This fall, Harrisites have discovered the viral social media app, Lapse, which imitates the style of film cameras to document their daily lives.
In previous years, students have used apps such as BeReal, Snapchat, and Instagram to showcase their day to day activities. However, Lapse has recently caught the attention of many.
Unlike many apps that put “film” filters over the user’s photos, Lapse requires users to take their photos on the app itself, discouraging the obsession many social media users have with creating “perfect” photos. Lapse also has many other features, such as creating a profile library and allowing users to put music onto their gallery.
The app focuses on the appeal of a digital camera – categorized as a “social photo journal.” Harrisites have been using Lapse to document their day to day lives, using the phrase “lapse it up” when referring to the app. Currently charted top five for Photo and Video on the Apple App Store, the app has a 4.8 out of 5 star rating.
Junior Zuzia Smolaga said, “I like the idea of having photos look like film without having an actual film camera.” She praises the app’s features, “I also really liked that you could see, post, and add reactions and comments to [the photos].”
On the other hand, senior Annie Wang describes her unfamiliarity with Lapse: “I’ve never heard of the app until my friends started talking about it.” She said, “I don’t see myself downloading it ever.”
Along with the several other similar features between Lapse and a digital camera, Lapse includes a waiting time for your photos to be developed and seen. This wait time typically takes a few hours.
Despite the quality of your device, Lapse uses a preset filter to mimic the style of a digital camera – a feature the app is known for. Zuzia continues, “I’ve never seen another social media app that imitates film. I’ve seen filters and stuff, but I didn’t think I’d see apps only having the pictures be film, I thought that was really cool.”
However, like many apps that quickly gained popularity, such as “BeReal,” students have noticed that the app is just as quickly losing popularity.
When asked if Zuzia think’s the app will continue to dominate student interests, she said, “I think [Lapse] already fell off a little bit because not a lot of people use it a lot anymore. Whenever I try to take a picture, I don’t immediately go for it, I go for the regular camera app.” Annie Wang agrees that the app will fall off, “I think it’ll fall off like BeReal honestly,” she said, “I think the people who really like it just kept using it but it stopped being very popular.”
