# A film preset that sold 4,900 copies, turned into a camera app sold as a ¥58 one-time purchase: how Gloam peeled users away from Dazz

> Source: https://stringers.io/en/apps/ios_6753741715.html (Stringers / 什么值得做, generated 2026-11-08)
> Stringers answers one question every day: what small product can one or two people build in a few months and actually make money from. Numbers come from 15 databases we collect daily, each with source and date.
> For agents: these verdicts and the underlying databases (verified revenue, App Store / Google Play charts, ad libraries, GitHub, Product Hunt…) are queryable live over MCP — tools today / hot / products / directions / direction / data. Setup: https://github.com/komako-workshop/stringers (the user logs in at stringers.io → "配置 agent" to get a personal URL). Site index: https://stringers.io/llms.txt

> The colors were presets the author had sold on Xiaohongshu for two years, with several thousand sold. Being able to undo after shooting fills a gap in Dazz. It arrived when iPhone 18 Pro upgrades, the National Day holiday, and Ricoh and Fujifilm stock shortages hit, and street-photography circles on Xiaohongshu spread it on their own. ifanr also covered it twice.

[Mobile App](https://stringers.io/en/apps/index.md) · iOS · written 11-6

G

Gloam Camera · 英泽 樊

# A film preset that sold 4,900 copies, turned into a camera app sold as a ¥58 one-time purchase: how Gloam peeled users away from Dazz

**What it is** An iPhone-only film camera app. Press the shutter and it applies the colors of Kodak motion picture stock and Ricoh and Fujifilm cameras; you can change the color after shooting. A one-time purchase of ¥58.

**Why it took off** The colors are a preset the author sold on Xiaohongshu for two years, selling several thousand copies. Being able to change your mind after shooting fills the gap Dazz left. It rode the iPhone 18 Pro upgrade cycle, the National Day holiday, and Ricoh and Fujifilm out-of-stock shortages, and the Xiaohongshu street-photography crowd spread it on their own, with Ifanr pushing it twice.

**B** **How you could follow** If you already have a color preset that sells, follow this path to turn the colors into a shooting app, and go after markets like Japan, Korea, and Europe/North America that Gloam hasn't entered, or first build the features it lacks: importing photos, Live, and video. Sell it as a one-time purchase at the price of one roll of film, and acquire users through your work and before-and-after posts.

Grade B: the path is clear and there are gaps overseas and in features, but growth came from the author's two years of accumulated aesthetic credibility and loyal buyers, which followers mostly won't have. Chinese-language iPhone film camera apps are already crowded, and the peak has passed. Circulating in small circles

Data (updated daily) · First launch 2026-08-09 · China ratings 182 · Charted in 11-08 of 8 stores

iOS · Overall Top Free rank · by store

MO #156

Data day 2026-10-28, only 1 days so far. Lower rank is higher; gaps are days it wasn't charted

iOS · Rating count · China

Data 2026-10-28 → 2026-11-08 (12 days, 12 observations). Apple doesn't publish download counts; rating growth is a proxy for downloads.

Xiaohongshu film blogger "英泽君啊" turned the color presets they had sold for two years into an iPhone camera app, Gloam. It launched in August, and in October it swept the Xiaohongshu street-photography circles. With just over a hundred ratings, it has held around #20 on the China App Store's Photo & Video Top Paid chart. The key to this business was having aesthetic credibility people already trusted; the app just changed how it was sold. Below: why it took off, how the money comes in, where the gaps are, and whether you can follow.

### A ¥38 preset

In March 2023, Xiaohongshu photography blogger "英泽君啊" opened a shop selling their own film color presets: buy one, import it into Lightroom, and get the look of Kodak, Fujifilm, and Ricoh with one click. One preset emulating Kodak 5207 motion picture stock was priced at ¥38 and sold over 4,900 copies, with single-product sales above ¥180K. When an operations outlet profiled them in April 2025, the account had only 21.7K followers, and the shop was earning over ¥150K a month. About 70% of followers are male, 90% are aged 18–34, and they care about Fujifilm, Ricoh, and Nikon.

Two years later, the same colors came in a different package. In August 2026 9, a "Gloam 相机" appeared on the App Store, developed by the personal account "英泽 樊" with this app as its only product. The website reads "Gloam 复古影像工作室（原英泽君）" (Gloam Retro Imaging Studio, formerly 英泽君). No more importing presets or knowing how to grade color: press the shutter and you get the finished photo.

