iPhoneography, getting out of your creative rut

Over the last few years, a new word has entered the photo world; "iPhoneography". If you think about it, iPhoneography is a strange new word isn't it? We never used to say Nikoneography or Canoneography, did we? After all, does it really matter what we are shooting with? 



On the second day of 2012, I exchanged my iPhone 3GS for a brand new 64GB 4S. Since that day this little camera has boosted my photographic creativity in more than a few ways. 

Going back to the end of 2011, I found myself in a creative rut. Most photographers have gone through periods where one was lacking the motivation of going out and trying new things. Some call it creativity block. Surprisingly the iPhone 4S has really helped me getting out of my rut!    

Looking at blogs like iPhoneography.com it almost seems like the whole thing is becoming a cult. But why? Is the 8 million 4S camera better than most of todays compact cameras? Probably not, but there are clearly some important advantages. Here we go:

1/ The best camera is the one which is always with you! Quoting Chase Jarvis, this is clearly the number one and the most import advantage! When an opportunity presents itself, using an iPhone is clearly better than not having any camera at all!

2/ Small form factor, easily fits in a pocket

3/ Looks non-intrusive to shoot. People will not feel overwhelmed.



4/ Good for street photography; as one can pretend working on the phone while shooting

5/ Automatic geotagging; built in GPS coordinates with every image. Works perfect with the new Map function in Lightroom 4!

6/ In phone photo editing with cheap third party applications, anywhere between free and less than 5 USD!

7/ Able to directly upload images to all kind of social media sites like FaceBook, Flickr, Twitter etc... straight from the phone!

8/ Easy to focus 100% on composition; since there is only one focal length, no choice of aperture, shutter speed. No complicated camera settings to play with... 

9/ Accessible and relatively cheap when one considers most of us already have a mobile phone anyway.

10/ Shooting with the iPhone is FUN! Dragging a heavy DSLR body around, one sometimes forgets why we all started making pictures in the first place...

Probably also the reason why I never take my DSLR on our yearly ski-holiday. A compact camera like my Nikon P7000 does the job of shooting some winterscapes just fine... however this winter the P7000 stayed in its bag and the iPhone was my go to camera for the entire week!  

Even though the small Nikon probably has better image quality than the iPhone each one of the advantages above made me grab the phone instead! Clearly it is never going to replace a pro (or even consumer) DSLR body. Every camera has its place. Just like a carpenter uses the best tool for a specific job, we should do the same as photographers!

For me part of the iPhoneography fun is the "in phone" photo editing. Here are my top 5 iPhoneography applications:

1/ Without doubt my number one is "Snapseed". Most of you probably know I'm a huge fan of Nik software ColorEfex and SilverEfex for my DSLR photo editing. This universal iPhone and iPad app of the same software developer, is really defining the future of photo editing on small devices like the iPhone. The fact that it received "Apple's iPad app of 2011" award probably says enough!

2/ "Camera +" ; this app replaces the native iPhone Camera app to make the images. Its most important feature is the fact that one can separate the focus and exposure points. On the native one they are always at the same spot and every photographer will understand that this is not always a good thing... Even though quite a few new camera replacement apps do similar things, this one has sold over 8 million copies!

3/"Filterstorm 4", Even though I've only just started using Filterstorm, it looks very promising! It's noise reduction seems like it is definitively worth the 3.99USD price of admission. Also this is one of the only apps that uses layer like photoshop. 



4/ "Photogene2"; interface of this photo editing app almost feels like a native iPhone app. It has some unique features like being able to make collages. See image above.



5/ "Autostitch" : a great app to shoot and edit panoramas in a matter of seconds! 


I will finish with a few iPhoneography inspirational hangouts. The first one is Instagram, a great online community for sharing images accesible on mobile devices like iPhones, iPad and since recently also on Android devices. Two blogs I read regularly are "iPhoneography.com" and "iPhoneographycentral.com" 


Let's end with the following: "The iPhone is not going to replace my Pro Nikon gear anytime soon,  but it sure is a good booster for creativity"!


Don't forget to check out my own iPhoneography gallery here.


Grab your iPhone and explore the world!
BJORN

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