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The Guardian has relaunched its iPad Eyewitness app, which offers users a daily news photo, with a new premium in-app subscription offer for extra images.

In a release , the Guardian reported that over the past two years, following its launch in April 2012, the app has been downloaded almost one million times (923,941) with an average of 11.5 million page views a month this year.

Last year the app was shortlisted for a Webby Award in the category of best tablet app, as well as a web innovation award at the Foreign Press Association Media Awards in 2010.

In a video outlining the new features of the relaunched app, head of photography, Roger Tooth, said the publication of a compelling news photo, which began in the centre pages of the newspaper in 2005, is "just as popular on the iPad".

As a result the "new and improved" app now also offers an subscription option which, for £1.49 a month, will give users an extra three images each day as chosen by the picture desk.

Tooth told Journalism.co.uk that there is "usually more than one great picture a day" so the Guardian thought a premium offering "could make use of that" additional material.

Subscribers will also be able to access "live daily photo series" around big news events, starting with an Olympic diary.

The release adds that in future this will consist of "a single standout picture each day during major world events", and will be seen in action during the Paralympics this month.

As before the relaunch, the app is free to download and users can receive a single image each day for no cost, and access to "an archive of the most recent 100 Eyewitness images", the release adds.

The images include those taken by the Guardian, as well as external sources such as Getty Images and Reuters photography.

"Each image is also accompanied by a 'pro tip', to give professional insights into the composition or technical specification of a particular image", the release explains.

Speaking to Journalism.co.uk Tooth added that when images are selected for use as the Eyewitness photo "the idea is that it's supposed to arrest the readers attention for more than a nanosecond".

It is important for images, wherever possible, to include "lots of detail", he said, to absorb the viewer's attention.

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Written by
Rachel McAthy

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