HYPE CYCLE

VSCO is one of my favorite photography editing sites that I love to use because of its many unique filters. Based on my research I think VSCO fits in the “peak of inflated expectations” because the site is continuously growing, and they are willing to add new features to make their app better and attractive. One feature that they are adding is something called “Montage”. This feature allows users that become paying members to be able to edit photos and videos together on one canvas. They can either choose to make it in portrait, square aspect ratio or landscape mode. Users can select their photos and videos from their camera to add it to whatever scene they choose. Since you’re able to share your content to Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and other platforms that will also attract more users to want to use the app more. I don’t think VSCO will lose their peak anytime soon if they continue to offer new and exciting features to their app.

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COMPETITORS

VSCO is a photography app where you can upload, take, edit and share high quality photos. The app is free to download but not everything on the app is free, some filters cost money.

I consider picsart one of vsco’s competitors. Picsart is not VSCOS number 1 competitor but they are somewhat similar. I chose picsart because VSCO filed a lawsuit against them because they supposedly reverse engineered from VSCO’s filters. One of the reasons why they think that is because 17 employees that currently for picsart helped create VSCO and they breached the terms for using, copying, or edit any of their filters. They have a lot of similarities: They both have adjustment tools. You can add filters to a photo and choose the strength level from zero to one hundred. You can crop your images to any size that you want, there are also sizes that are built in to post on Instagram.  You’re able to see the before picture by holding down on the picture while you’re editing the picture. A couple of differences is that VSCO’s filters are more clearer and sharper compared to picsart. Picsart and VSCO also have a lot of differences.

A couple of things that Picsart has that VSCO doesn’t is HDR adjustment, brushes and table optimization.

Adding an HDR-style effect to an image can make the darker areas become more brighter and the bright areas become darker. The brushes help you be able to touch up the image and make small adjustments. The tablet optimization help give a better user experience than using an app on a tablet that is designed for a phone A couple of things that VSCO has that picsart doesn’t is that it includes a publishing platform, geotagging, and manual shutter speed. Having a publish platforms is such a great tool because you can publish your photos to a website or to a private web address to share with friends and family.

Target Audience

VSCOs whole focus is on photography which is why their main target audience is mainly photographers (professional & amateur) but even if you’re not a photographer you can still use it. This app attracts a lot of the younger crowd, ages 18-29. There are more females using the app than males, during my research on the app I found out that 76% of VSCO’s users are female and 24% are male. Majority of VSCO’s audience use their platform to post on other platforms such as Instagram, Snapchat, Tumblr etc. A lot of users would rather use VSCOS’s filters because it makes their pictures look really high quality.  VSCO is a good use for not only pros but beginners as well which is why people tend to use it. They make it to where you can edit pics on the go in a timely matter. What makes VSCO different from other social media networking sites is that it doesn’t have features where you can comment or like and you can’t see who follow you. This makes it easier for people to post any kind of pictures they want to without worrying about the amount of likes they will get on it. This also helps users not care about gaining new followers. Users can easily share picture that they like in their own feed to show that they like the picture. The owner of the picture receives a notification that their post has been reposted. You can also edit your pictures on the desktop if you don’t want to do it on your phone. Since they are allowing users to post videos, this will attract more younger people to want to try using it.

USER EXPERIENCE

VSCO is available to download on apple and android phone. Their app layout is very minimalistic and not really too fancy. It’s honestly not that easy to use when you first try it out but once you get the hang of it it’s not that bad. There isn’t that many words and the symbols on the site don’t really tell you too much which is why it can be confusing when you first look at it. They offer help on their website on how to use their app if you can’t figure it out yourself. On their editing page it’s easier to understand and the main focus is the symbols. The symbols on the editing page allows users to be able to fool around and try different effects very easily. They make it easy to import pictures to create a journal. You can also take live pictures from the app and create GIFS. You’re only allowed to edit one picture at a time and if you want to finish editing the image later you can save it as a draft. Once you’re ready to post your image on your page they allow you to be able to create a caption and/ or add a tag underneath the image. The only downside of posting on your page is that everything is public. Even if someone doesn’t have a VSCO they can still look your profile up to see all of your images on your page.

ABOUT ME

My name is Morgan, I am a college student that likes to blog about social media channels that I like. I chose to do this blog on VSCO because it’s one of my favorite photo editing apps. I currently attend Georgia state and one of my favorite things to do is to make music. Besides blogging I produce and engineer artists in my hometown. I hope to be a multiplatinum producer/engineer in the future.