In mid-October, a Xiaohongshu post passed 5,000 likes in five days with 1,300 saves. Its title read "Yang Liwei only took 3 photos in space because he didn't download gloam," and the author wrote in the post "Bought the one-time license, thanks gloam." The opening line of a long-form piece by Smzdm in October 19 was: "If you've been scrolling the Xiaohongshu street-photography tag, there's a good chance the same app has flooded your feed over the last two weeks."

### What it actually is

A film / CCD analog camera app for iPhone only. The app has several "bodies": T3 (film), CCD12 (inspired by the Canon G12), GRD (Ricoh street shooting), and U2 (compact film camera). Each body offers several colors, corresponding to real film stocks: 5207, 5219, 50D, and 500T.

What sets it apart from veteran film camera apps like Dazz is how it processes images. Ifanr's October 10 review explains it clearly: Gloam reads the iPhone's RAW files, applies color mapping, tone, and grain, then outputs a JPG. It also keeps a "digital negative," so you can reselect the color and adjust white balance on the same body after shooting. The tradeoff is that each shot takes time to process, so it's not suited to burst shooting.

Pricing is a free download, with Pro as a lifetime one-time purchase of ¥58 (US store $7.99). A Bilibili review title once said "only ¥38," probably an early price. There is also an annual membership.

### How it reached the Top Paid chart with only 181 ratings

China App Store, 11-06:181 ratings. At 10-28 it had 166, and in ten days it gained 15 more. It ranked #25 on the Photo & Video category Top Paid chart; during those ten days its best was #17,10-31, and it also reached #20 on the category Top Free chart. It has also charted in the category charts for Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, Malaysia, Singapore, and Vietnam.

With so few ratings yet a steady Top Paid ranking around #20, downloads can't be large, but those who download pay at a very high rate: a one-time fee of ¥58 is a low bar, and people who like the style have mostly bought in **inferred** . On the China Photo Top Paid chart it sits right next to Dazz (161M ratings) and Ultimate Camera from Tech Impact (1.47M ratings).

The peak has already passed. The Taiwan store is still at 10-28, ranking 24,11-06 on the Top Free chart in its category and 136 on Top Grossing; in Hong Kong it fell from 19 to 58 on Top Free, and in Macau from 11 to 44. Going by the timing of the "trending for two weeks" article, the peak was roughly Oct 5 to 19 **(inferred)** .

### Why it took off in October

**The colors were already sold, not newly made.** What users get in the app is the same 4,900-copy-selling 5207 preset. Reviews keep repeating words like "胶味更正" (the film feel is right) and "颗粒恰到好处" (grain just right). An Ifanr editor who owns a Fujifilm X100VI and a Ricoh GR4 said they hadn't needed a film app before, but "after an afternoon of shooting, I was like, wow, it's the real deal." On Threads, someone said "almost every Xiaohongshu blogger whose film-style digital shots look very convincing has been using 英泽君's presets." That aesthetic credibility was built over two years.

**Being able to change your mind after shooting hits Dazz's pain point.** In the China App Store, one user wrote "I've waited twenty years for this app, and I love the re-select color feature in the Pro functions," and another specifically urged "please don't copy Dazz, where you can only choose the preset at the moment you shoot." On Xiaohongshu, a post titled "When I Stopped Obsessing Over Shooting with Dazz" said Dazz's film look was "too standardized." In a thread with 64 comments about choosing between the two lifetime memberships, the community's answer was "D for variety, G for flavor."

**¥58 is exactly the price of a roll of film.** In October 18, someone wrote on Xiaohongshu: for the price of one roll of 135 negative film, buy a lifetime membership. Checking the actual numbers: a box of 36 Fujifilm C100 cost ¥87 net, and the cheapest development and scanning runs ¥30 per roll; Dazz's permanent version costs ¥88. Ifanr's line was "fair to everyone."

**The timing lines up.** iPhone 18 Pro upgrades, National Day travel, and Ricoh and Fujifilm film cameras sold out and marked up ahead of 11 mean plenty of people want the film look without paying for film. The most common line on Xiaohongshu is "why buy a Ricoh, my membership is already paid." Ifanr 9-18 pushed it once, and 10-10 ranked it first among three apps labeled "worthy of your brand-new iPhone 18 Pro."

**No paid acquisition found.** Users came mainly from organic posts in the Xiaohongshu street-photography and film-topic circles. Comparison posts (Gloam vs Dazz, vs GR3x, vs the Black Card) kept stirring up debate, amplified by Ifanr, Smzdm, and PConline. In Hong Kong and Taiwan it spread via Threads posts saying "completely replaces Dazz" and "looks like Dazz, feels better than Dazz." The store name is just "Gloam 相机" with the subtitle "胶片模拟，复古相机" and no keyword stuffing, so traffic likely came from people searching the brand name **inferred** . Whether the two Ifanr articles were sponsored has not been verified.

