Turn Your iPhone Into A Crappy 1985 Camcorder With This App

For anyone who remembers the 80s, this app is ultimate blast from your past.

Given the popularity of apps like Instagram that intentionally make your photos look like garbage shot on film, it’s no surprise there’s finally an app that lets your iPhone or iPad shoot video that looks like it was recorded with a VHS camcorder from the mid-1980s.

Once upon a time capturing video memories required bulky equipment that didn’t even make phone calls.

Shooting footage that “looks and sounds like video recordings that have been in storage for 30 years”, the app incorporates all that lovely tape noise, static, and tracking distortion familiar to 80s folk who splashed out no small amount of money on those giant VHS babies that promised so much but delivered little. The date is spoof-able, so you can set it to display basically any date if you want to trick your friends. VHS defined a generation and while it was crappy even when it was popular the format has somehow managed to find an affectionate place in our hearts thanks to “You’ve Been Framed” and that Lord Of The Rings needed not one but two VHS tapes that had to be swapped over halfway through. They’ll swear you invented a time machine: “OMG, how’d you shoot that?”

It’s a bit pricey for something you’re probably only going to use occasionally, but having put it to the test we think it’s worth the cost of pint.

You can download the app from the App Store here, provided your device is running iOS 8 and higher.