watched the tutorial, you can select an existing photo in your photo library or grab a new one with the Camera Connection Kit.
ColorSplash loads the selected image and converts it into black and white. You can then selectively add color back into the image using one of four available brushes: hard- or soft-edged, transparent, or opaque. Your finger acts as the brush, and the iPad’s generous touch screen is your canvas.
The app offers two viewing modes: Normal, which shows the image in black and white with part color; and Red, which shows all the colored areas of your image in a vibrant opaque red. The latter mode allows you to easily see and edit border areas between color and black and white sections of your image. The Pan and Zoom feature makes coloring individual areas easier to edit, getting you closer to the pixels that need to be converted — an important feature given that your fingers are normally too large for detailed work. If you make a mistake simply use the Undo feature to backtrack and try again.
ColorSplash automatically saves your work in “sessions” in the event that you exit ColorSplash by accidentally tapping the home button. You can save multiple sessions and completed images are saved to the Saved Photos Album on your iPad.
The only problem we encountered with the app wasn’t really a problem with the app itself. The iPad’s ability to change screen orientation at the drop of a hat was pretty annoying when editing. So we recommend that you select landscape or portrait orientation and then activate the hardware screen lock button on the iPad. Now you can rotate your iPad around during editing and the image will not change orientation and make you dizzy.
You will enjoy using ColorSplash to call a persons attention, using a common technique used by photographers and advertisers, to an object in a photo. In our example, we are drawing your attention to a specific object in our photo — a vibrant orange flower growing on one of our favorite Hibiscus bushes.