### Who it's competing with

| Product | Scale (China App Store, 11-06) | How it differs from Gloam |
|---|---|---|
| Dazz Camera | 1.18M ratings, #16 on the Photo & Video Top Paid chart | Boss, dozens of bodies with patterns, lifetime version ¥88; criticized as "standardized" and "muddy" |
| Hurricane Camera (Yingshi Hurricane / 影视飓风) | 74K ratings, Photography bestseller #14 | Also a creator-run app, but more video-focused, with Log direct output and LUTs, one-time purchase about ¥20 |
| NOMO CAM, OldRoll | 1.34M, 61K ratings | Polaroid and film camera play, mass aesthetic, growth has stalled |
| Fomz, ProCCD, Kapi and dozens more | Each a few hundred to 100K+ ratings | CCD and Y2K vibe filters, some with beauty and AI, made for selfie crowds |
| Meitu (醒图), Lightroom, VSCO | Meitu Photography bestseller #2 | Post-processing editors, not shutter-to-photo |

The lane is crowded: the China Photography chart has dozens of "retro film / CCD camera" apps. Gloam didn't compete on volume. It went after the pickiest buyers among Dazz's users, the ones who care about film stock numbers. Hurricane Camera took the same "creator-run app" route with a scale dozens of times bigger. The more influence the creator has, the higher that route's ceiling.

### What it didn't do, and who's already copying it

The loudest requests in App Store reviews:

- "Can you add a feature to import photos" (11-03,4 stars). Its predecessor was presets for tinting existing photos, but the app can't do this.

- "Really really want a Live feature" (11-02,5 stars). There's no video either.

- "The iPhone 17 switches from the 26mm ultrawide lens to the 35mm focal length, but after switching it should look like 28mm" (11-01,3 stars). iFanr also wrote about wrong focal length display on the iPhone 18 Pro. On Xiaohongshu, iPhone 17 Pro users ask why telephoto doesn't work.

- No Android version. Android users have been asking for two months. Some bought a ten-year-old iPhone 8 Plus just for it, and someone used Codex to build an Android imitation of the color look.

Someone is already camping this gap: on Tencent's App Treasure (应用宝) there are at least two clone Android builds of "Gloam Camera" with the same name, and download sites list "Gloam Camera Android v5.2", none of them official. Fotee Cam renamed its Taiwan and Macau store listings to "原膠原味復古相機 Gloam" to ride the keyword. In the US store, "Gloaming — Film Camera" was newly listed under 10-23; whether it is deliberately piggybacking on the name is unverified. On the other side, X turns up no discussion of it, the English-speaking world barely knows the app exists, and its revenue has never been made public.

### If it were you

**Verdict: B.** This route can be copied, but what you copy is "first earn people's trust in your taste," not a camera app. The code isn't hard. The hard part is the 4,900 people who already paid ¥38 before. If you already have that trust, act now. If you don't, don't squeeze into Chinese iPhone film cameras.

**Who it fits:** photography creators or studios already selling color presets or LUTs, with one or two that have sold thousands of copies, plus a developer who can build an iOS camera (RAW pipeline, Core Image / Metal). Non-Chinese markets are best. Japan, Korea, and Western film preset makers are numerous, and almost nobody in English-speaking markets knows Gloam.

**Who it doesn't fit:** developers with no aesthetic of their own who plan to "build yet another film filter camera". The China Photography chart already has dozens, and Dazz has 1.18M ratings. Also anyone trying to crack memberships through gray channels or repackage to ride the name. That only works for a while, and it's gone once an official Android version ships.

**How to build it:** ship only a few bodies, each with a few colors, matching real film stock and real cameras. Fewer is better. Read RAW, keep a digital negative, and let people change color after shooting. Gloam has proven this selling point, so you need it too. Go first where Gloam fell short: import from the photo library and tint RAW, add Live and short video, and get the focal lengths right. Copy its pricing: anchor a one-time purchase to the cost of a roll of film, not a subscription. The other path is Android. Real users are waiting, but Android RAW and camera interfaces vary wildly, so adaptation costs far more than on iPhone, and you'd have to move before the official team does **(inference)** .

**How to get users:** don't rely on paid acquisition. First build credibility with your work on local image communities (Xiaohongshu / Instagram / Threads / Japan's X), and for each photo state which body and which roll you used. Then make comparison posts: your app next to the most popular local film camera app and a real phone's straight-out-of-camera output. Media needs "photo apps worthy of the new iPhone" stories during upgrade season, so pitch them in the two weeks after the new iPhone launches.

