SimEye aka filterCam
SimEye on App Store aka filterCam on Home Screen and both in App Library
$ 0.99
V 1.2 reviewed July 2023
Correction for other reviewer: Everything is in English, with the dialogue boxes requesting permission for access for Camera and Photos in both English and Japanese text (I don’t know which: Hiragana, Katakana, and Kanji) then reverting to English only for Saved Photo, with no option in the English language version of the app to switch language option to Japanese (defaults to device language?)
The App Store product page only indicates support for Japanese and English languages, and all other related apps by these developers also have only English or Japanese titles.
There is no Chinese!
Other than permission to access the Camera and Photos, it does not ask anything else, and does not show anywhere in the Notifications or Settings list of installed apps, other than the Home Screen and App Library.
Nor is there any indication of Tracking that I could see.
This a cute, cheap, simple app that does one thing, a diversion, more than a tool.
If you want something more robust and capable, you will have to use a real camera/video tool at a serious cost.
Created in 2012 by Western and Japanese Developers
Import EV since 2010
Supports iPad, iPhone, macOS
Last updated 2017-2019?
Supports Apple Watch
It is tiny, only 1.7 MB.
The app is formatted on the iPad for iPhone aspect and can be zoomed to extend to top and bottom edges of the screen with black pillars on each side of the screen, otherwise it has the standard black rectangular border all around.
I do not know the aspects for macOS or Watch.
There are only four screens: the initial splash screen seen when first opened, menu, viewfinder, and copyright page.
There are only three dialogue boxes: permission to access Camera with Japanese subtitle, permission to access Photos with Japanese subtitle, and Saved Photo in English only.
Once app is first opened, subsequent openings flash the splash screen too fast to see.
Also, once permission is given to access Camera and Photos, there is no option to disallow the access in the app or in Settings
If you are still concerned, delete the app, your saved photos will remain.
The viewfinder box is live with the filter enabled.
It only uses the main camera, not the “selfie” reverse camera.
The box itself is rectangular and is only in “portrait” mode in the app, no matter if your device is in locked “portrait” or “landscape” mode.
It will not switch to “landscape” if you unlock and rotate your device, but if you leave your device’s rotation locked in and turn your device 90 degrees you can view and take shots in “landscape” mode
The viewfinder and the photo it takes are both 480 across by 640 down pixels in JPEG format (Old TV/CRT standard resolution on its side) at 0 MP!
When photos taken are viewed on a high resolution device, especially full screen, they will be fuzzier than the smaller view from the viewfinder on your high definition screen.
The sizes of the few I took were approximately 30 to 90 KB
If you take a screenshot of the live viewfinder with your device the same image that was originally 480x640 0MP JPEG 80KB will now be clearer at 3MP 1620x2160 PNG 3.7 MB at full screen, but still not as high definition as a real photo taken with device’s Camera app.
If you then crop to remove the black border of the screenshot your edited photo is still clearer than the in-app photo at 1MP 1159x1560 PNG 3.7 MB at full screen., with same limitation as listed above.
Be aware that the avatar indicating type of filter in the upper left corner of the viewfinder does not transfer to the in-app photo.
You may want, however, to edit to remove it from your higher quality screenshot of the view finder.
Also, just for fun, you could use the screen recording feature while the viewfinder is live and record an okay quality video clip, then crop to remove the black border and avatar and save video clip again.
The app itself does not doing anything but use the Camera to take single shots, and Photos to save them.
It does not record or access for viewing any previous shots in-app., nor any other photos, taken or saved by other means.
$ 0.99
V 1.2 reviewed July 2023
Correction for other reviewer: Everything is in English, with the dialogue boxes requesting permission for access for Camera and Photos in both English and Japanese text (I don’t know which: Hiragana, Katakana, and Kanji) then reverting to English only for Saved Photo, with no option in the English language version of the app to switch language option to Japanese (defaults to device language?)
The App Store product page only indicates support for Japanese and English languages, and all other related apps by these developers also have only English or Japanese titles.
There is no Chinese!
Other than permission to access the Camera and Photos, it does not ask anything else, and does not show anywhere in the Notifications or Settings list of installed apps, other than the Home Screen and App Library.
Nor is there any indication of Tracking that I could see.
This a cute, cheap, simple app that does one thing, a diversion, more than a tool.
If you want something more robust and capable, you will have to use a real camera/video tool at a serious cost.
Created in 2012 by Western and Japanese Developers
Import EV since 2010
Supports iPad, iPhone, macOS
Last updated 2017-2019?
Supports Apple Watch
It is tiny, only 1.7 MB.
The app is formatted on the iPad for iPhone aspect and can be zoomed to extend to top and bottom edges of the screen with black pillars on each side of the screen, otherwise it has the standard black rectangular border all around.
I do not know the aspects for macOS or Watch.
There are only four screens: the initial splash screen seen when first opened, menu, viewfinder, and copyright page.
There are only three dialogue boxes: permission to access Camera with Japanese subtitle, permission to access Photos with Japanese subtitle, and Saved Photo in English only.
Once app is first opened, subsequent openings flash the splash screen too fast to see.
Also, once permission is given to access Camera and Photos, there is no option to disallow the access in the app or in Settings
If you are still concerned, delete the app, your saved photos will remain.
The viewfinder box is live with the filter enabled.
It only uses the main camera, not the “selfie” reverse camera.
The box itself is rectangular and is only in “portrait” mode in the app, no matter if your device is in locked “portrait” or “landscape” mode.
It will not switch to “landscape” if you unlock and rotate your device, but if you leave your device’s rotation locked in and turn your device 90 degrees you can view and take shots in “landscape” mode
The viewfinder and the photo it takes are both 480 across by 640 down pixels in JPEG format (Old TV/CRT standard resolution on its side) at 0 MP!
When photos taken are viewed on a high resolution device, especially full screen, they will be fuzzier than the smaller view from the viewfinder on your high definition screen.
The sizes of the few I took were approximately 30 to 90 KB
If you take a screenshot of the live viewfinder with your device the same image that was originally 480x640 0MP JPEG 80KB will now be clearer at 3MP 1620x2160 PNG 3.7 MB at full screen, but still not as high definition as a real photo taken with device’s Camera app.
If you then crop to remove the black border of the screenshot your edited photo is still clearer than the in-app photo at 1MP 1159x1560 PNG 3.7 MB at full screen., with same limitation as listed above.
Be aware that the avatar indicating type of filter in the upper left corner of the viewfinder does not transfer to the in-app photo.
You may want, however, to edit to remove it from your higher quality screenshot of the view finder.
Also, just for fun, you could use the screen recording feature while the viewfinder is live and record an okay quality video clip, then crop to remove the black border and avatar and save video clip again.
The app itself does not doing anything but use the Camera to take single shots, and Photos to save them.
It does not record or access for viewing any previous shots in-app., nor any other photos, taken or saved by other means.
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