Doug Pardee
Veteran Member
Overview
There are currently 86 different presets available for the VSCO Cam app. Ten come with the app, eight more are available for free download, and the other 68 are available for purchase. There are also two presets that were available for free download but aren't available any longer — if you already have those, that brings the total up to 88 presets.
I did an informal survey of which presets were used on over 400 photos chosen by VSCO to be featured in the VSCO Selects section of its Journal over the past eight months or so. Some of the selected images didn't use presets, or at least the presets used weren't indicated on the VSCO site; I skipped those. Not surprisingly, the most popular presets are among the ones that were provided with the app. There were some results that were a bit surprising, though.
A note on what this means, and doesn't mean
This is a very informal survey. It's simply looking at the images that VSCO chose for its Selects series in recent times. A number of factors affect this.
The included presets
Well over half of the images in the VSCO Selects used presets that come free with the app. The M5 and F2 presets are by far the most popular, followed by G3, C1, P5, and then M3. The black-and-white presets rank fairly low, with B1 and B5 taking most of the monochrome Selects, and X1 taking most of the rest. The T1 preset is barely represented in the Selects.
It's curious that the somewhat faded M5 and F2 are the most popular of the included presets, while the more heavily faded X1 and T1 are the least popular.
The free downloadable presets
The LV1 preset from the (no longer available) Levi's Commuter (LV) pack is definitely a hit. Its popularity is right in the middle of the ten included presets, beating out M3, the black-and-white presets, and poor old T1. The black-and-white LV2 preset, however, isn't getting much respect.
The Street Etiquette (SE) pack has been mostly ignored. SE2 and SE3 have gotten a little bit of interest, although not much. Here again, heavy fading (SE1) is proving unpopular.
The Analog/Aesthetic (A4-A6) pack is relatively new, but it's already making some waves. VSCO's "Best of Analog / Aesthetic" selections were heavy on A6: nine of them compared with two each of A4 and A5. For the Selects, A4 and A6 are popular; A5, a bit less.
The Hypebeast (HB) pack is also brand-new but both presets in the pack are getting a lot of interest. The first of those presets to appear in the Selects is HB1. However, the examples that accompany the linked article has about twice as many HB2 images as HB1. Similarly, photographers currently are posting twice as many HB2 images to their Grids as HB1 images.
Taking the included presets and the free presets together, about two thirds of the images chosen for the Selects were processed with presets that didn't cost a cent.
The big preset bundle
The other third of the Select images — the ones using paid-for presets — are scattered somewhat. Most of them use presets from the big bundle.
The F Series (Mellow/Fade) is the obvious winner. F1 and F3 lead the pack of paid presets, joining the included F2 to dominate the Selects. The F Series scores about 20% of the chosen images.
Although the included M5 preset is as popular as F2, the other presets in the M4-M6 pack (Mood:Subtle Fade) have found only modest success. The same can be said for the C and G Series (Vibrant Classic and Portraits), although the disparity isn't quite so high because C1 and G3 aren't such big stars as F2 and M5.
Other popular presets are in the K Series (Analog Classic) and the S1-S3 pack (Bright+Clean). All of the paid-for presets in these groups are getting attention except for S1.
Overall, the big preset bundle gets you 38 more presets, only a third of which have had much success in the Selects. But here's the thing. If you buy all of the popular packs mentioned here — C, F, G, K, M4-M6, and S1-S3 — you're basically at the $6 (US) price for buying the whole bundle of presets. Yeah, the remaining presets in the bundle don't get much play, but they're not really going to cost you anything. So if you're planning on going beyond the free presets, there's not much leverage in buying individual packs.
Not-so-popular presets in the big bundle
If you do buy the basic preset bundle, you'll be getting 25 presets that didn't made any significant contribution to the Selects. In total, only 10% or so of the Selects used those other paid presets.
The nine paid-for black-and-white presets in the B and X Series have been almost totally overlooked. Nearly all of the B&W images in the Selects use the presets that are included with the app — B1, B5, and X1 — with the free LV2 preset accounting for a couple more. The tinted B&W X4-X6 pack hasn't gotten any action at all, possibly because there is no free preset from that pack.