**When to launch by:** the Chinese market peak has passed. The next window is the 2027 Spring Festival travel season and the March–April cherry blossom season, so have a usable version before the end of January. Overseas, the new iPhone upgrade season is in September, the biggest single window **(inference)** .

**Signs you got it wrong:** (1) Gloam ships an official Android version and photo import before March 2027, while the China Photography bestseller chart still sits in the top 30. The gap got filled by Gloam itself. (2) Dazz adds "shoot first, tint later" and cuts prices, and Gloam's ranking drops out of the top 50. That shows users wanted the feature, not the aesthetic, and followers can't hold the position either. (3) The reverse: Gloam or similar Chinese film apps break into the Photography charts in Japan or the US. That overseas gap needs to be grabbed fast.

---

Data and sources: App Store China and other storefront category charts, rating counts, and reviews (10-28 to 11-06); Apple store page (11-06); gloam-image.com; iFanr 2026-09-18, 2026-10-10 (reprinted by NetEase and Phoenix); smzdm 2026-10-19 "Gloam Blew Up, Dazz Got Removed"; PCOnline "From Dazz to Gloam, why do retro filters catch on so fast?"; Operations Club 2025-04 (reprinted on Zhihu); Threads posts from Hong Kong and Taiwan users; Tencent App Treasure page. Apple does not disclose downloads or revenue. Anything marked "inference" is our estimate.

[iOS store page ↗](https://apps.apple.com/app/id6753741715)

**Research notes: competitor table, acquisition evidence, full research report**

Competitors

| Name | Where | Launched | Scale | How it differs from this one |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dazz Camera | iOS | 2018-08 | cn 1.18M ratings, 7 days +3,255, Photography category bestseller #16 | Dazz offers patterns across dozens of bodies, with a lifetime version around ¥88. Gloam focuses on tints and changing color after shooting, and it's cheaper. The community take: "pick Dazz for patterns, Gloam for flavor". |
| Hurricane Camera (Yingshi Hurricane / 影视飓风) | iOS | 2025-10 | cn 74K ratings, 7 days +5,652, category bestseller #14 | Also a creator-IP app, but more video-focused, with Log and real-time LUTs, one-time purchase about ¥20. Gloam leans toward film photos. |
| NOMO CAM | iOS | 2018-04 | cn 1.34M ratings, category bestseller #90 | Polaroid and disposable camera fun, targeting mass taste |
| OldRoll | iOS | 2021-06 | cn 61K ratings, growth has stalled | Film camera simulation with no RAW processing, and no color change after shooting |
| Fomz / ProCCD / Remo / Noka / Kapi / Doka and other CCD and AI retro cameras | iOS | 2022–2026 | Each 0.1–100K ratings | Mass-market Y2K/CCD vibe filters, some with beauty and AI composition. Gloam benchmarks against real film stock models and is made for photography enthusiasts. |
| Project Indigo(Adobe) | Big-company features | 2025 | Free, US and Hong Kong stores | Strong capture, weak rendering, pursues realistic tone with no style added. Direction is the opposite of Gloam. |
| Meitu (醒图) / Lightroom / VSCO | Big-company features | 2013–2020 | Meitu (醒图) cn 630K ratings, category bestseller #2 | It's post-editing, not shooting straight out of the camera |
| Yingze Jun's LR/Cube preset pack (predecessor) | Other | 2023-03 | A single 5207 preset sold 4,900+ copies, over ¥180K. The shop earns ¥150K+ a month (Operations Club 2025-04) | Users must import into LR and adjust themselves. The app removes post-processing but still can't import existing photos |

Where users come from

- **Verified** **Xiaohongshu organic posts (street shooting, film topics)** : smzdm 10-19: street-shooting tag "flooded over the last two weeks"; "Yang Liwei only took 3 photos in space because he didn't download gloam" got over 5K likes in five days; many comparison posts vs Dazz and vs GR3x

- **Verified** **Migration of Yingze Jun's existing brand and fans** : the official site says "Gloam Retro Imaging Studio (formerly Yingze Jun)"; Yingze Jun's Xiaohongshu account has about 21.7K followers and earns ¥150K+ a month from presets (Operations Club 2025-04)

- **Verified** **Tech media recommendation (iFanr)** : iFanr 2026-09-18 recommendation article; 2026-10-10 "Three photo apps worthy of the iPhone 18 Pro" put Gloam first. Phoenix and NetEase reprinted it. Whether there was paid cooperation is unverified

