Lighttrac - A Must-Have iPad App for Any Outdoor Photographer
By: Stephen Terlizzi
Shortly after I received my new iPad 2 several weeks ago, my first activity was to search for some great iPad Photography apps. While the cameras in the iPad 2 (unlike my iPhone 4) are eminently forgettable, it is definitely a great platform for planning your photography and reviewing the resulting photographs. If you are an outdoor photographer, one application that is a must-have is Lighttrac by Rivolu Pte ($4.99 - iTunes Link).
LightTrac helps you find the perfect lighting for your outdoor photos by giving your the information you need on the available light from the Sun and Moon based on the time and location anywhere in the world. LightTrac calculates and plots the angle of Sun and Moon on top of a map, for any location and can save multiple locations and easily switch between them.
As you can see from the above picture, I can get information about any location (in this case the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco) including Sunrise/Sunset and Moonrise/Moonset as well as the angle of the Sun or Moon at a given time. You can choose the date, time and location in advance to plan your photo shoot.
You can save the information for later retrieval and change the map from satellite to Google Street Maps as required. Finally, you can export to email a KML that can be used in Google Earth, Google Maps, etc. It would be nice to have some other export options such as Dropbox.
Also, the application is a universal app and is available on the iPhone, too. In short, if you do outdoor photography and care about taking outstanding photos, this is a must-have application.
