Chromatica Mark II vs Spectre Camera
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Chromatica Mark II
This photography app offers advanced manual controls and intuitive tools for both amateur and professional mobile photographers. Capture stunning images with features like ISO/shutter priority, object tracking, and depth capture for enhanced editing.
- Intuitive user interface
- ISO and shutter priority modes
- Object tracking
- Depth capture
- Clipping warnings
- Full manual controls
- Live luminance histogram
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Chromatica Mark II is a powerful manual camera designed for photographers who want precision, control, and clarity—without compromise. Whether you’re capturing fleeting moments or crafting deliberate compositions, Chromatica Mark II puts professional-grade tools directly in your hands. Take full control of your photography with an intuitive interface built for speed and focus. Adjust exposure, shutter speed, ISO, focus, and white balance with precision, and see your changes in real time. For those moments when you need a balance between control and convenience, Chromatica Mark II also offers semi-automatic modes, including ISO priority and shutter priority, so you can adapt instantly to changing light and motion. Stay locked onto your subject with intelligent object tracking, ensuring sharp results even in dynamic scenes. Choose from multiple resolutions to match your creative or practical needs, whether you’re shooting for social sharing or high-quality output. Light your scene exactly the way you want. Use flash or torch with adjustable brightness levels to fine-tune illumination, giving you more flexibility in low-light environments. Analyze your shots with built-in luminance and color histograms, helping you achieve perfect exposure and color balance every time. Create and save custom presets to streamline your workflow. Switch effortlessly between setups tailored for different scenarios—street, portrait, night, or experimental—so you’re always ready to capture the moment. Chromatica Mark II is designed with professionals in mind, featuring a clean, distraction-free interface that keeps your focus where it belongs: on your shot. With support for lock screen and capture controls, you can access key features faster and never miss an opportunity. Key Features: • Full manual controls: exposure, ISO, shutter speed, focus, and white balance • Semi-automatic modes: ISO priority and shutter priority • Intelligent object tracking for moving subjects • Multiple resolution options • Adjustable flash and torch brightness • Custom presets for faster shooting workflows • Real-time luminance and color histograms • Focus peaking and loupe for precise manual focus adjustements • Lock screen and capture control support • Portrait mode capture on supported devices • Clean, professional, and intuitive UI Chromatica Mark II isn’t just a camera—it’s a tool for photographers who demand more. Capture with intention. Create without limits.
Spectre Camera
This app uses AI to create stunning long exposure photographs, making it easy to capture professional-quality shots. Remove crowds, create light trails, and achieve silky smooth water effects effortlessly.
- AI-powered long exposures
- Crowd removal
- Light trail creation
- Silky water effects
- Live Photos and video support
- Automatic scene detection
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Apple iPhone App of the Year, 2019 Introducing Spectre, from the makers of Halide, one of the top camera apps in the App Store. Spectre uses AI to help you make amazing long exposure photographs. Spectre can remove crowds, turn city streets into rivers of light, make waterfalls look like paintings, and much more. Until now, it was difficult to take long exposures: from keeping the camera steady to guessing the amount of light you need. Spectre takes care of all of that! WHAT YOU CAN DO • MAKE CROWDS DISAPPEAR: Spectre helps take photos of crowded, touristy places. Simply set a medium or long duration and take a shot to erase the crowd from a location. Capture the those special moments like you remember them. • RIVERS OF LIGHT: At night, AI scene detection automatically switches modes to draw beautiful light trails, for stunning nighttime city photography or light painting. • GORGEOUS WATER: Capture waterfalls, ocean waves, fountains and more with beautiful ghostly water. LIVE PHOTOS AND VIDEO Spectre’s intelligent computational shutter takes hundreds of shots over the span of a few seconds, and saves them in an accompanying live photo. That means you can pick a different frame as your photo, apply live-photo effects, and even use the long exposure as a live-wallpaper! ENDLESS SMARTS Spectre is a packed with powerful technology from by the team that brought you Halide. From machine learning-based scene detection to computer vision aided image stabilization, Spectre is jammed full of impressive technologies to get the best possible image. DESIGNED FOR HUMANS Spectre is meticulously designed. Its dark UI is gentle on the eyes when you shoot at night. Gorgeous glowing highlights infuse it with a unique style. Custom typefaces and iconography combined with unique, smooth controls make it as tactile and delightful as an actual physical camera. Like its sister app Halide, the app is easily usable with one hand, even on the largest iPhones. HIGH-TECH SHOWCASE Build with the latest tech, Spectre isn't just a long exposure camera — it’s the cutting edge technology showcase of one of the App Store’s foremost camera apps, Halide. Here’s just a few of the latest technologies that we use in Spectre: - DCI-P3 Wide Color Pipeline - Live Photos - Metal Graphics Acceleration - Tripod Detection - Siri & Shortcuts - AI Stabilization - Machine Learning & CoreML - Computer Vision COMPATIBILITY: Spectre’s smart Automatic Scene Detection requires iOS 12. AI-based stabilization features are available on iPhone 6S and later.* For the best experience, we recommend iPhone 8 or later. On iPhone 6, Spectre captures in lower resolution. ABOUT US We’re Ben and Sebastiaan, two friends living in the San Francisco Bay Area that love building fantastic apps for photography. We hope you love Spectre! We’d love your feedback to make it even better or any reports of bugs you run into. You can always contact us directly via email: support@halide.cam, on our Twitter: @halidecamera or Instagram: @halideapp Don’t forget to share your amazing results by tagging them with #SpectreShot so we can share them on our growing social media accounts!
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: Spectre Camera at Free against Chromatica Mark II's $3.99. Spectre Camera also leads on ratings volume (2.4K vs 43) and rating (4.3 vs 4.1). Chromatica Mark II's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 1) and review sentiment (61% vs 46%). On update cadence, ads, monetization model and iOS requirement there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Spectre Camera is free to download; Chromatica Mark II costs $3.99 up front. Spectre Camera sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Chromatica Mark II asks for nothing beyond the download.
Spectre Camera holds the better App Store score, 4.3 against 4.1. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Spectre Camera has 2.4K ratings behind it against 43, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews complicate that: 61% of Chromatica Mark II's written reviews are positive against 46% of Spectre Camera's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.
Chromatica Mark II ships an update every 2 months, Spectre Camera every 3 months. The most recent releases landed on September 20, 2026 and September 22, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Chromatica Mark II | Spectre Camera |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $3.99 | Free — better |
| Rating | 4.1 (43 ratings) | 4.3 (2.4K ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 61.1% of reviews — better | 45.6% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 43 | 2.4K — better |
| Update frequency | Every 2 months — better | Every 3 months |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Paid | Paid |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch — better | iPhone |
| Requires iOS | 17.6 | 16.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 15 MB | 12 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Natalya Petrenko | Lux Optics Incorporated |
Customer experience
Chromatica Mark II
Spectre Camera
Bugs and requests
Chromatica Mark II
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
Spectre Camera
Reported bugs
3 issues- Crashes and freezes on some devices
- Compatibility issues with older iPhones
- Focusing and stabilization problems
Requested features
5 requests- Longer exposure time options
- More manual control over settings
- Raw image format support
- Apple Watch remote support
- Improved low-light performance
In-app purchases
Chromatica Mark II
No in-app purchases
Spectre Camera
- Spectre Pro$4.99
Questions
Is Chromatica Mark II free?
Is Spectre Camera free?
Which has better reviews, Chromatica Mark II or Spectre Camera?
Do Chromatica Mark II or Spectre Camera have ads?
Which is updated more often, Chromatica Mark II or Spectre Camera?
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