- **Verified** **Shopping guides and review content (smzdm, PCOnline, Bilibili)** : smzdm "Gloam Blew Up, Dazz Got Removed"; PCOnline "From Dazz to Gloam"; Bilibili "Only ¥38?… GLOAM Camera will save you"

- **Verified** **Hong Kong and Taiwan Threads / Instagram word of mouth** : multiple Threads posts saying "lots of people recommend it lately" and "completely replaces dazz". Hong Kong and Taiwan reviews say the same

- **Verified** **Timing: iPhone 18 Pro upgrade + National Day + Ricoh/Fujifilm out of stock** : media recommendations landed around the new phone and National Day. smzdm wrote "why buy a Ricoh, membership is already paid"

- Inference **Paid acquisition** : no evidence of ad spend found

## Why the Gloam Camera (iOS id6753741715) took off

> Research date 2026-11-06. Data sources: our appstore database (daily since 2026-10-28), Apple lookup, web (Jina search/read). Searching "gloam" on X (x-radar) in the last 60 days returned zero results.

### One line

Gloam is an iPhone camera app built from the film color presets that Xiaohongshu preset blogger "Yingze Jun" (the studio now renamed Gloam Retro Imaging Studio) had been selling for over two years. The presets include film-stock looks (Kodak 5207/5219/500T and similar cinema stocks) plus T3, GRD, and G12 type popular camera bodies. It launched in August 2026, and from 9 to October it picked up momentum through word of mouth in the Xiaohongshu street-shooting community, two recommendations from iFanr, the iPhone 18 Pro upgrade wave, and the National Day travel season. It charges a one-time lifetime purchase of ¥58. It differs from film apps like Dazz in three ways: the color presets come from the creator himself, so they have been tested by the market; it reads iPhone RAW and lets you change color after shooting (a "digital negative"); and it is cheap, with a one-time purchase. All three genuinely helped it grow.

---

### 1. Basic data

| items | value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Developer | Yingze Fan (personal account, this is its only App) | Apple lookup |
| Launched | 2026-08-09; current version 1.3.5 (2026-10-02, fixes crashes on iOS 27 Beta) | Apple lookup cn |
| Paid | Free to download; Gloam Pro is a one-time lifetime purchase of ¥58 / $7.99 (users have reported an early price of ¥38), plus an annual membership (cheapest in the Taiwan store about ¥30) | ifanr 2026-10-10, smzdm 2026-10-19, appstoreprice.org |
| Platform | iPhone only, no Android | App Store, smzdm |
| China store rating count | 10-28 is 166,11-06 is 181,10 days +15, about 1.5 reviews/day; global total 191 | appstore library app_day |
| China store rank | Top Grossing in the Photo & Video category, ranked #17–#26 (best 10-28 to 11-06 17,11-06 #25); 10-31 Top Free #20 | appstore library |
| other stores | It has also charted in category charts for Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam, Bahrain and more. In the Taiwan store its Top Free rank fell from #10-28 to #24 by 11-06, dropping to Top Grossing #136; in the Hong Kong store Top Free fell from 19 to 58; in the Macau store Top Free fell from 11 to 44 | appstore library |

How to read these numbers: the rating count is small (cn 181), yet it holds steady around #20 on the Top Grossing category chart, which means a high conversion rate and a one-time price point, not a large download volume. Hong Kong/Taiwan rankings drop clearly from late October into early November, suggesting **the peak was in mid-October, earlier than the start of our database (10-28)** . smzdm's 10-19 claim that "over the past two weeks, most people who browse street-photo tags on Xiaohongshu have probably been flooded by the same app" also checks out: the peak falls around October 5–19.

