What you need to know
- Halide is available on iPad for the first time.
- The app is universal, meaning all existing iPhone users get it for free.
Popular iPhone camera and image editing app Halide has a big new release out that brings it to iPad for the very first time. Lux, the developer behind Halide, made the announcement just now. The app lands just in time for the new M1 iPad Pros to arrive this Friday, too.
The announcement post is well worth a read because it goes into details about the challenges the team faces when taking an app that's designed for one-handed iPhone use and putting it onto a device that very much isn't. iPad has a huge screen which is a benefit, but it's also a drawback when you're deciding where to put interface elements as well.
Hold the iPad in two hands and you realize that controls have to be in a special zone: too close to the edge puts them at risk of being accidentally triggered, as you hold the iPad by its bezels instead of by its edges like an iPhone. Putting them too far risks hand gymnastics that make it feel like you're going to drop the much-heavier device.
Lux also had to deal with the way images appear different when viewed through a large viewfinder, like an iPad. You'd think that bigger is always better, but that isn't really the case here.
Shooting on iPad you might wonder if you're alone in feeling a little weird when composing a photo on the large screen. It's not just you: Sometimes we'd shoot a good photo using the large iPad viewfinder, only to find it feels completely different on a small iPhone screen.This is has to do with human vision. When looking at a photo on your phone, most of the image fits in your central, or "foveal" vision. On a large iPad screen, part of the image spills into your peripheral vision. So you might compose a photo "reading" it one way, only to be "read" a different way. This is made worse by that usability thing again: ergonomically, we shoot very differently on iPhone than on iPad.
All of this was, of course, overcome and Halide for iPad is now available. It's a universal app as well, so one download gets you the iPhone and iPad versions with no extra costs involved. You can download Halide from the App Store now. It's free with in-app purchases available.
Want to nab a new M1 iPad to take advantage of Halide? These are some of the best iPad Pro deals you'll find on the internet.
