Priime Styles
$29 Developer Priime, inc priime.com Requirements OS X 10.11 or later
This set of photo filters can be used as a standalone app, or as an extension or plugin for both Photos and Lightroom, taking images on a “round trip” that returns them to the original app with changes intact. Don’t go expecting a full-fledged photo editor like the developer’s similarly-named iOS app, however. This is strictly about the filters. There’s more than 100 of them, and they’ve been developed with the aid of working photographers. And while a few fall into the “stick a vignette on it and desaturate the colors” trap that we’ve seen so many times before, filters such as the bright Americana or Tamil Pais are all about blue skies and punchy colors.
An Explore button (top left) opens up a grid that shows you the effect of every filter on your selected image, a split view gives a before and after comparison, and there’s a slider that affects the intensity with which the filter is applied. There’s no way to edit filters or create your own. Clicking on the Show Details button takes you to a web page detailing the photographer behind the filter and the thinking behind their creation, and a short biography, but sadly not a link to more of their work. The filters are displayed alphabetically, with no way to sort them.
Priime Styles will edit any photo format you’ve got imported into Photos or Lightroom, including TIFF and raw image files from all major camera manufacturers. There’s no reduction in resolution as you take it through the filtering process, and it handled a 20MP image file with ease. It’s also possible to edit several photos as a batch, as long as you don’t mind the same effects being applied to each one. Curiously, when using the standalone app, a loaded image shrinks down to about half of the app’s window when you apply a filter to it – something that needs to be fixed.
If you like one-shot filters, there are some pleasing effects to be discovered in Priime Styles. Unfortunately, the app has some quirks (although it works quite well as a Photos extension) and has the feeling of something that’s not quite finished, especially as you’re being asked to pay $29 for it. With a few patches and some downloadable packs of additional filters, perhaps some created with big-name photographers, Priime Styles could grow into a very interesting app.
the bottom line. A strong set of filters, but there are areas that could be improved and the app, as a whole, feels unfinished. Ian Evenden