The eight paid-for Instant presets of the P Series barely make a ripple. Although the P5 preset that's included with the app is the fifth-most-popular preset used on Selects images, most of the other presets in this series haven't been represented at all. Of the ones that have — P3, P6, and P7 — only one image each has been chosen.
The M1-M3 presets (Mood:Underexposed) don't get much play, and what play they do get is almost all with the included M3. M2 gets a bit of attention, but M1 is being completely shut out.
The S4-S6 pack (Bright+Warm) also has seen little success in the Selects. And as already noted, neither has the S1 preset.
The T Series (Faded & Moody) is mostly unrepresented in the Selects, and even the included T1 preset is rarely seen.
Side note: the VSCO staff favorites
A while back, an article at the VSCO Journal listed "8 of the VSCO Staff’s most commonly used Presets." That list was, "C3, F3, G3, S6, P6, T2, B3, X3." Interestingly, only the first three of those have been popular in the Selects. The last five presets in the list have, altogether, collected less than 2% of the Selects. It seems that the staff's favorites aren't influencing the choices for the Selects.
The Contemporary Collection
The Contemporary Collection is relatively new, and it's separately priced, so it's at a disadvantage. It hasn't gotten much attention in the Selects.
The A1-A3 pack (Analog/Archetype) has been represented solely by the A1 Preset except for one image processed with A3.
The H1-H3 pack (Polychrome Summer) has been represented by just one image, processed with the H2 preset.
The H4-H6 pack (Polychrome Winter) has been represented by just one image, processed with the H5 preset.
The N Series (New Modern/Lights) has been represented solely by the N1 preset.
Overall, the Contemporary Collection doesn't pull its weight in the Selects, especially for the price. That could be somewhat of a chicken-and-egg situation, but it could also be that this collection is simply overpriced for what it delivers — compared to the basic bundle. Here's a link to my review of the Contemporary Collection.
The Legacy Collection
The Legacy Collection is also relatively new (for VSCO Cam 2.0), and it's also separately priced. Furthermore, VSCO provides no description of what the presets are. It's at a distinct disadvantage, and that shows.
The faded 05 preset has been the most popular of this relatively obscure set. The 04 and 07 presets also are getting some play. The three B&W presets in the Legacy Collection have thus far been completely shut out of the Selects.
This is another collection that isn't pulling its weight in the Selects — compared to the basic bundle. Here's a link to my review of the Legacy Collection.
The Essence / Archetype Collection
The Essence/Archetype (E1-E8) presets are brand new and separately priced. The first two images using this collection that were chosen for the Selects used E3 and E7. The Best of Essence / Archetype article had 15 examples, with E4 having four images, E3 having three, E1 and E7 having two apiece, and E2 and E8 having one apiece. E5 and E6 weren't used on any images in that article.
Having fielded two Selects in its first week, this collection looks like it'll be influential. Here's a link to my review of the Essence / Archetype Collection.
An analysis
There is at least one clear trend here: heavy modification of coloration isn't popular in any form. It's not just the packs that give heavily faded looks or warped colors. All of the black-and-white presets also are relatively unpopular, and the tinted black-and-whites are totally unloved. We find the B, P, SE, T, and X Series at the bottom of the popularity list.
One might well suspect that's the effect of curation: that it reflects the curator's preferences for the type of images to be spotlighted in the Selects. However, using the new search tool on the VSCO Grid to spot-check the number of pages of images with the various presets shows a very similar picture.
The big surprise in the Grid search is with the heavily-faded T1 preset. T1, which is included with the app, turns out to be modestly popular overall even though it hardly ever appears in the Selects. The B5, SE3, and M2 presets also are used noticeably more than they are chosen for the Selects, but they're not used a lot. On the other hand, P5 is somewhat less popular in general than in the Selects, but it's still fairly popular in general.
