SMARTPHONE PHOTOGRAPHY
Feature-packed smartphones mean you have a powerful camera in your pocket. But can a phone really replace a ‘proper camera’ for serious photography? Jeff Carter reveals how to get the best out of your phone when shooting outdoors
Jeff Carter
With over 30 years of photographic experience, SE Scotland-based motorsports photographer Jeff Carter has travelled the world in search of that perfect shot. The former Fujifilm X Photographer has also carved out a reputation for his landscape work, running workshops in and around his home in Dunbar and further afield in the Highlands. Visit www.macleanphotographic.com and Instagram: @maclean_photo
The first thing to remember when using a smartphone for more serious work is to stop thinking of it as a ‘snapshot’ camera and treat it like a DSLR or mirrorless set-up.
Composition and lighting are equally important for mobile phone photography. The latest smartphone sensors pack a mighty punch, with 48MP or more being common these days, but these sensors are quite small. This means a very deep depth of field even with the fast apertures that phone cameras have, which is perfect for landscape photography, and noise can be more of a problem in low light. However, the clever software engineers have found solutions that negate almost all these issues, with the latest phones being packed with firmware to simulate shallow depth of field and reduce noise significantly in low light.
There is also the issue of the lenses having a fixed, usually very fast, aperture. The latest iPhone, for instance, has an f/1.78 aperture on the main camera and f/2.2 and f/2.8 on the ultra-wide and telephoto respectively. While a fast aperture can be useful in low light or indoors, they are not adjustable, and this must be taken into account when shooting long exposures.
