Comparison

Ancient Light vs HDR Cast

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

Head to head
About

Ancient Light

Features
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Ancient Light transforms your iPhone into a camera of the nineteenth century. 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 -- * All four optical lenses - ultrawide (0.5x), wide (1x), 2x, and telephoto (5x) - selectable from the viewfinder * Shoot once, save many - save multiple historic versions from a single capture * 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 * Higher-resolution Daguerreotype frame output, scaled to the photo instead of the source frame artwork * 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.

About

HDR Cast

Stream HDR videos from your iPhone or iPad to an Apple TV using AirPlay. Experience your content in high dynamic range on a larger screen.

Highlights
  • Stream HDR video
  • AirPlay support
  • iPhone and iPad compatible
  • Apple TV output
Features
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Play videos over AirPlay to AppleTV from iPhone / iPad

Screenshots

Ancient Light4 screens
HDR Cast1 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: HDR Cast at Free against Ancient Light's $0.99. Ancient Light's advantage is chart position (#195 vs unranked). On ads, in-app purchases, device support 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

HDR Cast is free to download; Ancient Light costs $0.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

Scorecard2 real differences · 8 level
Ancient Light versus HDR Cast: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterAncient LightHDR Cast
Price$0.99Free — better
Rating—5.0 (1 ratings) — better
Number of ratings—1 — better
Update frequencyEvery 5 days—
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
Monetization—Free
Best chart rank#195 — better—
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad
Requires iOS16.016.0
Further details — not scored
Size6 MB1 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperGreg AndersonGreg Benz Photography LLC

In-app purchases

None

Ancient Light

No in-app purchases

None

HDR Cast

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Ancient Light free?
Ancient Light costs $0.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is HDR Cast free?
HDR Cast is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do Ancient Light or HDR Cast have ads?
Neither Ancient Light nor HDR Cast shows ads.

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