For the new (temporarily free) A4-A6 pack, it seems that A6 is indeed more popular — at least at this early point — than A4 and A5, although there isn't quite so much difference in preferences as in VSCO's "Best of Analog / Aesthetic" article.
For the new E Series, it seems that E1-E4 are about twice as popular on the Grid as E5-E7, while the heavily faded E8 hasn't gotten much interest.
The bottom line — buying the popular presets
Going with just the built-in presets is quite practical. If you already got it, the Levi's Commuter freebies seem to be well worth the trouble to have downloaded, mainly for LV1. Unfortunately, this pack is no longer available.
You probably won't care much for the Street Etiquette freebies, but they won't cost you anything, either. And SE3 seems to have its fans, although the curator for the Selects doesn't seem to be one.
The Analog/Aesthetic freebies are getting some interest, but not overwhelming. Since these are "limited time" freebies, it would be prudent to grab them while you can.
The Hypebeast freebies are brand-new, so no information is available. Off-hand, they look very interesting and could prove to be quite popular. These are billed as "limited time" freebies, so it would be prudent to grab them while you can.
If you want to expand beyond those, the $6 (US) bundle of presets definitely is the way to go. There seems little point in buying individual packs, because you'll probably end up at six $1 packs very quickly (C, F, G, K, M4-M6, and S1-S3).
The Contemporary Collection and Legacy Collection are luxury items. Taken together they cost $5, but produced less than one eighth the number of images chosen for Selects as the new (paid-for) presets in the $6 standard preset bundle. You might want to check out my reviews, although maybe spending $5 doesn't give you any pause.
The Essence/Archetype Collection may be the best second purchase, after the big bundle. It's $2 for 8 presets, which isn't a big bargain compared with the other collections. However, initial indications on the VSCO Grid show some good acceptance of almost all of these presets. VSCO has indicated that this pack is a limited-time offer, so if you're interested, it might be worthwhile spending the two bucks.
A personal perspective
All of the above is necessarily about what most people seem to like. I took a look at the 30 photos I've posted on my own Grid, and found that my own usage is nothing like that.
As noted above, the popular series are C, F, G, K, M4-M6, and S1-S3. My grid has no photos with C Series presets. Nor any with F Series presets. Nor any with G Series presets. Two photos use K1. I have one photo with M4 and one with M5. Two photos use S2. All together, that's six out of thirty that use the popular presets.
On the other hand, I have eight that use the Contemporary Collection: four with A1, two with N1, one with N2, and one with H1. And two that use the Legacy Collection: one with 01 and one with 07.
Four use the free downloads: two with LV1, and one each with SE2 and SE3.
The other ten are scattered around the "unpopular" presets: a B3, an M3; an S4, an S5, and an S6; two with T2, one with X1, and two with X6.
Which just goes to show that it's all a matter of individual taste.
Graphics
[Graph data as of April 4, 2014.]
Here's how the various groups contribute to the surveyed Selects. The dark blue is the 10 presets that are included with the app. The light blue is the 38 extra presets that you get if you buy the big bundle. The red area is the 8 free presets — most of which is LV1, which is no longer available. The other two slivers are the Legacy and Contemporary collections.
Here's a look at how the individual presets and their packs contribute to the surveyed Selects.
Presets that haven't been recognized in any of the surveyed Selects don't appear in this chart, including the entire X4-X6 and A4-A6 packs. The presets in italics are the ones that are included with the app. The first bar lists all of those included presets; they also appear in the bars for their respective packs.
This graph really illustrates how much the "big 4" presets — M5, F2, G3, and C1 — dominate the Selects. Between them, those four presets, which are all included with the app, account for about 40% of the surveyed Selects. The presets at the next level (P5, LV1, F1, and M3) have each been used on about 5% of the surveyed Selects.
There are currently 86 different presets available for the VSCO Cam app. Ten come with the app, eight more are available for free download, and the other 68 are available for purchase. There are also two presets that were available for free download but aren't available any longer — if you already have those, that brings the total up to 88 presets.
