I received a very welcome notification this morning from my App Store sales tracker letting me know that the very awesome FX Photo Studio was on sale for 99 cents. I’ve been eyeing this app for a while, waiting for the price to come down a bit so I could play with it.

After forking over my dollar and waiting for the download, I eagerly load the app and am greeted by this simple intro screen:

The great thing about FX Photo Studio is that it is a powerhouse of an application, with multiple functionality, providing a little bit of everything for the iPhoneography enthusiast. Having an introduction screen with a few simple actions ensured that I wasn’t completely intimidated by all of its features at once. A cool feature is the little lens in the middle of the flower actually reflecting images from either your front or back camera. Can you see my cheesy smile?

Wanting to give FX Photo Studio an initial test run, I decided to load up a less than amazing photo I took earlier today:

Nothing too special, right? Let’s see what we can produce with FX Photo Studio.

For the Instagramers and square photographers out there, you’re going to love this. Upon importing a photo, FX Photo Studio immediately asks to crop your photo into a perfect square with a simple as hell interface, removing one less headache when prepping your next Instagram shot.

As I mentioned before, FX Photo Studio packs a hell of a punch in its feature set, but somehow elegantly provides a user interface that doesn’t scare you away. Everything is neatly organised into toolsets:

• Tools - for image adjustments, image cropping and rotation.
• Color Splash - an awesome in-built feature that turns your photo into a black and white image and enables you to selectively restore colour to a desired portion of the photo).
• Add Text - enables you to add some cool labels and captions to your photo.
• Add Effect - lets you get to work on your photo with 194 effects/filters to choose from!

Adjusting my image for better clarity was a pinch. Quickly tap in a light filter, some tilt shift and minor adjustments and we get this:

It’s looking a lot better right?

FX Photo Studio has serious amount of filters and effects, way too many to explore in one review so I’ve uploaded a few versions of the same photo with some of FX Photo Studio’s filters applied:

(1) Some serious sketchwork

(2) A really nice filter that outlines edges

(3) More sketchy stuff, this time with the plane untouched, while the rest of the photo gets the filter treatment (another cool feature of FX Photo Studio)

I could go on for days about the intricacies of the app and some of the interesting features, but it’s better if you just get in there yourself and have a play with it. Here are a few extra things that caught my eye:

• A button that randomises the filter applied to your photo (for those moments where you just want to see what you get).
• The ability to “cutout” certain areas of the photo where the filter will not be applied to (see the photo above - I selected the area of the plane and had the filter applied to everything around it).
• There are a heck of a lot of filters and effects, luckily there is a favourites feature which lets you organise the ones you enjoy using the most for easier access.
• When applying filters and saving in high resolution, that progress bar can be a killer. FX Photo Studio has included some random, but interesting, facts to read while we wait for the iPhone’s processor to do its work.
• You can export the photo you are working on not only to the usual places (Camera Roll, Email, Facebook etc.), but also straight into Instagram, Tumblr, your wireless printer and to their very own International Photo Contests which, if you’re lucky, will see your photos featured in real galleries around the world!

#parting thoughts

Had I known about the intense power and feature set of this app, I wouldn’t have waited for a price drop. It works well with high resolution photos, has more features than I know what to do with and provides everything in a beautiful, elegant interface. Well worth the purchase!

If you’re on time, you can catch FX Photo Studio on sale for 99 cents by clicking here!