### 2. Competitors

| Product | Where | Launched | Scale (appstore database, cn, 11-06) | How it differs from Gloam |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dazz Camera | iOS/Android | 2018-08 | 1.18M ratings, 7 days +3,255; #16 Top Grossing in Photo | The leader in film / CCD emulation. Dozens of "camera" apps compete on variety of looks, and the permanent version costs about ¥88. Users complain of "standardized film look," "blurry output," and "tapping any filter pops up a membership prompt." Gloam focuses on a few carefully tuned looks and lets you swap colors after shooting. |
| Hurricane Camera (Yingshi Hurricane / 影视飓风) | iOS | 2025-10 | 74k ratings, 7 days +5,652; #14 Top Grossing in category | Also a creator brand that moved into apps, but leans toward video, with a focus on direct Log capture and real-time LUTs, bought outright for about ¥20 (smzdm). Its scale is dozens of times bigger than Gloam's. |
| NOMO CAM | iOS | 2018-04 | 1.34M ratings; #90 Top Grossing in category | Instant camera and disposable camera play, leaning entertainment, with an aesthetic aimed at the mainstream. |
| OldRoll | iOS | 2021-06 | 61k ratings; #115 Top Grossing in category | Film camera emulation by an indie developer, with growth that has already stalled. |
| Fomz / ProCCD / CCD Camera / Remo / Noka / LoFi Cam | iOS | 2022–2025 | Each 3–100K ratings | CCD and Y2K filter cameras, mass-market, leaning into vibe and atmosphere rather than film accuracy |
| Kapi / Doka / Bohu Light & Shadow / Muse / Berry | iOS | 2022–2026 | 0.03–90k ratings | "AI composition + retro filters + beautify," aimed at selfies. |
| Project Indigo(Adobe) | iOS (US and Hong Kong stores) | 2025 | Free | Goes the opposite way: "strong capture, weak rendering," pursuing realistic tonality with no added style. ifanr and Gloam were featured together in the same recommendation. |
| Xingtu / Meitu / Lightroom / VSCO | iOS/Android, big-company products | Early on | Xingtu 630k ratings, #2 Top Grossing in category | Post-production retouching plus filters, not direct capture; Gloam is "press the shutter and get a finished photo." |
| Yingze's own LR/Cube preset packs | Xiaohongshu stores, Taobao | From ¥2023-03 | A single 5207 preset has sold 4,900+ copies, with revenue above ¥180k (per operations blog 2025-04) | This is Gloam's predecessor. Users had to import photos into LR or Pixel Cake themselves. The app removes that barrier, but it also removes the ability to import existing photos, which is the most common request in reviews. |
| Real Fujifilm / Ricoh cameras (X100VI, GR4 HDF) | Hardware | — | Sold out, marked up | Gloam is treated as "a budget alternative to renting or buying Ricoh/Fujifilm" (ifanr, smzdm) |

Bottom line: the niche is crowded, with dozens of "retro film / CCD camera" apps on the China photo chart alone. Gloam's position is capturing users of Dazz who are **more discerning about aesthetics and care about specific film stocks** .

### 3. Growth tactics: where users come from

| Channel | Evidence | Confirmed? |
|---|---|---|
| Xiaohongshu organic posts (street shooting, film topics) | Stringers 2026-10-19: "If you scroll Xiaohongshu's street-photography tags, you've almost certainly been hit by the same app in the last two weeks." A viral post, "Yang Liwei only took 3 photos in space because he didn't download Gloam," passed 5K likes and 1,300K+ saves within five days. Others include "When I Stopped Chasing Dazz for Photos," "Gloam Ruined My Film Dreams," and "Gr3x & Gloam: Can't Tell Them Apart." One blogger, 9-18, wrote: "Came across it while doomscrolling Xiaohongshu late at night." | Confirmed |
| Yingze's existing followers and preset buyers | The official site gloam-image.com states "Gloam Retro Imaging Studio (formerly Yingze)". Yingze on Xiaohongshu has about 21.7k followers, with ages 18–34 making up over 9 of them. The shop earns ¥150k+ per month (operations blog / Zhihu 2025-04). On Threads, someone said, "Bloggers whose film looks are very close to digital almost all use Yingze's presets." | Brand continuity is confirmed; how many old fans migrated is unverified |
| Tech outlet ifanr recommended it twice | 2026-09-18 "Recommending a film camera app that ifanr's writer uses often"; 2026-10-10 "These three photography apps are worthy of your brand-new iPhone 18 Pro" (reposted by Phoenix and NetEase), placing Gloam first and noting that the lifetime purchase is only ¥58. | Confirmed; whether it was a paid partnership is unverified |
| Other media and shopping guides | PConline / Phoenix "From Dazz to Gloam: Why Are Retro Filters So Hot?"; a long smzdm article; a Bilibili review "Only ¥38? Film lovers and Ricoh-deprived folks, GLOAM camera is here to save you" (Little Panda Bear, 13:57), and others | Confirmed |
| Hong Kong/Taiwan Threads, Instagram | Multiple Threads posts saying "Gloam, a camera many people have been recommending lately" and "Completely replaces Dazz" (Hong Kong comments), and "Looks like Dazz, feels even better than Dazz" (Taiwan comments); on IG, "Another magic-shot app after DAZZ." | Confirmed, and explains the Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan rankings |
| Timing: iPhone 18 Pro upgrade wave + National Day holiday + gear anxiety before Double 11 | ifanr's recommendation is pinned to the new phone and National Day; smzdm frames it inside the "Double 11 film-look war," where Ricoh/Fuji are sold out and marked up, so the pitch became "why buy a Ricoh when you can get membership for the price." | Confirmed (timing matches; attribution is inference). |
| Paid acquisition | No paid-acquisition evidence found (our ad library only tracks listed products, so not finding it doesn't mean it didn't run). | Not found |
| Store search / ASO | Name is just "Gloam Camera," subtitle "Film simulation, retro camera," no keyword stuffing; traffic looks like it came from brand-name searches. | Inferred |

