The Blur app will give your home screen wallpaper a fresh new look

Use your own pictures or ones borrowed from the Internet as a fancy blurred background on your Android

Want a really cool effect for your home screen wallpaper, but aren't a PhotoShop guru? If so, you need to check out a new app called Blur in Google Play. Blur allows you to take any picture and apply an adjustable blur effect and set it full resolution as your home screen wallpaper.

It's really simple to do, and the whole routine involves only choosing a picture and adjusting a slider. The paid version (just 99-cents) also allows you a bit of control over the colors, while the free version will randomly do a bit of adjustment if you like by tapping on the image. The free version also has some ads in a banner at the top.

Blur registers as an Android intent, so you can share pictures into it right from the gallery, and the entire process is live and with a real-time view. I tend to keep things pretty simple when it comes to the home screen on my devices, but I'm digging this one, and gladly sprung for the paid version. Check out the short video of just how it works and the end result after the break.

Jerry Hildenbrand
Senior Editor — Google Ecosystem

Jerry is an amateur woodworker and struggling shade tree mechanic. There's nothing he can't take apart, but many things he can't reassemble. You'll find him writing and speaking his loud opinion on Android Central and occasionally on Twitter.