Camera360 (iOS)

Camera360 Ultimate for iOS is a photo editor with tons of fun and unique tools, but the interface can be confusing, and it lacks features for sharing the finished product. You can save your completed projects to your photo library and share from there, but it would be much better if it had the options found in other photo editors (more on this later).

Tons of interesting photo features
Camera360 is not your run-of-the-mill photo-editing app. It does have common features like rotate, crop, brightness, and contrast, but where it truly diverges from the rest of the pack is in its added extras.

One mode is designed solely for "selfies"; it has an entire filter list dedicated to making your self portraits look smoother, and one filter even makes just your lips look more red (it's called "Sexy Lips"). If the filters are not enough, it also has a Face Fix tool that smooths out wrinkles and blotches. While it sounds useful, I tried the app on many co-workers and we agree the effect can make you look a little washed out and otherworldly.

Camera360 Ultimate also has a ton of interesting filters divided up into various categories such as Lomo, Retro, HDR, and Colorful. Each category has a handful of separate filters to experiment with. But the app also has artistic categories such as Cartoon and Sketch, and while I've seen these type of filters before in other apps, this app does a great job with giving you some variety within each category. You can apply as many filters as you want to an image, but there is no layer manager, so you should definitely be sure of your choices when you hit the Apply button. With that said, using multiple filters can make for some really neat effects.

Other camera modes
Along with an enormous number of filters, Camera360 Ultimate has a number of ways to take and display your photos. A Burst Mode lets you manually touch and hold to take rapid shots, or you can set it to automatic to take 5, 10, 15, 30, or 60 shots in a row. You can then go in and choose which shots you want to keep. This is a great feature for those of us who wish we could use the burst mode exclusive to the iPhone 5S.

The Double Exposure mode lets you take one shot, then add a second one to blend the two photos together. With some creativity, this feature can make for some cool shots, but I wish it showed the overlay that Sarah Mitroff noted in her review Camera360 for Windows Phone. Without the overlay, I was never sure how the two images would line up until I had already taken them.

You can grab nine photos to make a quick collage, but why stop there? You also can layer effects on your collage afterward.

(Credit: Screenshot by Jason Parker/CNET)

Grid Mode has a number of multipaned patterns for making an on-the-spot collage where you snap the pictures that will show up in each pane. If you want to use photos from your camera library, there's also a Collage mode where you can select nine photos and the app automatically arranges them into one of four different layouts.