I did an informal survey of which presets were used on over 400 photos chosen by VSCO to be featured in the VSCO Selects section of its Journal over the past eight months or so. Some of the selected images didn't use presets, or at least the presets used weren't indicated on the VSCO site; I skipped those. Not surprisingly, the most popular presets are among the ones that were provided with the app. There were some results that were a bit surprising, though.
A note on what this means, and doesn't mean
This is a very informal survey. It's simply looking at the images that VSCO chose for its Selects series in recent times. A number of factors affect this.
- Availability. The Contemporary and Legacy collections have only been available since December 2013, and the Analog/Aesthetic, Essence/Archetype, and Hypebeast packs were just released. The Levi's Commuter pack was available for only a few months.
- Price. People can't use presets that they chose not to pay for.
- Photographer's style. The preset used is chosen by the photographer.
- Curator's style. The photos in the Selects series are chosen by the curator.
The included presets
Well over half of the images in the VSCO Selects used presets that come free with the app. The M5 and F2 presets are by far the most popular, followed by G3, C1, P5, and then M3. The black-and-white presets rank fairly low, with B1 and B5 taking most of the monochrome Selects, and X1 taking most of the rest. The T1 preset is barely represented in the Selects.
It's curious that the somewhat faded M5 and F2 are the most popular of the included presets, while the more heavily faded X1 and T1 are the least popular.
The free downloadable presets
The LV1 preset from the (no longer available) Levi's Commuter (LV) pack is definitely a hit. Its popularity is right in the middle of the ten included presets, beating out M3, the black-and-white presets, and poor old T1. The black-and-white LV2 preset, however, isn't getting much respect.
The Street Etiquette (SE) pack has been mostly ignored. SE2 and SE3 have gotten a little bit of interest, although not much. Here again, heavy fading (SE1) is proving unpopular.
The Analog/Aesthetic (A4-A6) pack is relatively new, but it's already making some waves. VSCO's "Best of Analog / Aesthetic" selections were heavy on A6: nine of them compared with two each of A4 and A5. For the Selects, A4 and A6 are popular; A5, a bit less.
The Hypebeast (HB) pack is also brand-new but both presets in the pack are getting a lot of interest. The first of those presets to appear in the Selects is HB1. However, the examples that accompany the linked article has about twice as many HB2 images as HB1. Similarly, photographers currently are posting twice as many HB2 images to their Grids as HB1 images.
Taking the included presets and the free presets together, about two thirds of the images chosen for the Selects were processed with presets that didn't cost a cent.
The big preset bundle
The other third of the Select images — the ones using paid-for presets — are scattered somewhat. Most of them use presets from the big bundle.
The F Series (Mellow/Fade) is the obvious winner. F1 and F3 lead the pack of paid presets, joining the included F2 to dominate the Selects. The F Series scores about 20% of the chosen images.
Although the included M5 preset is as popular as F2, the other presets in the M4-M6 pack (Mood:Subtle Fade) have found only modest success. The same can be said for the C and G Series (Vibrant Classic and Portraits), although the disparity isn't quite so high because C1 and G3 aren't such big stars as F2 and M5.
Other popular presets are in the K Series (Analog Classic) and the S1-S3 pack (Bright+Clean). All of the paid-for presets in these groups are getting attention except for S1.
Overall, the big preset bundle gets you 38 more presets, only a third of which have had much success in the Selects. But here's the thing. If you buy all of the popular packs mentioned here — C, F, G, K, M4-M6, and S1-S3 — you're basically at the $6 (US) price for buying the whole bundle of presets. Yeah, the remaining presets in the bundle don't get much play, but they're not really going to cost you anything. So if you're planning on going beyond the free presets, there's not much leverage in buying individual packs.
Not-so-popular presets in the big bundle
If you do buy the basic preset bundle, you'll be getting 25 presets that didn't made any significant contribution to the Selects. In total, only 10% or so of the Selects used those other paid presets.
The nine paid-for black-and-white presets in the B and X Series have been almost totally overlooked. Nearly all of the B&W images in the Selects use the presets that are included with the app — B1, B5, and X1 — with the free LV2 preset accounting for a couple more. The tinted B&W X4-X6 pack hasn't gotten any action at all, possibly because there is no free preset from that pack.