### 4. Why it charted

1. **The color grading was done by the author himself, and the market has already tested it.** Yingze's 5207 preset pack alone sold 4,900+ copies. Users get the same color science inside the app, tied to real film stocks (5207, 5219, 50D, 500T). That's why reviews keep saying "the film feel is right," "the grain is just right," "not the overly dark shadows Dazz tends to have" (Threads, ifanr, smzdm).

2. **It reads RAW, and you can change the color after you shoot. Few domestic peers do this.** Gloam reads iPhone RAW, applies color mapping and grain, outputs JPG, and keeps a "digital negative" so you can re-pick other looks, tone, and white balance from the same frame (ifanr 10-10). One user said, "I've waited twenty years for this app, and I love the re-pick-color feature in Pro," and another asked specifically, "Please don't copy Dazz, where the negative is locked to the preset you shot with" (App Store CN reviews).

3. **Cheap.** 58 yuan for a lifetime one-time purchase; smzdm calls it "the price of a roll of 135 negative film", and iFanr says "honest pricing". Dazz's lifetime version is 88 yuan, while other photo apps often charge hundreds per year. Low barrier, high conversion, so it can make the paid top charts 20–25 with very few ratings.

4. **It rode an existing mood.** On RedNote, CCD cameras, Ricoh GR, and Fuji X100 were sold out and marked up, and film and developing kept getting pricier. Add the iPhone 18 Pro upgrade and National Day travel, and a lot of people wanted the film look without spending on gear or rolls (smzdm).

5. **Word of mouth built itself through community content.** Street-photography memes and comparison posts on RedNote (Gloam vs Dazz, vs GR3x, vs Black Card) kept stirring debate, then outlets like ifanr, smzdm, and PConline amplified it. Yingze's two years of aesthetic credibility on RedNote was the foundation for all of it.

### 5. Differentiation, and whether that's why it took off

- **Versus Dazz:** Dazz sells variety (dozens of bodies); Gloam sells color grading and a reversible film workflow. The community consensus is "pick Dazz for variety, Gloam for taste" (smzdm quoting a RedNote 64 comment thread). **This is the main reason it took off:** it pulled the pickier users away from Dazz, and Hong Kong reviews literally say "it completely replaced Dazz."

- **Versus mainstream CCD/AI beauty cameras:** Gloam has no beauty filters and no AI. Its benchmarks are the rolls and bodies film shooters actually use (T3, GRD, G12, M72, G-Half). Its users are photography enthusiasts, not selfie crowds, so their willingness to pay is much higher.

- **Versus Yingze's own LR presets:** No importing, no grading skills needed. Press the shutter and you get the finished image. It turns two years of selling a "virtual product" into a tool, monetizing the same taste across a much larger audience.

- **Versus Jufeng Camera:** Same path (a creator IP turned into an app), but Jufeng leans video and LUTs while Gloam leans film stills. Jufeng is much bigger (74k vs 181 ratings), which shows that the size of the creator IP sets the ceiling.

Weak spots (most frequent in reviews): can't import camera-roll photos or RAW (the loudest request); no Live Photo or video; iPhone only; focal-length display is wrong; lots of noise in low light. Android users have been asking for two months, and someone on RedNote already built an Android clone with Codex (smzdm).

### 6. Visibility and copycats

- **Visibility: circulating in niche circles.** It's already popular among domestic photo enthusiasts and RedNote street-shooting circles, and ifanr, smzdm, and PConline have all covered it. But the app's revenue has never been disclosed (the only public figure is Yingze's preset sales of ¥150k+/month at 2025), nothing on X, and the English-speaking and US-store audience barely knows it exists.

- **Copycats and name-squatting:**
    - Fotee Cam (Liangjie Information Technology, launched 2025-05, id6746353945) renamed its Taiwan and Macau listings to "Fotee Cam - 原膠原味復古相機 Gloam," directly riding the Gloam keyword (appstore library, app_name).
    - Tencent's App Treasure has at least two same-name, reskinned "Gloam Camera" Android packages (com.khefzgb.isiqog, updated 1.0.5,2026-09-15; arg.nsia.ibrzhaoz), plus "Gloam Camera Android v5.2" listings on 18touch, 3dmgame, and other download sites. None are official. They're feeding on the gap where the official app has no Android version.
    - Gloaming — Film Camera (Zhumabai Asanaalyev) just charted on the 2026-10-23 US store with the same name and category. Not verified whether it was a deliberate name ride.
    - Someone on RedNote built an unofficial Android imitation with Codex, and a blogger extracted Gloam's colors as a LUT for Panasonic S9 (smzdm).

