78 MACWORLD FEBRUARY 2020
FEATURE PHOTO-EDITING TOOLS IN IOS 13 AND IPADOS 13T
he Photos app for
macOS has
improved
substantially since
its introduction, especially in
the variety and sophistication
of its image-editing tools. On
the iPhone and iPad, Photos
lagged considerably. But with
iOS 13 and iPadOS 13, Apple offers a
distinct catch-up with its image-editing
tools, even exceeding the Mac version in a
couple regards.
Let’s look at what’s new and how to
best use these new tools to crop, revise,
and enhance images after capturing
pictures.
WHAT’S NEW IN PHOTOS
EDITING
Apple changed and expanded the controls
available while editing, while also
improving the way in which each control is
accessed and modified.
Intensity slider. Nearly every tool now
has an adjustment slider you can slide left
and right or up and
down, depending on
your editing
orientation. This allows
fine and coarse
changes in the
“intensity,” or how
much of the setting
you’re applying. Tapping the main control
icon typically resets the slide back to
remove the adjustment. Haptic feedback
lets you feel a sort of rotation, like it’s a dial,
particularly the zero point. Intensity also
applies to photo filters, so you can apply
one with a heavy or light hand, as you like.
Cropping. You can now skew an image
in each axis across its middle and its
center as separate controls, the effect of
rotating the image as it were a flat object
you were turning with perspective toward
or away from you.
Controls don’t crowd the screen.
Earlier editing tools splayed out more like
the macOS equivalent, making it very
awkward to see and select tools from a listCropping tools include rotation and two tilt options.The intensity slider allows precision control over application
of settings of all kinds.