Move over Prisma, there’s a new filter app making the rounds. Everfilter is an incredibly simple new app out of Japan that turns your photos into painted-looking masterpieces.
Unlike most filter apps, which offer numerous styles and permutations for fancying up your photos, Everfilter basically has one option. When you open the app, you select an image, and the app does its magic. The only change you can make is to swap the automatically generated version of that image into a nighttime (sunset) version by tapping an icon in the lower lefthand corner of the app.
Either way, the resulting image follows a similar style to that of Japanese artist Makoto Shinkai.
The main Everfilter interface.
Image via Christina Bonnington/Everfilter
The app works best with outdoor portrait images and landscapes, from our experience using it thus far. It does have some quirks, particularly with regards to where and how it applies cloud cover. If you use an indoor photo, the app may edit clouds into the background if portions are white or overexposed (which, as you can see below, makes for an unusual image). In other photographs where the subject is off in the distance, their outline may be partially obscured by this over-application of cloud cover.
The application of cloud cover can be a little…odd.
Image via Christina Bonnington/Everfilter
But for many photos, the results really are beautiful, which makes the app a welcome tool in our quest for unique and artistic Instagram photos.
Image via Christina Bonnington/Everfilter
Image via Christina Bonnington/Everfilter
Image via Christina Bonnington/Everfilter
The app is free and available on Android and iOS.
Update 9:36am CT, Dec. 12: In a tweet shared on Dec. 7, Everfilter announced that due to a copyright complaint, the app is no longer in the App Store or Google Play. We’ll continue to update this post if more details arise, or when the app is once again available for download.