What is a Recipe?
A recipe in PicTapGo is a sequence of filters or adjustments that you can apply to your image as a single step. Recipes help you:
- Save time
- Get consistent results
- Create new looks from combinations of filters
- Add new looks to your library (i.e. from the recipes we share on our Instagram page)
You can create recipes yourself in PicTapGo or import them from other sources.
What Steps Are Included in Recipes?
Recipes can contain any filter, and most adjustments in the app. Things that are excluded from recipes include:
- Touch tools
- Develop settings
- Crop
- Share screen canvas options
Applying Recipes
Access your recipes by pressing the Recipes button on the Edit Home screen, or by scrolling way down past the Filters. Tapping a recipe thumbnail brings up the Recipe Editor, which has many of the same features as the Filter Editor. You can change the recipe's strength, swipe the carousel to quickly preview other recipes, and view before / after version of the image. Tap the checkmark to apply the recipe. Tap the X button to cancel.
Once you apply a recipe, all the steps in the recipe are added to your current edit.
What Does Recipe Strength Do?
The Strength slider in the Recipe Editor acts a little differently from other editors. A recipe may consist of multiple steps, and each step in the recipe might have its own strength setting for that step already. Therefore, the Recipe Editor's strength slider scales the strength of each step in the recipe by the given amount. This is slightly different from how recipes in PicTapGo Classic worked (where the whole recipe would be applied, then the result of THAT would be scaled by a certain amount).
Creating a Recipe
You can create recipes in two places in PicTapGo:
- From the Rewind Editor
- From the Share Screen
In both cases, you'll access the Save Recipe screen, which shows you the steps in your recipe, and prompts you to give your new recipe a name. As usual, pressing the checkmark will confirm your choices (creating a new recipe in your library), and the X button will cancel.
Modifying Recipes
You can modify the selected recipe in the Recipe Editor in a few ways. Pressing the menu button (bottom center) will give you several choices:
- Rename allows you to change the recipe's name
- Export allows you to save a single recipe to a file for backup or sharing
- Delete does exactly what you would expect a delete option to do
History
The thumbnail section immediately after your recipes includes a history of the edits you've made in PicTapGo. Each time you save or share a photo, PicTapGo creates a recipe from your edit, and places it in the History section. Recipes in the History section work just like any other recipe, with a few exceptions. You can apply a History item, change its strength, etc, but your options for modifying it are different. Instead of the rename / export / delete options for normal Recipes, History items only have one button, a "+" button allowing you to give the History item a name and add it to your Recipes.
Importing from PicTapGo Classic
PicTapGo knows how to read recipes from PicTapGo Classic, if you are migrating from the old app.
- In PicTapGo Classic, tap and hold on a recipe and select Email All.
- Send the email to yourself.
- Open the Mail app on your device with PicTapGo installed, find the email you just sent, and tap the attachment.
- Choose PicTapGo (not Classic) to open the file.
Importing from RadLab
If you're an old-school Totally Rad user who has favorite recipes from RadLab, you can also import those into PicTapGo. Send the .rls files (RadLab recipes) to your device, whether via AirDrop or email, and chose PicTapGo to open them. They should import just fine.
Backup / Save / Export
You can backup your recipes, along with all the rest of your settings, via the Backup options in the Settings Screen.
Instagram Recipes
We occasionally share recipes we've created on our Instagram page (be sure to follow us!). If you've missed past recipes, or need to re-download them for whatever reason, we've created a page with links for all our Instagram Recipes. Click Here from a browser on your device to view a list of links. You'll have to tap on them each individually (sorry, no better alternative at the moment, unfortunately), but tapping any one of the links will import that recipe into PicTapGo.