Review: AutoStitch
November 3, 2009
Overview
It seems I've been reviewing a lot of in-depth apps lately, so let's gear down and have a look at an app that is simple and straightforward: AutoStitch. AutoStitch uses multiple photos from the iPhone camera roll to stitch together a panorama photo.
Features
• Simple, intuitive interface: just select the images and touch "Stitch"
• Use any existing camera app to take photos
• Advanced blending algorithms combine your images with no visible seams
• Stitch any number from 2 to 20 or more images
• Crop the panorama result to any desired region with automatic or manual cropping
The Breakdown
The Good
Autostitch is ridiculously easy to use. Simply open AutoStitch and tap the photos from your camera roll that you would like to use. Once the images have loaded into AutoStitch, press "stitch" and the panorama image begins rendering.
Once the panorama is rendered, you have the choice of cropping the saved image or saving it to your camera roll as is. If you choose to crop the image, AutoStitch automatically selects the largest portion of the image for you, but also allows you to move the crop marks as you see fit. Once the image is saved, you're done!
So I mentioned how simple Autostitch is, but it is worthy of note that part of the reason for that is because Autostitch does not actually take photos. Some users may see this as a drawback to AutoStitch, but I don't and here is why: AutoStitch allows you to use any photo-taking app you want. AutoStitch merely stitches photos together. It doesn't take photos or store them, which makes for a simple, clean, minimalist feel.
Lastly, I will mention other panorama-making apps and why I think AutoStitch is the best one I have found. Of the panorama apps on the App Store, the main three (with mostly positive reviews) are Panorama, AutoStitch and Pano. I have only tested Pano and AutoStitch, but of the main three, AutoStitch is the only app that does not bother with a camera feature. This means that AutoStitch is the app of choice for simply making panoramas because it allows the user the freedom to take pictures with any app they choose.
It's also worth noting that AutoStitch leaves you the option to shoot now and make panoramas later, if you choose. Pano, by contrast, walks the user through the process of taking each picture one at a time before allowing a user to make a panorama. So there's no option in Pano to stitch photos from a library as there is with AutoStitch.
The Bad
The only real downer for AutoStitch is the fact that it is no substitute for a true fisheye or panorama lens. For example, I went to the Georgia Bulldogs vs Arizona State game a few weeks ago and snapped a bunch of photos of Sanford Stadium, then stitched them together using AutoStitch. The resulting panorama was awesome, but because people don't stand still, the separate images I took had people in different poses which resulted in "ghosting" in certain areas of the panorama. This is not any fault of the app itself. It's just a result of the reality that you are actually stitching separate photos together as opposed to taking a single photo at once.
The Verdict
AutoStitch is a very handy panorama making app...the best of the ones that I have seen thus far. This is due mainly to the fact that AutoStitch does one thing and does it well: stitch photos into panorama images. And best of all, at $1.99, it's less than Panorama and Pano!