gps4cam iPhone App Review

Features
Performance
Verdict


There are more and more cameras appearing on the market these days with GPS which allow you to view the location where you have taken your images. Of course, if you haven't got a GPS camera but want to be able to add location information your images you may need to upgrade your camera equipment. One solution is gps4cam, an iPhone app which will geotag your photos no matter what camera you use.

gps4cam iPhone App Features

• Four modes: Standard, precise, energy saving and manual
• No need to synchronize manually the time and date of your iPhone and your camera
• Share one bar code with several cameras
• Date your photos with iPhone data
• Visualise the trip and different capture points on a map
• Share the geotagged pictures on websites like Flickr or Picasa
• Organize the geotagged pictures with software like Aperture or Lightroom
• Works with all camera brands including Canon, Nikon, Sony and Panasonic
• Geotag all the usual image formats (jpg, raw, tiff...)
• Contextual help and instructions
• Complete FAQ
• Guided tour
• Multilingual (English, French, German and Dutch)
• GPX export

gps4cam iPhone App Performance

Using the app is really easy but you need to be aware that while the app is using a GPS signal, your iPhone battery life will reduce quicker than normal. There are four modes to select from and your choice will depend how long you are out shooting for and how accurate you want the geotagging to be. Standard will capture your location every 1, 5 or 10 minutes, precise will capture every 30 seconds, energy saving uses GSM antennas and manual lets you capture your location by shaking your iPhone.

Once you have selected your mode, click "Start a new trip". The next screen tells you when you started your trip, how long it has been going and how many location captures the app has taken. You can pause the trip at any point. When you are done, hitting export gives you are bar code which you then picture with your camera. This can also be exported to Facebook, Twitter or by e-mail as a GPX file. To complete the geotagging you need to download the gps4cam software and install onto a computer. Next, take your all your images taken during the trip (plus the bar code) and put them on your computer in one folder. Using the software you simply locate the folder your images are in and select an output folder and hit go. The process doesn't take long, but will depend on the number of images you are geotagging. Your pictures are now geotagged. The image on the right shows the exif data of an image taken on a Fujifilm FinePix T200, which isn't a GPS camera, but thanks to gps4cam now has GPS data. The image below shows a set of geotagged images in Picasa. By clicking on the red marker, you can see the location the image was taken on the map.

gps4cam iPhone App Verdict

Most manufacturers have released cameras with GPS units built-in and the ability to geotag images is becoming more popular. If you have a non-GPS enabled camera which you don't want to replace, the gps4cam iPhone app offers a very cheap, easy way to geotag your images which is extremely reliable and does the job perfectly.

The gps4cam iPhone app is easy to use and does the job perfectly.

gps4cam iPhone App Pros

Cheap method to geotag images
Easy to use
Reliable

gps4cam iPhone App Cons

Demanding on the already short battery life on the iPhone

FEATURES
PERFORMANCE
VALUE FOR MONEY
OVERALL

The gps4cam HDR iPhone App is available from the iTunes Store for £1.99. For more information please visit the gps4cam website.