Flickr 3 Point Oh!

Flickr App Image Editor

You know your app is long overdue for a refresh when the latest release is big news across the web. Flickr 3.0 clogged the inter-tubes today and although the new version adds some great features it still doesn’t live up to the competition.

The new interface is much more slick and you have some ability to manage your photo stream now. The biggest enhancement is automatic uploading of photos and videos (so apps like Flync are now somewhat redundant, but not entirely). The other big change is the camera.

Personally I never used the app’s camera before. I would classify this as a social-sharing camera since the focus is on socializing your photos rather than photography. The camera interface is quite simple with only two options: video or photo and the flash mode. Once you take the photo (and you can only take one at a time) you’re into a very slick editor where you can apply a number of filters or other edits – curiously though there’s no cropping tool. Also, you no longer get the Aviary editor, which is a mixed blessing.

Automatic uploading is something a lot of other apps already do, and a number of third parties exist for Flickr. I already use Flync for this and apart from uploading like the Flickr app can now do Flync also allows you to re-size before uploading, review and edit the upload queue, and provides more control over the upload the process.

The new interface is split into four parts: searching for photos, photos from your friends, your photo stream, and notifications. In your photo stream you can see all your photos, your public photos, your albums, and the groups you belong to. Something that’s also new is that you can move your photos into albums. You can also favourite photos, add comments, share them, and edit the title, description and privacy from the detailed view of the photo. This is a much better interface that the previous version which barely let you view the photos in your stream and from your friends.

In the end the new features of the Flickr app are welcome improvements to the previous version but ultimately don’t go far enough to bring Flickr up to expectations.

Cross-posted on Schultzter’s blog.

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