The Android platform just grows and grows - here's a rundown of the
best Android apps available for designers on Google's mobile OS.
Android is hugely popular. In fact, it’s the world’s most-used mobile
OS. And the ecosystem is evolving. Even a year ago, before Google had
rebranded its Android Market to Google Play, you'd be hard pushed to
populate a post of the best Android apps – iOS trounced all over the
green alien in that respect.
However, as developers have become more savvy to the opportunities of
Android - and its huge install base - there are now many many apps on
offer for the creative. Here we pick some of the best Android apps, so
you don’t have to…
Paperless is a tablet drawing app that also lets you sketch and paint
with water colours, feather, pencil and brushes. The app adds precision
to your images with a customisable engine so you can set line
thickness, size, opacity and smoothing. As well as the ability to share
your creations via Facebook, you can also save images as PNG files.
Fontly is an app celebrating the art of vintage typography. Founded by designer Brendan Ciecko,
Fontly works as a sort of community of typography lovers. The app's
users send in their snaps of signs, neon, architectural, foil lettering
and hand-painted vintage typography loveliness. You can explore the
extended, full-screen experience with the community’s curated typography
on Fontly’s interactive map.
This basic sketching app features 11 brushes, colour picker and
eraser, and lets you share your doodles via email and MMS. It's free to
download, or you can splash out $1.99/£1.31 for Sketcher Pro and enjoy additional features such as adjustable canvas size and the ability to pan/zoom.
Combining typography with popular photo editor Instagram led Phillip Pastore to create Ampergram,
a cool app that enables you to create endless typographic compositions
using cool photos of fonts. You can capture and tag your own letters, or
use the app's already stellar offerings generated by the communtiy.
Letter results can be filtered by style and the location in which they
were spotted.
Evernote's free app is a basic tool that lets you sketch - or
'skitch' - something new or annotate an existing image and then share
with others. Bear in mind that you must first have an active Evernote
account, also free, before you can download Skitch onto your tablet.
A good solid app for digital painting on your Android tablet.
Includes more than 20 default brushes and nine pencils, plus you can
create your own and share with other users. If you have a Galaxy Note,
there's a specific version of the app for you.
This vector drawing app is pretty capable for creating complex designs on your mobile device. The app offers
a variety of different brushes and five different types of symmetries
(X-Axis, Y-Axis, Arbitrary Angle, Radial, and Kaleidoscopic). You can export to SVG, and the user-friendly interface makes it easy to pick up and run with.
Want to see how people affected by colour-blindness will perceive
your designs? This clever little app shows you just that. Several colour
modes are included, including Protanopia, Deuteranopia, and Tritanopia,
and you're able to compare a colour blind view with normal vision in
split-screen.
This app doesn't have the easiest interface to find your way around,
but once you have, it proves itself to be a very nifty little Android
art app. The canvas is resizable, can be flipped and rotated, and comes
with 'fix' and 'infinite canvas' options. There's a blur and smudge
tool, and your pen, volume and back buttons can be assigned to specific
tools within the app.
This free painting app focusing on natural brush effects and smooth,
pleasant workflow, Serious Paint boasts natural media brushes that
simulate proper bristles and blending. One of its niftiest features is
Colour Sweep, a configurable swatch of colour that you can set up and
then access with a simple gesture while drawing.
SketchBook Pro has been a true revelation for many on the iPad -
launching early in the device’s life, it has made it possible for many
artists to go truly mobile. If you have an Android tablet, it makes
sketching on the go a delight, with a raft of brushes and an intuitive
interface.
After a version on your phone? Try SketchBook mobile (£1.26) or if you can do with a more limited feature set and just want to have a scribble, try the free version of Mobile or the Express version of tablets. Like many Android apps and devices, finding the compatible version is half the battle...
When Photoshop finally came to mobile devices (it was first on
Android, before hitting iPad) there was a collective cheer from
Photoshop users everywhere - as it meant, via Creative Cloud, you could
now start work in the office, carry on out and about, and continue where
you left off at your desk (of course you can change that order if you
wish!).