The eight paid-for Instant presets of the P Series barely make a ripple. Although the P5 preset that's included with the app is the fifth-most-popular preset used on Selects images, most of the other presets in this series haven't been represented at all. Of the ones that have — P3, P6, and P7 — only one image each has been chosen.
The M1-M3 presets (Mood:Underexposed) don't get much play, and what play they do get is almost all with the included M3. M2 gets a bit of attention, but M1 is being completely shut out.
The S4-S6 pack (Bright+Warm) also has seen little success in the Selects. And as already noted, neither has the S1 preset.
The T Series (Faded & Moody) is mostly unrepresented in the Selects, and even the included T1 preset is rarely seen.
Side note: the VSCO staff favorites
A while back, an article at the VSCO Journal listed "8 of the VSCO Staff’s most commonly used Presets." That list was, "C3, F3, G3, S6, P6, T2, B3, X3." Interestingly, only the first three of those have been popular in the Selects. The last five presets in the list have, altogether, collected less than 2% of the Selects. It seems that the staff's favorites aren't influencing the choices for the Selects.
The Contemporary Collection
The Contemporary Collection is relatively new, and it's separately priced, so it's at a disadvantage. It hasn't gotten much attention in the Selects.
The A1-A3 pack (Analog/Archetype) has been represented solely by the A1 Preset except for one image processed with A3.
The H1-H3 pack (Polychrome Summer) has been represented by just one image, processed with the H2 preset.
The H4-H6 pack (Polychrome Winter) has been represented by just one image, processed with the H5 preset.
The N Series (New Modern/Lights) has been represented solely by the N1 preset.
Overall, the Contemporary Collection doesn't pull its weight in the Selects, especially for the price. That could be somewhat of a chicken-and-egg situation, but it could also be that this collection is simply overpriced for what it delivers — compared to the basic bundle. Here's a link to my review of the Contemporary Collection.
The Legacy Collection
The Legacy Collection is also relatively new (for VSCO Cam 2.0), and it's also separately priced. Furthermore, VSCO provides no description of what the presets are. It's at a distinct disadvantage, and that shows.
The faded 05 preset has been the most popular of this relatively obscure set. The 04 and 07 presets also are getting some play. The three B&W presets in the Legacy Collection have thus far been completely shut out of the Selects.
This is another collection that isn't pulling its weight in the Selects — compared to the basic bundle. Here's a link to my review of the Legacy Collection.
The Essence / Archetype Collection
The Essence/Archetype (E1-E8) presets are brand new and separately priced. The first two images using this collection that were chosen for the Selects used E3 and E7. The Best of Essence / Archetype article had 15 examples, with E4 having four images, E3 having three, E1 and E7 having two apiece, and E2 and E8 having one apiece. E5 and E6 weren't used on any images in that article.
Having fielded two Selects in its first week, this collection looks like it'll be influential. Here's a link to my review of the Essence / Archetype Collection.
An analysis
There is at least one clear trend here: heavy modification of coloration isn't popular in any form. It's not just the packs that give heavily faded looks or warped colors. All of the black-and-white presets also are relatively unpopular, and the tinted black-and-whites are totally unloved. We find the B, P, SE, T, and X Series at the bottom of the popularity list.
One might well suspect that's the effect of curation: that it reflects the curator's preferences for the type of images to be spotlighted in the Selects. However, using the new search tool on the VSCO Grid to spot-check the number of pages of images with the various presets shows a very similar picture.
The big surprise in the Grid search is with the heavily-faded T1 preset. T1, which is included with the app, turns out to be modestly popular overall even though it hardly ever appears in the Selects. The B5, SE3, and M2 presets also are used noticeably more than they are chosen for the Selects, but they're not used a lot. On the other hand, P5 is somewhat less popular in general than in the Selects, but it's still fairly popular in general.
