Ford has been trying hard to connect with “Generation Y” lately. Their most recent attempt was released earlier this month in the form of an application for the Apple iPhone: the “Ford Flex Photo Lab.”
The Flex Photo Lab app offers a “mini-Photoshop” type photo filtering for pictures on the iPhone, as well as a section to “Discover Flex” through 360-degree exterior and interior views, vehicle information, a photo gallery, and a feature to use the iPhone’s internal map/GPS to find the nearest Ford dealership.
“Flex consumers love new technology, and we know that a lot of them have iPhones, so we wanted to offer them a free application that is both a cool and useful tool,” said Usha Raghavachari, Ford Crossover marketing communications manager.
- Kaleidoscope: Tilt, twist or touch your iPhone to change photo patterns and colors.
- Brightness/Contrast: Touch up or down to adjust brightness; left or right for contrast.
- Hue/Saturation: Touch up or down to adjust hue; left or right for saturation.
- Electric Lines: Touch to draw intense glowing lines on your photo.
- Spot Burner: Touch to darken, or burn, select areas of your photo.
- Spot Lighter: Touch to lighten select areas of your photo.
The problem with this application and many other applications for the iPhone created by companies to market a new product is that it’s a blatant advertisement, and rarely does the app offer anything new or revolutionary. Most of the time the apps aren’t even very good. Sadly, the Flex Photo Lab app isn’t any different. Much like the original Audi A4 Driving Challenge iPhone App, it really needs some work before it will be worth downloading, even thought it’s free (Audi released the A4 Driving Challenge Version 2, which is much better.)
I downloaded the Ford Flex Photo Lab app and played around with it for a while, took the screenshots you see in this article then deleted it. Not that it’s completely worthless, but it really needs some tweaking. The filters to apply to the photos (see image at right) are difficult to apply and control. The Brightness/Contrast and Hue/Saturation are the only filters worth messing with, although the Kaleidoscope can be fun once or twice. Another annoyance is after you apply a filter and decide to undo it, you are forced to go into the photo library and choose the same photo again (or take another photo) every time.
Going in to “Discover Flex” isn’t much better. The features list is basic, but the 360-degree view mode is touchy, jerky, and grainy. Going into the Flex Photo Gallery crashed the application completely. The mode to find a Ford dealer doesn’t use your current location like most iPhone apps do, but instead uses the last searched location on the iPhone’s internal maps feature. Exiting the map requires you to relaunch the Flex app.
Flex Photo Lab is available for free via the iTunes App Store, so download it, check it out, let me know what you think of it.
Ford: Good job for getting into the iPhone thing; I hope more carmakers follow suit, and I’d love to see a (greatly) improved version of this app in the near future.
Download Ford Flex Photo Lab for iTunes
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