An excellent feature set is coupled with a slick interface. And
whilst it’s not got the feature set of its desktop brother, for £6.99
it’s very good value. However, it won’t run on a Nexus 7 (the Android
version requires a tablet running Android 3.1 or higher, an 8.9in
display or larger, and a minimum screen resolution of 1280x800).
This may change with an update soon, however (it would be good to use on a Galaxy Note as well).
Filter effects aren’t exactly a new thing, but Paper Camera takes a
different approach to the post effects found in the likes of Instagram.
What does it do? Well, it displays effects in real time on your camera
as you’re using it. There are some neat effects on offer - including
cartoon, half tone and sketch. It’s not a serious tool for serious work -
more a toy - but it's a worthy entrant in our best Android apps.
Fontest is a developer and typography tool that helps you quickly
preview how your favorite fonts are rendered on Android. Includes six
high quality free fonts.
Haven’t heard of TED? Where have you been hiding? The conferences -
known for sharing the views of some of the world’s most fascinating
people - are an inspiration. And using your Android device you can watch
them with this app. An absolute must.
Searching for the perfect pattern wallpaper for your GNex, Nexus 7 or
other Android device? Well look no further. Pattrn is a very nice app
which gives you access to a huge collection of patterns created by the
COLOURlovers community. You can set wallpaper for different days of the
week, keep track of your favourites and more. And - like a surprising
number of our best Android apps - it’s completely free.
Fresco is a neat digital painting app enabling you to create natural
media effects on the go. Loads of brushes, filters, and effects are
coupled with layers functionality and the ability to export to Photoshop
PSD format makes it a great tool for starting a project on the move and
continuing it in your studio using desktop tools.
Whilst it’s not necessarily an app that will change your workflow or
outlook on life, Pixlr-o-matic is a nice tool for adding retro effects
to your images or photos. It has 100 effects, 280 overlays and almost
200 different borders - so for the grand cost of nada it’s worth
including in our run down of the best Android apps.
Want an app like Kuler (no longer available on Android) but don’t
want to cough up the cash? Well Colour Reference could be ideal. A well
thought out interface makes it easy to browse colours and develop new
harmonious colour schemes for using in your site or app designs.
Once work is done, what better way to relax and unwind than
pretending you are a robot, monster, or rabbit? That’s exactly what you
can do with the slickly designed MouthOff from ustwo. There’s even some
lovely signature mouths designed by the likes of Jon Burgerman and Jeff Bowman. Creative AND fun!
It’s not that hard to guess what FXCamera does - yep, that’s right,
it’s an app for adding ‘effects’ to your images. And there are some nice
effects on offer - from the now very popular toy camera effect to
fisheye lens to Pop Art-esque posters. Again, it won’t change the world,
but it’s a nice bit of creative fun.
Pantone knows a thing or two about colour - and this app, as seen on
iOS devices - enables you to create colour palettes on the move,
extracting Pantone colours from images and more. One of the best things
about the app is being able to quickly look up the reference number of a
Pantone colour if you’re out and about. You can also, like in Kuler,
export palettes for use in Creative Suite (and QuarkXPress docs).
Want to create stereoscopic 3D images from the camera on your phone?
Yes, thought so. Check out 3DSteroid Pro - an app that enables you to do
just that, with some excellent tools (such as being able to save out a
high-res image - not available in the free version) and a very
user-friendly interface.
Everything you’d expect is here - from the ability to create and add
to your own boards to browsing other peeps’ pins. Why not start by
visiting our very own Pinterest page at pinterest.com/creativebloq?
Lomo, Diana, Holga, Polaroid - all undeniably cool retro cameras. And
with Vignette you can recreate the look of these and more with 76
customisable effects and 57 frames. You can also add cross process
effects. Very versatile and on sale for 69p, so go grab it.
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