I’ve always liked Polaroid photos although I never owned a Polaroid camera. There is something about its ‘capture-the-moment’ feel that appeals to me as that how I would describe my style of photography. When I got my HTC Desire mobile phone, I was pleased that I could download free apps that could give me this Polaroid effect. There’s FxCamera and RetroCamera to name a few. But what about those that I took with a proper camera – digital or film? Luckily, there are tutorials a-plenty on the internet if one wishes to produce this effect to existing photos using Photoshop. The image below was produced from following such a tutorial.

Polaroid effect using Photoshop

Now for people who can’t be bothered following the tutorial and/or those who do not Photoshop, there is an easier way to get this effect using Poladroid. Once you install this software, you simply drag and drop the image from your computer to the application and wait until it produces your Polaroid image. You can even shake the photo, like you would with an actual Polaroid print, to make the processing faster. Although I’m not really sure if that works. Anyway, the finished effect may not be as good as the real Polaroid print but it will do nicely. Here is a sample set of what I’ve played with so far. I’ve added the captions on each ‘print’ and arranged them scrapbook-style using Photoshop.

Poladroid photos

Poladroid is free to download and use. It supports both PC and Mac.

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