Intro:
Photographer Youtuber Julia Trotti and her cousin, Leondro Balan, made a FREE photo editing app called the Digital Film App or Digital Film Actions App for both Android and IOS. I tried this app out not to long after it was released onto Android and really like it. On the Google Play Store this app, as of writing this post, only has 3.8 stars which to me is quite surprising because I have not found any major issues with the app. So below I have everything I like and dislike about the app. 🙂
Overview:
I really enjoy editing in this photo editor. This app laid out nicely with only three tabs at the bottom. You have a variety of presets, an editing tab with all basic editing options (contrast, white balance, shadow adjustments, etc.), and a tab for sharing and exporting your photo. My favorite part of this app is definitely the presets. The presets work super well and there is one for almost every kind of photo you would edit in the app.
What I like:
- You can do most of your basic editing right in this app.
- There are presets just like Lightroom and they all work super well.
- You can adjust just about anything in your photo.
- You can tap and hold an photo to see the original photo with no edits.
- You have an option for a yearly subscription but can buy individual presets as well.
- As of writing this the app has a new dark theme.
- App gets a good amount of updates so new features get added constantly.
What I don’t like:
- Importing on a google pixel is not super great. I have to import it into another app such as Lightroom or photoshop express and then move it into the Digital Film App. This may just be a Google Pixel file issue though so I wouldn’t hold it against the app.
- Not having a healing brush is a bit annoying but you can just easily import it into Lightroom or Photoshop express since most photographers do keep those apps installed on their phones.
Editing a Photo:
The photo below is what I will be editing in a step-by-step format so you can see what edits can be done in this app.
Step 1:
The screenshot below shows what preset I used and as you can see, this editing app allows you to adjust the opacity of each preset. I chose the pacific preset because to me it brought out the colors in the photo a bit more. Having the preset on full opacity though was certainly a bit to much so I lowered it.
Step 2:
Next I moved over to the edit tab. In here I first adjusted the exposure and contrast in the photo. I add contrast to almost all of my photos because I feel that it helps them to pop.
Step 3:
Next I worked on the colors in the photo. For this photo, I increased the white balance just a bit to help balance out the colors. Personally I never mess with the tint of a photo so I did not touch that. I then increased the saturation a bit mostly for the sky colors.
In editing the screenshot below, I accidently circled the wrong thing but this is a feature in the app that I wanted to point out anyways. I circled the button for resetting that edit. This is a super useful feature because on a phone, resetting by dragging the slider can be difficult when the screen is small so this reset button really came in handy!
As you see below, the next tab is the highlights tab. The default is +50 and I played around with it a bit but decided to leave it at the default.
The next edit is for the shadows and this isn’t the normal shadow editor as it would be in other photo editors and by using it you get a tint on the photo so I again did not use that feature.
Step 4:
The next section of the app has the shadow and highlight editor more as it would be on another photo editor. I did brighten up the shadows and smooth the highlights out in this part.
Step 5:
For the final edits on this photo I did make the photo slightly sharper since I took this on the my Google Pixel 4a and for mobile photography you often do need add a bit of sharpness to photos.
That is all of the edits that I did on this photo. Below, if you are reading this online, you can slide the slider to see the exact before or after from editing this photo. If you are not in a browser you will probably have two separate photos. 🙂
The photo I chose to edit definitely doesn’t show how much this app can do but below are a few edits where I only used a preset to edit the photo. These photos were used in my post on Leaf Photography Post.
I really love this app and think that a laptop/desktop editor of this app would be incredible. I recommend that you go check it out for your phone! Note that this app can be used on Android and IOS. 🙂
Before I wrap up this post, I wanted to mention a few things. I never did a post on Google’s Android 11, but all of the screenshots were edited with the new Android 11 screenshot editor which was super useful for this post. I love the new pen styles for drawing over screenshots like I did to add arrows and circles in this post.
Also, a shoutout to Julia Trotti’s youtube channel. This app is an awesome app for editing and it I hope that some of you are able to check it out as well! On her channel she focuses on portraiture and despite this app really being made for portraiture edits it still is an incredible editor for any kind of photo. Here is a link to the Digital Film App website for more information:
https://www.digitalfilmactions.com/
If things such as a healing brush are added I will definitely try to update this post. If you have this app and realize that the app has a feature that I either did not mention or said it did not have be sure to add a comment or send me an email! Thanks!
I really hope that you enjoyed this post. If you did, I love hearing from all of you in the comments!
Thanks a ton for reading,
-Digital Wonders & Smiles
Digital Wonders and Smiles 