In an age of GIFs, Vines and Apple’s Live Photos, it isn’t all that surprising to see still photography take another step away from stillness. That’s exactly what Polaroid is doing, with Tuesday’s debut of an app called Polaroid Swing that aims to help you create and share “moving photos” on your phone.
Each photo taken in the app is actually a one-second “moment” — touch the image or give your phone a swing, and the image comes to life, revealing the motion. You can share your moving photos within the Polaroid Swing app, or externally on Facebook and Twitter.
The app is the product of a partnership between Polaroid and Swing, a Silicon Valley startup whose chairman is Twitter co-founder Biz Stone. Stone said the app “has the potential to change the way we think about images, just like Twitter’s 140 characters changed how we think about words.”
To do so, Swing will need to differentiate itself from the other kinds of moving images and quick video formats that are already popular, as well as image-centric social networks like Instagram and Vine.
To that end, Swing co-founder Tommy Stadlen pointed to the unique look and feel of the app and the moving images it creates when I asked how Swing plans to stand out. “We capture super high frame rates and apply frame blending algorithms to give you a super-smooth, inky, expressive look. As for feel, being able to reach into the Polaroid picture and alter reality sets this apart.”
Stadlen also thinks that a single second’s worth of motion is the sweet spot for moving images. “We learned that this time horizon gives you the composition of a still, but with more dynamism and magic,” he said, adding, “In terms of ambition, we see the Polaroid moving photo eventually moving beyond software to hardware.”
The free app is available today for iOS users. Swing’s team doesn’t have a date set for the Android version’s debut, but says that it’s “coming soon.”
Source:cnet.com
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