Comparison

Retrograf vs Ancient Light

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

Retrograf

Transform your photos and videos with authentic '90s analog film and VHS aesthetics. Apply a variety of filters, adjust key visual elements, and add unique overlay effects to achieve a vintage look.

Highlights
  • 24 film style presets
  • Light leaks, film scratches, fades
  • Vintage color palettes
  • Exposure, contrast, temperature adjustments
  • Vignette and chromatic aberration
  • Customizable overlay effects
Read full description

Inspired by analog film cameras and VHS videos from the '90s, Retrograf reproduces retro touches to your photos + videos. ● Filter Presets Light leaks, film scratches, fades and vintage color palettes are the basic elements for transport your photos and videos back to another era. Retrograf offers 24 fantastic film style presets that combine these elements appropriately. ● Adjustment Tools You can alter the exposure, contrast, temperature, tint, and clarity, enhance shadows and highlights, add vignette and chromatic aberration, and much more. ● Overlay Effects You can create your own look by combining the overlays provided. Overlays include light leaks, film scratches and grainy textures.

About

Ancient Light

This app transforms your iPhone into a 19th-century camera, simulating twelve authentic historic photographic processes. Apply these unique effects to new photos or import existing ones from your library.

Highlights
  • Simulates 12 historic photographic processes
  • Apply effects to new or imported photos
  • Supports ultrawide, wide, 2x, and telephoto lenses
  • Save multiple historic versions of a photo
  • ProRAW DNG output on iPhone Pro
  • Customizable effects for Daguerreotype and Tintype
Features
Read full description

Ancient Light transforms your iPhone into a camera of the nineteenth century. Take a new photograph or import a favourite from your photo library. Twelve authentic historic photographic processes - each faithfully simulated through the physics of tone, silver chemistry, grain, paper, emulsion, and light. Not filters. Processes. -- THE TWELVE PROCESSES -- Daguerreotype (1839) - The first successful photograph. A mirror-like silver surface with luminous shadow detail and seven scanned frame choices, plus No Frame. Tintype (1853) - The photograph of the working class. Robust, immediate, metallic, with regular or square format options and optional worn plate borders. Albumen (1850s) - Warm egg-white paper prints mounted as cabinet cards, with soft sepia-brown toning, aged cream stock, rounded corners, and a ruled inner border. Sepia - The warm brown tone of silver sulphide that preserved Victorian portraits through a century and a half. Cyanotype (1842) - Sir John Herschel's iron-based process. Deep Prussian blue. The print that gave photography the word "blueprint." Anthotype (1839) - Made from crushed plant pigments. Delicate, fugitive, botanical. The most poetic photographic process ever devised. Platinum (1873) - The process of fine art portraiture. Cool, shadow-rich, with a tonal range silver could never match. Autochrome (1907) - The Lumiere brothers' starch-grain colour process. Dreamy, pointillist, the first practical colour photography. Emulsion - A damaged instant-emulsion look with faded color, warm highlights, scorched edges, amber leaks, scratches, and oxidized surface wear. Bromoil (1907) - Oil-based ink on bleached gelatin. Painterly and stippled, with inky shadows and pale milky highlights. Lippmann (1891) - Gabriel Lippmann's Nobel Prize-winning interferential process. Warm amber ageing, long-exposure softness, and glass plate scratches from a century of handling. Infrared (1930s) - Light beyond the visible spectrum. Luminous white foliage, darkened skies, ethereal skin tones. The spectral world captured on heat-sensitive emulsion. -- WHAT ANCIENT LIGHT CAN DO -- * Import your own photos - apply historic processes to images from your photo library, even with camera access disabled * All four optical lenses - ultrawide (0.5x), wide (1x), 2x, and telephoto (5x) - selectable from the viewfinder * One photo, many processes - explore and save multiple historic versions of a captured or imported photo * On iPhone Pro: saves both a filtered JPEG and the original 48MP ProRAW DNG as a paired asset * Emulsion process with faded instant-film color, warmer highlights, lighter grain, and scanned edge damage * Albumen cabinet-card output with warm paper tone, aged stock texture, rounded card corners, and ruled border * Infrared process with glowing foliage, dark skies, and spectral black-and-white tonality * Tintype options - choose regular or square format, with period borders or no borders * Seven Daguerreotype frame styles plus No Frame, selectable directly from the viewfinder * Adjustments apply to the photograph while preserving Daguerreotype frame artwork * Full adjustment suite - exposure, contrast, highlights, shadows, black point, saturation, vibrance, warmth, sharpness, and vignette * Auto enhancement with one tap * Precision crop tool with inset handles and rule-of-thirds grid * Landscape side-panel layout keeps the image large while all controls stay accessible * Photographer credit field - your name travels with every saved file in the IPTC metadata * Process, frame, and Tintype options stored between sessions * iPhone and iPad, all orientations * No subscription. No ads. No account required. Ancient Light is a single purchase. Everything in it is yours.

Screenshots

Retrograf4 screens
Ancient Light4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is update cadence: Ancient Light at weekly against Retrograf's every 2 weeks. Ancient Light also leads on price ($0.99 vs $2.99). On review sentiment, ads, in-app purchases and monetization model 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Retrograf costs $2.99 and Ancient Light $0.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Retrograf ships an update every 2 weeks, Ancient Light weekly. The most recent releases landed on November 3, 2026 and October 31, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard2 real differences · 8 level
Retrograf versus Ancient Light: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterRetrografAncient Light
Price$2.99$0.99 — better
Rating—2.5 (2 ratings) — better
Positive reviews50.0% of reviews50.0% of reviews
Number of ratings—2 — better
Update frequencyEvery 2 weeksWeekly — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationPaidPaid
DevicesiPhoneiPhone, iPad — better
Requires iOS16.016.0
Further details — not scored
Size43 MB6 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperSeohyeon LeeGreg Anderson

Customer experience

Retrograf

Written reviews2 reviews
Positive50.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative50.0%

Ancient Light

All ratings2 ratings
Positive50.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative50.0%
Written reviews2 reviews
Positive50.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative50.0%

In-app purchases

None

Retrograf

No in-app purchases

None

Ancient Light

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Retrograf free?
Retrograf costs $2.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Ancient Light free?
Ancient Light costs $0.99, with no in-app purchases.
Do Retrograf or Ancient Light have ads?
Neither Retrograf nor Ancient Light shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Retrograf or Ancient Light?
Retrograf ships an update every 2 weeks, and Ancient Light weekly. Most recently, Retrograf was updated on November 3, 2026 and Ancient Light on October 31, 2026.

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