A solo-built pro camera app shows a practical indie app workflow
The iPhone camera app works well for everyday users, but professional photographers may want more control over settings and file formats. This app was built to bring DSLR-style controls into a phone camera app. Development started in November 2025 with Cursor and several .
After Opus became available, most of the work used Opus, with Codex helping when Opus struggled with specific tasks. The hardest part was building a new portrait mode with a custom . The blur had to look realistic while letting users change bokeh shape, size, and distortion, so tuning took a long time.
The raw image output from the iPhone looked weak on its own, which showed how much Apple relies on to make photos look good. The app icon was made and refined with Krea.ai, then Figma designs and the icon were given to ChatGPT to create brand guidelines for the .
Key points
- The app targets photographers who want more manual control than the default iPhone camera offers.
- Cursor, Opus, and Codex were used as development helpers.
- The hardest feature was a custom portrait mode with realistic blur.
- Krea.ai helped create the app icon, while ChatGPT helped turn Figma designs into brand guidelines.
- The workflow connects product building, design, branding, and work into one solo process.