DECADE, TECHNOLOGY, STYLE and DEGREE dials
Three choices make a look: the decade, the camera or print inside it, and how hard it shows.
The DECADE wheel
The knurled wheel under the viewfinder has 15 positions, one for each decade from 1890 to 2030. The year sits in a small window above the wheel; the decade's caption sits below it, in capitals. Each decade brings its own 12 video technologies, its own 12 photo styles and its own period sound. You can browse all of them, with renders, on the decades pages.
- Drag the wheel: it clicks, with a tap of haptics, once per decade.
- Flick it and it coasts, still clicking, until it stops.
- Tap the left or right half of the wheel to move exactly one decade.
- At 1890 and 2030 it pushes back like a rubber stop.
The captions under the wheel
| Decade | Caption | Decade | Caption |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1890 | Hand-cranked 35 mm film | 1970 | Super 8 and early video |
| 1900 | Early motion picture | 1980 | VHS camcorder |
| 1910 | Silent film, tinted | 1990 | Hi-band 8 mm and Mini DV |
| 1920 | 16 mm and 9.5 mm home cine | 2000 | Mini DV and early digital |
| 1930 | 8 mm home film | 2010 | Smartphone HD video |
| 1940 | 8 mm colour film | 2020 | Computational video |
| 1950 | Regular 8 home movies | 2030 | Speculative future |
| 1960 | Super 8 film |
Titles, cards and the signature use lettering from the decade too: an italic serif before 1930, a heavy uppercase serif from the 1930s to the 1960s, a typewriter-style monospace from the 1970s to the 1990s, a rounded heavy face for the 2000s and the phone's own system face from 2010 on.
The decade of the day
The camera doesn't remember the last decade you used. Every launch starts on the decade of the day, which changes at midnight. The order is shuffled so that two days in a row never land on the same decade, and every decade comes around within 15 days.
Once per launch the wheel spins in from the far end and settles on the day's decade, and for 6 seconds the caption under it is replaced by a fact of the day from that decade, for example "1969: The Moon landing is broadcast live." With Reduce Motion the wheel doesn't spin; only the fact appears. If you touch the wheel first, neither happens. The same fact appears in ABOUT under "TODAY IN THE 1960S" (or whichever decade it is), and VoiceOver reads it aloud. The 2030 "facts" are playful guesses rather than history.
The TECHNOLOGY and STYLE dial
The round dial on the left has 12 numbered positions. What it chooses depends on the mode:
- In CINE it is the TECHNOLOGY dial: the film stock or video format of the decade, from its cadence and grain to its color and wear. The VHS-C Family Video and the Surveillance Camera Tape are positions 1 and 10 of the 1990s.
- In STILL it is the STYLE dial: the camera and print of the decade, including the print's shape and border, such as the Photo Booth Strip or the Orange Date Imprint.
The caption above the dial shows TECHNOLOGY or STYLE and the name of the current entry. Each mode keeps its own position, and the app remembers both between launches; a new install starts on 1. The number stays put when you change decade, so position 3 in 1960 becomes position 3 in 1970.
15 decades × 12 gives 180 technologies and 180 photo styles. Each decade page lists all of them with a render: try 1960 or 1890. To understand what each one changes, from the lens to the medium to the aging, read How it works.
DEGREE: how strongly the decade shows
The round dial on the right, marked 1 to 12, sets the strength of everything the decade does to the picture. The caption reads "DEGREE" and "n OF 12".
| DEGREE | What you get |
|---|---|
| 1 | Almost clean: a hint of the decade. |
| 7 | The decade as specified: the reference look, and the default. |
| 12 | Pushed: more grain, more wear, more of everything. |
A tip: 7 is where you want to start, because that is how the medium looked when it was new. Turn it up to 9 or 10 for a reel that spent forty years in an attic, and down to 4 for a well-kept print.