For the new (temporarily free) A4-A6 pack, it seems that A6 is indeed more popular — at least at this early point — than A4 and A5, although there isn't quite so much difference in preferences as in VSCO's "Best of Analog / Aesthetic" article.
For the new E Series, it seems that E1-E4 are about twice as popular on the Grid as E5-E7, while the heavily faded E8 hasn't gotten much interest.
The bottom line — buying the popular presets
Going with just the built-in presets is quite practical. If you already got it, the Levi's Commuter freebies seem to be well worth the trouble to have downloaded, mainly for LV1. Unfortunately, this pack is no longer available.
You probably won't care much for the Street Etiquette freebies, but they won't cost you anything, either. And SE3 seems to have its fans, although the curator for the Selects doesn't seem to be one.
The Analog/Aesthetic freebies are getting some interest, but not overwhelming. Since these are "limited time" freebies, it would be prudent to grab them while you can.
The Hypebeast freebies are brand-new, so no information is available. Off-hand, they look very interesting and could prove to be quite popular. These are billed as "limited time" freebies, so it would be prudent to grab them while you can.
If you want to expand beyond those, the $6 (US) bundle of presets definitely is the way to go. There seems little point in buying individual packs, because you'll probably end up at six $1 packs very quickly (C, F, G, K, M4-M6, and S1-S3).
The Contemporary Collection and Legacy Collection are luxury items. Taken together they cost $5, but produced less than one eighth the number of images chosen for Selects as the new (paid-for) presets in the $6 standard preset bundle. You might want to check out my reviews, although maybe spending $5 doesn't give you any pause.
The Essence/Archetype Collection may be the best second purchase, after the big bundle. It's $2 for 8 presets, which isn't a big bargain compared with the other collections. However, initial indications on the VSCO Grid show some good acceptance of almost all of these presets. VSCO has indicated that this pack is a limited-time offer, so if you're interested, it might be worthwhile spending the two bucks.
A personal perspective
All of the above is necessarily about what most people seem to like. I took a look at the 30 photos I've posted on my own Grid, and found that my own usage is nothing like that.
As noted above, the popular series are C, F, G, K, M4-M6, and S1-S3. My grid has no photos with C Series presets. Nor any with F Series presets. Nor any with G Series presets. Two photos use K1. I have one photo with M4 and one with M5. Two photos use S2. All together, that's six out of thirty that use the popular presets.
On the other hand, I have eight that use the Contemporary Collection: four with A1, two with N1, one with N2, and one with H1. And two that use the Legacy Collection: one with 01 and one with 07.
Four use the free downloads: two with LV1, and one each with SE2 and SE3.
The other ten are scattered around the "unpopular" presets: a B3, an M3; an S4, an S5, and an S6; two with T2, one with X1, and two with X6.
Which just goes to show that it's all a matter of individual taste.
Graphics
[Graph data as of April 4, 2014.]
Here's how the various groups contribute to the surveyed Selects. The dark blue is the 10 presets that are included with the app. The light blue is the 38 extra presets that you get if you buy the big bundle. The red area is the 8 free presets — most of which is LV1, which is no longer available. The other two slivers are the Legacy and Contemporary collections.
Here's a look at how the individual presets and their packs contribute to the surveyed Selects.
Presets that haven't been recognized in any of the surveyed Selects don't appear in this chart, including the entire X4-X6 and A4-A6 packs. The presets in italics are the ones that are included with the app. The first bar lists all of those included presets; they also appear in the bars for their respective packs.
This graph really illustrates how much the "big 4" presets — M5, F2, G3, and C1 — dominate the Selects. Between them, those four presets, which are all included with the app, account for about 40% of the surveyed Selects. The presets at the next level (P5, LV1, F1, and M3) have each been used on about 5% of the surveyed Selects.
I bought the limited collection, contemporary collection, and chromatic collection. For now I'm keeping A1-6, B1, B5, C1-3, C5-8, F1-3, G1-3, K1-3, HB1-2, M5-6, N1-3, S1-3, X1, X4, P8, S6. That's nearly 40 presets! And I already try hard to eliminate as many as I can.
