5secondsapp app review: create animated gif files in only seconds!

Introduction

5secondsapp by Eric Marschner is a very simple yet clever app. It allows you to create animated GIF files from nearly anything. Just allow it access to your camera, take a video, and it will spit out an animated GIF in seconds. With some easy tools you can customize your GIF afterwards, meaning you can add all kinds of effects to your own creation. This amazing app is created for both iPhone and iPad and is only about 3.4 MB big. 

Creating a GIF and Making It Your Own

Creating a GIF has never been easier. Simply go to your camera, take a video (or a series of photos), and the app will do all the hard work for you. After your initial GIF is ready, you can go into the file and edit it frame by frame. You can easily add text or different camera effects to each frame.

The app is really user friendly but doesn’t explain anything to the user, simply because that isn’t necessary. When you are ready with your GIF we’re ready to export or share the file, right?

 

Sharing the File and the Absence of Ads

You will soon know that this app doesn’t have any ads in it. This is really a weird thing to happen with a free app, so I was wondering where the catch is. Well, after making my first GIF I found it. If you want to export your GIF to your Camera Roll, that app asks your permission to subsequently upload the app to 5secondsapp.com, where all the GIFs from users are to be found.

This is also the case if you want to share it via Facebook, Twitter, Tumbler or SMS. I don’t think this is a big problem, and it is certainly a clever way of monetizing an app without annoying ads popping up. Of course the website does have ads, which is where the developer will get its revenue. When you upload the GIF to the site, it’s for everyone to see and you lose the rights to your image.

 

Pros and Cons

Pros

• Easy to use
• Make GIF files from both video and photos
• Making GIFs is fun!
• A clever way around the ads

 

Cons

• You’re basically creating content for someone’s website

 

Conclusion

I am a big fan of this app. Not only is it a hugely clever way of monetizing without using ads in app, it also is amazingly fun to create those GIF files. If you don’t mind about helping the developer populate his website with GIFs, this app is definitely the best around for making animated GIF files. With all the different sharing functions and editing tools, this app is very complete. The fact that it is completely free is a bonus on top of that, as I think, especially without the ads, I would pay at least $0.99 for this app! It's a must-download in the photo and video category!