I did it! I made an iPhone app and officially joined the ranks of millions of developers with an app on the Apple App Store. HerePix: Photos from where you are.
For the past few years, especially when traveling, I kept asking myself, “What photos have I taken here?” Sure, you can dig through your phone to find them, but why isn’t there an app that instantly shows you all the pictures you’ve taken at a specific location? Turns out, some apps do exist, but they were bloated with unnecessary features. I wanted something simpler, more intuitive.
Though I’ve always been comfortable with tech, I never really saw myself as an app developer. I’ve spent more time with scripts and found object-oriented programming challenging—especially back in college when I struggled through Java classes. I had tried making simple apps with tutorials or Swift Playgrounds, but those felt like exercises without a real goal in mind.
That’s when I decided to try a different route. I knew I could figure out app design and tweak code if someone could just give me a solid starting point. After seeing how outsourcing app development worked at my day job, I thought, why not give it a shot for my personal project? I turned to UpWork, a platform similar to Uber or TaskRabbit, where freelancers bid on jobs. I found a developer overseas who agreed to help me with the basic foundation of the app. Within a week, he had provided the skeleton code, and I had an app that did the basics of what I envisioned.
That’s when the real fun began. I started refining the app, working on the branding—enter HerePix, a name I’d been holding onto for years for this exact idea. I dived into learning Swift, UIKit, and building out layouts, focusing on the visual elements and taking the app beyond the initial framework. Today, only about 5% of the code in the released version of HerePix came from the freelancer; the rest has been the result of my time, effort, and plenty of trial and error.
I started testing HerePix with the Xcode simulator, then on my own iPhone. Whenever I’d go to a new place, I’d open the app and verify that all my photos from that location were displayed. I’m happy to say that the app is now everything I wanted it to be—simple, intuitive, and exactly what I’d envisioned.
Of course, this isn’t going to make me a fortune. In fact, it’s a free app that will likely go unnoticed by most people, but that’s not why I made it. This was a passion project, something I did for the joy of creating. And who knows, maybe it will lead to future apps down the road.
So, if you’re curious, give HerePix a try. I’d love to hear what you think, and I had a blast making it!
As of this post, HerePix is available worldwide on the Apple App Store for iPhone running iOS 18.0 or later.