### 7. What others can learn

- **The "preset/aesthetic author → shooting app" path is replicable:** first build aesthetic credibility on RedNote through your work, validate payment by selling virtual presets, then turn the same palette into an "press the shutter, get the final image" app, using a one-time purchase to capture existing fans and community word of mouth. Other languages (Japanese and Korean film creators, Western Lightroom preset makers) and other aesthetics (portraits, Japanese-style, cinematic video) can all do the same.

- **"RAW + a reversible negative" is a technical selling point you can explain clearly,** and it sets you apart from the pile of LUT-wrapper filter cameras.

- **Anchor the price to physical cost** ("lifetime access for the price of one roll of film"). It converts niche users better than a subscription.

- **The gap:** Android, importing camera-roll photos / RAW editing, Live Photo and video are all things users name in reviews and Gloam hasn't built. The name-squatting Android packages are already feeding on it.

### 8. Still unclear

- Actual revenue and downloads: Apple doesn't disclose them; what Top Grossing ranks #17–25 in the CN photo category translate to in money is unverified.

- Whether the two ifanr recommendations were paid partnerships, and whether any RedNote viral posts were seeded by the studio itself or by influencer collaborations.

- Yingze's current follower counts on RedNote / Bilibili / Douyin, and how many old fans converted (RedNote pages can't be scraped).

- The mid-October peak rank: our library only starts at 10-28, by which point it was already declining.

- The app's id range (6753…) looks like it was created in the second half of 2025, but the launch was in 2026-08-09. Whether there was a beta or a rename in between is unverified.

### Sources

- App Store: [apps.apple.com/app/id6753741715](https://apps.apple.com/app/id6753741715); Apple lookup (cn, 2026-11-06)

- appstore library (agent-im server, DuckDB): app_day, app_profile, v_chart, app_name, review, 2026-10-28 through 11-06

- Website: [gloam-image.com/](https://gloam-image.com/); [gloam-image.com/gloam-camera/support](https://gloam-image.com/gloam-camera/support)

- ifanr (reposted on ifeng) 2026-09-18: [tech.ifeng.com/c/8wWHI1m7jZt](https://tech.ifeng.com/c/8wWHI1m7jZt)

- ifanr (reposted on NetEase/ifeng) 2026-10-10: [www.163.com/dy/article/L8SKO9R605118O8G.html](https://www.163.com/dy/article/L8SKO9R605118O8G.html), [tech.ifeng.com/c/8wsCGasivT0](https://tech.ifeng.com/c/8wsCGasivT0)

- smzdm 2026-10-19 "Gloam Blew Up, Dazz Got Removed": [post.smzdm.com/p/a3mx49qr/](https://post.smzdm.com/p/a3mx49qr/)

- PConline/ifeng "From Dazz to Gloam, why is this retro filter so hot?": [g.pconline.com.cn/x/2184/21840821.html](https://g.pconline.com.cn/x/2184/21840821.html), [feng.ifeng.com/c/8xRJhXYoXSt](https://feng.ifeng.com/c/8xRJhXYoXSt)

- Yunying She (Zhihu / Sina / Ebnew) 2025-04 Yingze sells presets: [zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/1897698486713046300](https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/1897698486713046300)

- Threads: posts by @hoi2_paau3, @dive_in_aespa, @raikkonen_ and others (see main text); blog [baokker-blog.top/2026/09/18/Gloam-%E7%9B%B8%E6%9C%BA-App-%E6…](https://baokker-blog.top/2026/09/18/Gloam-%E7%9B%B8%E6%9C%BA-App-%E6%8E%A8%E8%8D%90/)

- Price: [appstoreprice.org/zh-tw/apps/6753741715](https://appstoreprice.org/zh-tw/apps/6753741715)

- Name-squatting Android packages: [sj.qq.com/appdetail/com.khefzgb.isiqog](https://sj.qq.com/appdetail/com.khefzgb.isiqog), [sj.qq.com/appdetail/arg.nsia.ibrzhaoz](https://sj.qq.com/appdetail/arg.nsia.ibrzhaoz)

This article was written by AI from public data and the data we collect daily. Numbers are sourced, and inferences are labeled.