Lightscope vs Image Inspector
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side ā with what reviewers say about each.
Lightscope
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Shot in Apple Log and tired of flat, washed-out previews? Lightscope plays Apple Log (1 & 2) footage back the way it was meant to look ā in real Rec.2100 HLG ā and lets you grade it right on your iPhone or iPad. PLAY IT RIGHT ⢠True HDR playback of Apple Log 1 & 2 clips (Rec.2100 HLG) ⢠Technical LUTs generated from DaVinci Resolve for accurate log-to-display transforms ⢠One-tap HDR / SDR display modes GRADE ON-DEVICE ⢠Color wheels (lift Ā· gamma Ā· gain), exposure in the scene-referred log domain ⢠Tone curves with a live curve editor ⢠Color warper and skin-tone secondaries ⢠Film & cinema looks, plus your own .cube LUTs ⢠Broadcast scopes: waveform and vectorscope, on the image while you grade ⢠Non-destructive: every clip remembers its grade automatically ⢠Shareable grade presets EXPORT ⢠10-bit HEVC in Rec.2100 HLG (true HDR) or Rec.709 (SDR master) ⢠Saved straight back to your Photos library TRY EVERYTHING FREE FOR 14 DAYS Every feature is unlocked for two weeks ā no account, no sign-up. After the trial, your library stays free to browse, and a single one-time purchase of Lightscope Pro keeps true HLG playback, the full grading suite and export forever. No subscription. Family Sharing supported. Everything happens on your device. No uploads, no tracking. Requires iOS 17 or later. Apple Log recording requires iPhone 15 Pro or later (or footage from Final Cut Camera / Blackmagic Cam).
Image Inspector
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Every photo carries a second layer: where it was taken, which iPhone took it, when it was really edited, and sometimes a thumbnail of what it looked like before you touched it. Image Inspector reads that layer and puts it in plain language. Open a photo. A few seconds later you have a full report. WHAT IT FINDS ⢠Hidden location. Coordinates, altitude, compass heading and speed, decoded from the file and flagged before you post. ⢠The Story. Your photo retold as a narrative: the device, how you were holding it, the angle of the sun, whether it was golden hour. Worked out offline from the metadata alone. ⢠Tamper Check. The file cross-examined against itself. Capture, digitized and modify clocks that disagree. A camera clock that drifts from GPS satellite time. Recorded dimensions that do not match the real pixels. The embedded preview that still shows the pre-edit image. ⢠Provenance. Reads C2PA Content Credentials, IPTC markers, and the fingerprints that generators such as Midjourney, DALL-E, Stable Diffusion and Firefly leave behind. Declarations only: an unmarked file is reported as unproven, never as real. ⢠Apple maker notes. The private fields other viewers show as an opaque blob: Live Photo identifiers, burst UUIDs, device uptime, grip and tilt, HDR type, colour temperature. Every field listed, none invented. ⢠Readable text, faces, people and pets, QR codes and links, semantic labels and an attention map. ⢠Privacy Audit. Emails, phone numbers, links, card numbers, IBANs, identity documents, embedded author names and camera serial numbers, gathered into one verdict. WHO IT IS FOR Anyone about to post a photo. Marketplace sellers. Photographers who want their own data back. Developers checking a dataset. Anyone curious what a machine sees. HOW IT WORKS Metadata, the story, tamper checks, provenance, faces, text, codes and labels all run on your device using Apple's Vision framework. The Content Safety check is the exception: that image is sent to our server, classified, and deleted. No account. No photo library permission, the picker is enough. Nothing is saved: close a report and it is gone. Share the X-Ray card, or export the whole report as JSON or plain text. It works from the share sheet too.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Image Inspector at none against Lightscope'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. Lightscope sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Image Inspector asks for nothing beyond the download.
Lightscope ships an update every 5 days, Image Inspector every 6 days. The most recent releases landed on October 1, 2026 and October 10, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Lightscope | Image Inspector |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Update frequency | Every 5 days ā better | Every 6 days |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | No ā better |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPad, Mac ā better |
| Requires iOS | 17.0 ā better | 18.0 |
| Further details ā not scored | ||
| Size | 28 MB | 26 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Jian Zhou | BigBalli Consulting llc |
In-app purchases
Lightscope
- Lightscope Pro$9.99
Image Inspector
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is Lightscope free?
Is Image Inspector free?
Do Lightscope or Image Inspector have ads?
Which is updated more often, Lightscope or Image Inspector?
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