If you ever felt like your photos were worth bragging about, then you might want to pick up Mission: Pic for free on iOS.
It was made by just a couple of developers who hope that the app will turn mobile photography into a competitive sport. In that sense, it’s another attempt at gamification — or using game mechanics for non-game applications.
With Mission: Pic, the developers issue a new mission each day. Players take photos that satisfy the assignment, and then all of the players vote on who did the best job. The result is an ever-evolving leaderboard of the best photos.
And why not? If you think of Instagram as a photo app with a social layer, then Mission: Pic is a photo app with a gaming layer (or meta game). It uses a Tinder style swipe-to-vote user interface. You can vote a picture up, down, or just pass on it.
If today’s mission assignment is “metal,” players could submit a close-up photo of an aluminum can or a well-framed photo of the crowd at an AC/DC concert.
The app was created by two developers and a part-time helper with the goal of getting people outside, interacting with strangers, and changing their perspective through creativity and play. Mission: Pic rewards activity with achievements and rewards.
“We shoot for missions that can be completed any day, anywhere, by anyone, but nothing gets us more excited than hearing from players who say they spend all day looking a little closer at the world trying to find the perfect picture,” said Brett Rounsaville, co-creator of Mission: Pic, in an email.
Rounsaville, who works in Oakland, Calif., is a former designer for the Walt Disney Company who, after leaving his job and his home, spent the next two years on a quest to complete his life list. While traveling, he maintained a weekly online video series and collected several nominations and awards along the way. His adventures have been featured on “Good Morning America,” CNN, Fox News, CTV and countless radio, newspaper, and Web outlets.
More recently, he has been creating “urban adventure games” with The Go Game for Fortune 500 companies.
Mission: Pic’s other co-creator is Shane McCafferty, a seasoned iOS developer. He’s made apps since the inception of the Apple App Store for individuals and companies, including Eurogamer, Videogamer, VG247, Orange, Head First, JAW, and Capcom. He has had several No. 1 applications. His apps have been featured by Apple many times and played by millions.
Rounsaville got started in March 2014 with contractor David Yun, and they brought McCafferty on later.
“We’re scratching a very real itch in the mobile photography world. It resonates most with folks who want a lightweight way to stretch their creativity every day and love interesting photography,” Rounsaville said.
“We bring an element of gaming to mobile photography that is bolstered by years of domain expertise in the real-world gaming space,” he continued. “I have been producing urban adventure games that involve, in small part, sending folks out into the world to capture creative photos and videos, and in that capacity, I’ve produced games for Google, Microsoft, Apple, Dropbox, and others.”
“Think of it as a cross between Instagram, Reddit, and Tinder,” Rounsaville said. “We’re genuinely convinced that not only can we build something that everyone can have a great time playing but also a platform that could be responsible for discovering the next Ansel Adams or Anne Geddes.”
The developers are bootstrapped, and they’ve had one small investment from Ian Fraser, co-founder of The Go Game.
So far, about 55 percent of users are monthly active users, and nearly 10 percent of users take a photo every single day. One player takes a picture of LEGO snowtroopers in a different setting each day to satisfy missions.
