REVIEW: Handy Photo for iPhone and iPad

Despite the lack of Adobe polish, Handy Photo is a seriously good photo editor, and it won't break the bank either.

Our Verdict

A powerful photo editor; the UI isn’t for everyone, but this is an amazing price for the effects you get.

For

  • Powerful photo editor
  • Great selection of effects
  • Superb rubber stamp tools

Against

  • UI not for everyone
  • Needs further development to polish out imperfections

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The selling point to Handy Photo is its interface, which uses the corners of the screen to cater for rotating menu options. It’s all designed to keep the central area of the screen clear, allowing you to use swipe gestures to tone your effects up or down, much like Luminance. The editing options for the large part work well, although the orange and blue menu palette didn’t convince us. Where Handy Photo really excels, though, is the depth of its effects.

Developer’s ADVA Soft have once again made the most of their cloning technology from AntiCrop, but here it’s been vastly improved upon. Coupled with superb rubber stamp tools to iron out distortions, the Magic Crop element of Handy Photo is currently the best way to perform a large background clone on an iOS image. Additionally, there’s the Move Me tool, which enables you to clip out objects and move, resize or flip them.

It’s not without its problems, but thanks to the excellent airbrushing arsenal on offer, you can fix most blemishes with a bit of patience.

You'll find this review, and many more, in Tap! Magazine issue 30.

Key Info

  • Works with: iPhone, iPad, iPod
  • Price: $1.99/£1.49
  • Version: 1.0
  • App size: 161MB
  • Developer: ADVA Soft
  • Age rating: 4+

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The Verdict
8

out of 10

Handy Photo

A powerful photo editor; the UI isn’t for everyone, but this is an amazing price for the effects you get.

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