What is a retro camera app?

An app that makes phone photos and videos look like they were taken on an older camera: film grain, faded or shifted colour, light leaks, soft lenses, date stamps, VHS lines. The good ones tell you which camera and which decade they are imitating. CAM135 has 23 cameras and 11 films, each named and dated.

Which retro camera app has a date stamp?

CAM135 has the orange LED date stamp of a 90s point-and-shoot as a switch in the viewfinder, on photos and on video. It is free.

Does it do retro video too?

Yes. Seven camcorders, from a Super 8 cine camera to VHS-C, Hi8 and Mini DV, with the tape's wobble and timestamp. It records in the app, not as an effect applied afterwards.

Is the retro camera app free?

Three films and three cameras are free with no card, including the Holga and the Lomo LC-A. Every camera and film is $19.99 once. There is no subscription for any of it.

Retro camera app · old cameras, dated

A retro camera app that knows which decade you mean.

Retro is not one look. 1978 was slide film and a station wagon. 1998 was a disposable and a flash. 2004 was a camcorder with the time in the corner. CAM135 has a camera for each.

Download free Pick a decade

23 old cameras · 11 films · $19.99 once

Three teenagers on a sagging couch at a 1998 house party lit by a hard disposable-camera flash, a sharp shadow on the wood-panelled wall behind them — nobody remembers whose house

01Four decades, four shelves

Say the year. Get the camera.

Each decade below is a real film and real cameras from the app's shelves, put back in the years people actually carried them.

A family of four beside a wood-panelled 1970s station wagon at a desert overlook, squinting under a deep cobalt sky, with the dense shadows and saturated colour of Ektachrome slide film — somewhere past Kingman

1978

Slide film and a reflex

The seventies were slide film in a metal reflex camera, projected on a wall. Ektachrome held a blue sky harder than any print film and gave up the shadows entirely. In CAM135 the Canon AE-1 and the Pentax 67 carry that contrast, and the Canon 514XL carries the Super 8 the holiday was filmed on.

AE-1Canon AE-1

P67Pentax 67

OM-1Olympus OM-1

514XLCanon 514XL

A boy on a chrome BMX doing a small wheelie in a suburban cul-de-sac at golden hour, a friend on the curb behind him, warm amber and slightly soft like Kodak Gold 200 — before the streetlights

1988

Gold 200 and a camcorder on the shoulder

The eighties were consumer colour negative: Kodak Gold in a Nikon, printed at the drugstore with the whites gone yellow. The JVC GR-C1 is the VHS-C camcorder every birthday was taped on, and the Fisher-Price PXL-2000 is the toy camcorder that recorded onto audio cassettes and looked like a security tape.

F3Nikon F3

FM3ANikon FM3A

GR-C1JVC GR-C1

PXL2KFisher-Price PXL-2000

Three teenagers crammed on a sagging couch at a house party, one mid-laugh, lit by a hard direct flash that throws a sharp shadow onto the wood-panelled wall, with the cool shadows and heavy grain of a disposable camera — nobody remembers whose house

1998

The disposable and the date stamp

The nineties were the disposable camera: a plastic lens, a tiny flash and a roll of Fuji Superia, handed to the lab on Monday. Point-and-shoots of the time burned an orange date into the corner. CAM135 has the Fuji QuickSnap, the date stamp as a switch, and the Hi8 camcorder for the video.

QSNAPFuji QuickSnap

LC-ALomo LC-A

TR55Sony Handycam TR55

HI8Sony Hi8

A still frame from a Mini DV camcorder tape of a backyard barbecue at dusk, a dad at a smoking grill and a teenager blurred in the foreground, soft standard-definition video with a cool magenta cast and blooming patio lights — dad, grill, 2004

2004

Mini DV and the timestamp

The 2000s were standard-definition video with a timestamp in the corner: a Sony Mini DV camcorder, a small CCD sensor that turned every light into a smear and every shadow into noise. CAM135's Sony DCR-PC100 records that, with the tape's own timestamp burned in.

PC100Sony DCR-PC100

HI8Sony Hi8

TR55Sony Handycam TR55

02Old camera app, not old photo filter

The camera decides what the photo can be.

A filter is applied to a picture that already exists. A camera is applied to the light. A Holga cannot be sharp. A pinhole cannot be fast. A camcorder cannot be quiet. CAM135 loads the camera first, so the limits are there while you frame.

LC-ALomo LC-A

HOLGAHolga 120N

ROLLEIRolleiflex 2.8F

SX70Polaroid SX-70

QL17Canonet QL17

M6Leica M6

AE-1Canon AE-1

F3Nikon F3

FM3ANikon FM3A

OM-1Olympus OM-1

503CWHasselblad 503CW

P67Pentax 67

PEN-EEOlympus Pen EE

QSNAPFuji QuickSnap

BROWNIEKodak Brownie

PINHOLEPinhole 6×6

16 STILL CAMERAS · 7 CAMCORDERS · EACH WITH ITS OWN FILM, LENS AND LEAK

03Retro cam app · video

Press record. It comes back on tape.

Seven camcorders record in the app, with the head wobble, the colour smear and the timestamp of the tape they are named after.

JVC GR-C1VHS-C · 1984

Sony Hi8VIDEO 8 · 1989

514XLCanon 514XL

H16Bolex H16

GR-C1JVC GR-C1

TR55Sony Handycam TR55

HI8Sony Hi8

PC100Sony DCR-PC100

PXL2KFisher-Price PXL-2000

04Retro camera app · pricing

Every decade, $19.99 once.

All 23 cameras and all 11 films. No subscription, no watermark, no ads. Three cameras and three films are free to start.

Download on theApp Store Get it onGoogle Play

See the full pricing

Questions

The short answers.

What is a retro camera app?: An app that makes phone photos and videos look like they were taken on an older camera: film grain, faded or shifted colour, light leaks, soft lenses, date stamps, VHS lines. The good ones tell you which camera and which decade they are imitating. CAM135 has 23 cameras and 11 films, each named and dated.
Which retro camera app has a date stamp?: CAM135 has the orange LED date stamp of a 90s point-and-shoot as a switch in the viewfinder, on photos and on video. It is free.
Does it do retro video too?: Yes. Seven camcorders, from a Super 8 cine camera to VHS-C, Hi8 and Mini DV, with the tape's wobble and timestamp. It records in the app, not as an effect applied afterwards.
Is the retro camera app free?: Three films and three cameras are free with no card, including the Holga and the Lomo LC-A. Every camera and film is $19.99 once. There is no subscription for any of it.