A frame shop in a phone

Smartphones have turned us all into photographers. Now with the help of some apps, we can also be photo artists, framing our snaps and making collages.

A horde of such photo-enhancing apps have sprung up in the age of Instagram and Snapchat, which use images as a primary mode of communication. But many of these apps are poorly designed because the entire category is not particularly high tech.

One exception is Moldiv, which is carefully designed and easy to use. It offers a large variety of prearranged photo frames for a single image, with shapes and cutouts, or space for eight or more photos. Tapping on one frame puts the app into editor mode.

With a few taps, you can drop a new photograph or one from your phone’s archive into the frame. There are options to adjust the photos, by dragging or zooming to get just the right part of the image in place in the frame, and you can add special effects, including sepia or black and white tones.

The app lets you adjust the frame, changing the thickness of margins around an image and even the roundness of the corners. If you’re feeling more creative, you can make the backdrop to your photo a different color, pattern or - amusingly - another photo. Text labels can go on top, in a variety of styles, and there’s an option to add stickers like hearts, flowers, speech bubbles and more.

When you’re done, a few taps save the image or share it on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook. The core app is free on iOS and Android, but the full array of effects is $6 (Rs 384).

For a simpler photo frame app, check out PicFrame by ActiveDevelopment. It does a few things well, with almost no frills or distractions: It can add a customisable frame around your photos, or let you squeeze a group of photos into one framed image as a collage. You can also embed videos, to take advantage of video features on social media like Instagram.

PicFrame uses a system of gestures for adjusting  and editing your photos. It also lets you add text labels, colored frame backgrounds and so on, but it one does not offer hundreds of frame options. It is $1 (Rs 64) on iOS and Android.

An alternative is Photo Grid-Collage Maker, which is free on iOS and Android and may be my favourite in this category. Photo Grid, which has some of the professional feel of PicFrame and some of the visual flair of Moldiv, offers more than 300 frame layouts. The photo editing system also includes options like blurring and retouching, as well as the usual filters.

Photo Grid has an array of frames, stickers and text labels and its interface makes it easy to edit and arrange photos in a frame or collage. It also has a feature that turns photos into a video slide show, with background music, text and stickers. A “poster” section lets you apply frames and text that make your photos look like a poster.

Framatic, another popular photo-framing app, has a “magic shake” option: If you shake your phone, the app will randomly select some frame settings for your image. The results can be surprisingly good.
One caution: The app, which is free on iOS and offers a wide range of frames and style adjustments, puts a watermark on your images. To get access to all special effects, you have to buy in-app packs that can cost up to $5 (Rs 320).