Honesmith Optics vs Rake Plus
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side ā with what reviewers say about each.
Honesmith Optics
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Some photos are better when you make the decisions yourself. Honesmith Optics is an iPhone camera built for RAW and manual photography. Focus and exposure metering can be controlled independently, while manual focus, P/S/M exposure modes, RAW and ProRAW give you direct control when shooting close-up subjects, backlit scenes, or with external lenses. Focus here. Meter there. Tap the preview to set focus. Press and hold to place exposure metering independently. Your subject can stay in focus without forcing you to meter from the same part of the frame. EV compensation gives you a quick final adjustment when you want the image brighter or darker. Shoot RAW. Keep more room to edit. On supported iPhones and camera configurations, Honesmith Optics can capture Bayer RAW or Apple ProRAW and save the original image as DNG, giving you more flexibility for exposure, color, and post-processing. Take more control when you need it. Manual focus, magnified viewing, and Focus Assist make precise focusing easier for macro photography, external lenses, and shallow depth of field. You can control: ⢠ISO ⢠Shutter speed ⢠White balance ⢠Auto and manual focus ⢠Independent exposure metering ⢠EV compensation ⢠RAW / ProRAW ⢠JPEG / PNG ⢠Aspect ratio and filters ⢠Timer ⢠Volume-button shutter ⢠High-resolution photos and 4K video on supported devices No account. No subscription. Your photos stay yours. Honesmith Optics does not require a Honesmith account and does not use Honesmith cloud processing for your photos. Core photo, video, and RAW processing stays on your device. There are no ads or usage analytics. Advanced features are available through one-time in-app purchases. There is no subscription. Whether you are learning manual photography, shooting RAW, working with macro or external lenses, or simply want more control than the built-in camera gives you, Honesmith Optics gives you a more deliberate way to shoot with iPhone. Availability of RAW, ProRAW, high-resolution capture, video formats, and certain camera controls depends on your iPhone, physical lens, iOS version, and current capture configuration.
Rake Plus
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Change the light, the air and the focus of a photo after you took it. Rake Plus reads how far away every part of your picture is and works from that, the way a real lamp, real fog and a real lens would. Four tools, all on your device. Portrait photos carry the depth your iPhone measured when it took them. Any other photo works too: Rake Plus estimates its depth on your device. CLEAR ā take the haze out Haze, smog and smoke thicken with distance. Clear measures how much haze lies at each distance in your photo and removes it by distance: far hills and skylines come back, and the foreground is left alone. Strength sets how much; Protect keeps the far distance and the sky from turning grainy. RELIGHT ā move the light Drag a lamp across the picture and watch the light wrap around a face and cast real shadows. ⢠Five looks in one tap: Rembrandt, Butterfly, Split, Softbox and Flash, a flash on the camera. ⢠Three lights like a studio: key, fill and rim. ⢠Drag a light to move it; pinch to pull it toward you or push it behind your subject. ⢠Power in stops, depth, size for crisp or soft shadows, warmth, and shadows on or off. ⢠Original sets how much of the photo's own light to keep. AIR ā fog, mist and shafts of light Fill the scene with fog that thickens with distance, so your subject stays clear while the background fades. Add a sun, and the fog catches its light: trees, windows and your subject block it, and the light falls through the gaps in shafts. ⢠Density, where the fog starts, glow and warmth. ⢠For the sun: power, depth, size, warmth and how strongly the beams show. LENS ā move the focus after the shot Tap where the photo should be sharp. Everything else blurs the way a real lens would: the farther from the focus, the softer, with your subject's edges kept clean. On Portrait photos of people, the outline your iPhone saved keeps the blur off the hair. ⢠Aperture, and how deep the sharp zone is. ⢠The character of the blur: round or bladed, an anamorphic oval, cat's-eye discs at the edges, and the swirl of old portrait lenses. ⢠Glow: how brightly lights spread into discs. TOGETHER The tools stack in order: haze removed first, then your light, then the air, then the lens the whole scene is seen through. Hold Compare at any time to see the photo as it was shot, and undo or redo any change. Save to Photos adds the result at full resolution as an edit of the original, which Photos can revert, depth and all. IN PHOTOS TOO Rake Plus is also in the Photos app: open a photo, tap Edit, then the ⯠menu, Extensions, Rake Plus. A photo you edited with Rake Plus opens there with its settings, so you can change them later. RAKE PLUS PRO ā four more tools, Live Photos, borders and Recipes, one purchase An optional one-time in-app purchase. Try every Pro tool and a Live Photo merge on your own photos in the app first; the purchase is needed to save or share, and to use them inside Photos. ⢠WINDOW: sun through blinds, panes or leaves, bending over your subject and shading the wall behind. ⢠WEATHER: rain or snow through the scene, hidden behind your subject, fading the distance. ⢠GRADE: colour your subject and the distance apart, with no mask to draw. ⢠MOTION: a short looping clip from the still ā a push-in, a sway or a Vertigo zoom. ⢠LIVE PHOTOS: merge the three seconds into one picture: smooth water, passers-by taken out, or light trails. ⢠BORDERS: white or black, with the camera and its settings written underneath. ⢠RECIPES: save an edit, every tool as you set it, and put it on other photos in one tap. PRIVATE BY DESIGN Everything happens on your device, including estimating depth. Photos come in through the system picker, or from Photos when you edit there, without access to the rest of your library, and nothing is uploaded: there is no server to upload to. No account, no credits, no subscription, no ads. TIPS ⢠Portrait-mode photos work best. In Photos, they are the ones with the Ę depth control under Edit.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Rake Plus at none against Honesmith Optics's 1. On price, update cadence, ads and device support there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price Ā· Rating Ā· Positive reviews Ā· Number of ratings Ā· Update frequency Ā· Ads Ā· In-app purchases Ā· Monetization Ā· Best chart rank Ā· Devices Ā· Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Honesmith Optics sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Rake Plus asks for nothing beyond the download.
Honesmith Optics ships an update weekly, Rake Plus every 8 days. The most recent releases landed on September 30, 2026 and October 7, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Honesmith Optics | Rake Plus |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Update frequency | Weekly ā better | Every 8 days |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | No ā better |
| Devices | iPhone | iPhone, iPad ā better |
| Requires iOS | 17.0 | 17.0 |
| Further details ā not scored | ||
| Size | 5 MB | 53 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Shih-Chen Yang | Pablo Miranda |
In-app purchases
Honesmith Optics
- Honesmith Optics Pro$11.99
Rake Plus
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is Honesmith Optics free?
Is Rake Plus free?
Do Honesmith Optics or Rake Plus have ads?
Which is updated more often, Honesmith Optics or Rake Plus?
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