iPhone Photos

It can be a real drag when you want to organize some photos on your iPhone or iPad and you realize this has to be done on your computer. After making the new photo albums and organizing the photos then you have to sync to your iOS device. Once on your iPhone the photos in albums can't be moved or edited at all.

Luckily Apple got wind of the situation and plans to add this functionality to the next version of its mobile operating system firmware, iOS 5. This doesn't come out until the fall, but for those with jailbroken iPhones the feature can be installed right away. The tweak is called PhotoAlbum+ and it's available on Cydia for $4.99.

Making panoramas on the iPhone is easier than ever thanks to 360 Panorama, an app by Occipital updated yesterday on the App Store. No more stitching together images with desktop software or worrying about focal length. 360 Panorama simply records the photo as you pan across the scene.

The app works smoothly and intuitively to record a panorama much like recording a video. In fact, because the software uses video processing it only works with the iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, and latest iPod touch. Once the image is created the panorama can be emailed, saved to the camera roll, or shared online.

With Panasonic's MW-20 digital photo frame, you can show off the photos, videos and music on your iPhone in style. The MW-20 stands in portrait or landscape orientation on a flat surface or can be mounted to a wall for that hanging picture effect.

The iPhone docks and shares content with a nine-inch high-resolution LCD screen, and a built-in 5.6mm speaker provides audio. The MW-20 also includes two GB of internal storage and fifteen different display patterns for photos.

Apple surprised everyone when they announced that iOS 4.1 would add High Dynamic Range (HDR) photography capabilities to iPhone cameras. HDR combines two or more photos at different exposures to create an optimal scene. Unfortunately, some iPhone 3GS owners were even more surprised that they would not receive the feature when updating.

Although the iPhone 4 upgraded the rear camera to 5.0 megapixels and added a flash, light sensor and HD video recording, iPhone 3GS owners can still get excellent pictures with the previous 3.0 megapixel model. Already the 5x digital zoom feature (added in iOS 4) works well on the 3GS, and HDR can be a simple download away.

Some iPhone applications have preferences to set an accelerometer lock, which keeps the orientation of the app in one direction no matter which way the iPhone turns. Unfortunately, most commonly used apps do not have this feature.

Rotation can be switched off when viewing photos on the iPhone Camera Roll or Photo Library. When viewing a photo, hold down with one finger on the photo as if you're trying to copy the image.