specimen · renato.design vs Drawing Projector
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
specimen · renato.design
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specimen is a 3D scanning app for iPhone that treats the captured object as a specimen — worth describing, worth situating, worth demystifying. You point the phone at a thing. You walk around it. You flip it over. You capture the bottom. The app produces a mesh you can open in Rhino, Blender, or any 3D software. Witness describes what was captured in clinical language. A registrar's voice. Surface reads as glazed ceramic. Bottom not captured. Approximately fourteen centimeters across. Afterwords is six voices from the dead. Sōetsu Yanagi speaks on the beauty of humble objects. Walter Benjamin speaks on what scanning itself is — what aura means when an object is captured. D'Arcy Thompson speaks on the forces that made the form. Roland Barthes speaks on the detail that pierces the viewer. George Kubler speaks on where this object sits in its class. Vilém Flusser speaks on the gesture of capture. Concordance names the mechanism, not the marketing term. Light detection and ranging. Infrared pulses. Time of flight. Structured light. Photogrammetry. Triangulation. Exports in millimeters, Z-up — the Rhino-default design-studio convention. Switchable to inches for the truly stubborn or architects among you. Share a capture package as a .zip and AirDrop it to a Mac running the free specimen Companion for full-detail reconstruction Apple only exposes on macOS. Requirements: iPhone with LiDAR (iPhone 12 Pro or later Pro / Pro Max). Apple Intelligence–capable device if you want the voices to speak on-device; the app falls back cleanly otherwise. No cloud. No account. No credits. No subscription. Built for students and makers as a tool for contemplative work. specimen is part of renato.design, a creative research practice authored through Iterative LLM Co-Authorship — a collaboration between Phil Renato and Claude (Anthropic). Released as a research artifact, not commercial software. See the disclaimer in Settings → About for details.
Drawing Projector
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Turn any photo or template into traceable line art — then project it live through your camera onto paper and trace with a real pencil. Drawing Projector: AR Trace converts your image to clean edge art on-device (no internet required), then overlays it semi-transparent over your live camera feed. Position your phone above the paper, adjust opacity, lock the frame, and trace stroke by stroke — just like a classic drawing projector, right from your pocket. CORE FEATURES • Camera lightbox overlay — project any image as transparent line art onto paper • Opacity & lock controls — dial in the perfect trace opacity, freeze the frame while you draw • Flashlight & grid — illuminate your paper and keep proportions true • Photo to line art — convert any photo to traceable edges, entirely on-device • Built-in template library — anime characters, animals, flowers, and more to start instantly • Timelapse recording — every tracing session is captured frame-by-frame; export your draw-with-me video and share it • Daily draw streak — build a habit with a streak counter and local reminder each day • Progress gallery — before/after view of every finished project WORKS OFFLINE Import, convert, trace, and export your entire session in Airplane Mode. All processing is on-device. Creative tracing aid — camera lightbox for drawing. See Settings → Legal for full disclaimer. EULA - https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is ads: specimen · renato.design at none against Drawing Projector's shown. specimen · renato.design also leads on update cadence (every 2 days vs fortnightly). Drawing Projector's advantage is iOS requirement (16.0 vs 18.1). On price, in-app purchases and device support 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
Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
specimen · renato.design ships an update every 2 days, Drawing Projector fortnightly. The most recent releases landed on October 12, 2026 and October 13, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | specimen · renato.design | Drawing Projector |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Update frequency | Every 2 days — better | Fortnightly |
| Ads | No — better | Yes |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Devices | iPhone | iPhone |
| Requires iOS | 18.1 | 16.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 2 MB | 32 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Phillip Renato | TUSE TECH LLP |
In-app purchases
specimen · renato.design
No in-app purchases
Drawing Projector
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is specimen · renato.design free?
Is Drawing Projector free?
Do specimen · renato.design or Drawing Projector have ads?
Which is updated more often, specimen · renato.design or Drawing Projector?
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