With the awesome camera on BlackBerry 10 smartphones, I'm snapping pictures here and there a lot more than I had previously. Before sharing, sometimes it's always nice to touch it up a bit and while there are some nice filters and effects built into BlackBerry 10, there are some pretty cool editing apps out there to try out.

A current favorite of mine is Magic Photos. It comes with a handful of tools that allow you to manipulate your photos. Though I find myself only using one or two more than the rest. I have always loved the effect where the entire photo is black and white but then there is a select area that has color. Magic Photos allows you to create this effect with your photos.

Magic Photos is natively built and has a really simple interface for manipulating your photos. Once you've selected the tool you want to use, just go ahead and use your finger to alter and tweak the part you want. There is an undo button too, so if you make a mistake, just go back a bit.

Magic Photo tools

  • Decolorize - turn an image black and white while keeping certain areas their original color
  • Sketch - convert your photos into sketches
  • Cartoon - convert your photos into cartoons
  • Blur - add a blur effect to your photo (e.g. blur the background, keeping the main part of photo in focus)
  • Recolor - recolor photos using artwork and effects
  • Retouch - remove unwanted sections from your image

By far my favorite tools are Decolorize and Retouch. I love the effect of a black and white picture with a certain area popping out at you. Very happy that I can now create this effect from my BlackBerry. With Retouch, I love being able to 'clean up' a scenic image. Many times I've taken photos and there's always something that distracts from its beauty. Sometimes is a lamp post that doesn't look right or rubbish etc. Retouch lets me clean those up and present a beautiful scenic photo.

You can check out the video above for a quick demo of the app in action. One thing to note is that Magic Photos received an update shortly after shooting the video so the version demo'd does not include the Cartoon and Blur tools.

Magic Photos is one of my favorite BlackBerry 10 photo editing tools and priced at $1.99/£1.50, I think that it's well worth it. It's available from BlackBerry World and if it tickles your fancy, give it download today.

More information/Purchase Magic Photos from BlackBerry World

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