7 tips to better iPhography ( iPhone Photography )

We have had thousands of new visitors to iPhography.com & hundreds of new followers on Tumblr so we decided it was a great time to give a round up of the best of our iPhography tips.

For those of you who are new to iPhography ( iPhone Photography ), welcome & here are our ‘7 tips to better iPhography’

Tip #1 - Definition

Although not specifically mentioned in iPhoto ‘09 that the new feature called ‘definition (a slider in the adjustments pallet) is for iPhographs. It appears to be perfect as a one step solution to clarifying & enhancing the details of your iPhography. Just the thing we have been waiting for.

We’re looking forward to getting to try it out (preferably on the snazzy 17” Macbook Pro)

The other thing we’ve noticed as we troll the web for iPhographs is the amount with extra glow or fuzzyness. This is caused simply by people clearing the lens with their fingers or synthetic clothing. The best way to clean your iPhone’s lens is with a lint free cloth or cotton tshirt. Gently brush aside any dust before trying to wipe greasy finger prints off, because you don’t want to rub the grit into the lens & scratch it.

Tip #2 - Hold your breath!

Because breathing on the lens or fogging it to clean the lens, is the worst thing to do. Photographers that purchased secondhand SLR lenses may notice they weren’t as sharp as new ones. This isn’t because old lenses sucked but because people often breathed on the lens to clean it & no matter how well sealed it is, this would often cause almost invisible bacteria or mould to grow inside the lens.

Tip #3 - Super Macro

Wonderful iPhography can happen when you marry a Swiss Army Knife & an iPhone

Now don’t make me slap you, if your gonna say that you don’t have a Swiss Army Knife?? You can survive almost anything in life with a Swiss Army Knife, a Zippo, an iPhone & a roll of gaff tape. But if for some strange reason you don’t own one or don’t have enough spare cash, then pop down to your local gadget store & grab a cheap $5 magnifying lens or better yet, grab all different kinds & experiment

Note in the iPhograph above, the direction the knife is facing. It works much better this way as you can rest the iPhone on the lens & get in closer than if the handle was the other way around.

Here are some macro iPhography examples I quickly shot before sunset. I only used iPhoto’s crop & enhance tools

Who said you cant get good macro on an iPhone? Above is a 5 cent piece (Not the larger 20) the item that may destroy your iPhone because Apple won’t put a sliding/flap dock cover

This is one of those small clover flower thingies (my wife’s description) Notice the nice Bokeh

The above was a cactus tree from my neighbour that drops all of it’s flowers over my fence. But keep in mind that you don’t just need to use the lenses to keep things in focus they also can create some wonderful defocused iPhographs

Tip #4 - Size is important

Something I have recently discovered but you may not know could save you from some frustration. Images in the Camera Roll taken with the camera are saved at 1600 x 1200 but the images in your library that have been synced from your computer are 640 x 480 or smaller depending on the aspect ratio.

A good way to test this is if you have Photogene installed, open an image from the camera roll & use the crop tool. You will notice numbers to the bottom left indicating image size. Then open an image from your library & do the same & you will see it is much smaller.

So remember for best edits always edit the image while it’s in the camera roll (or use the app to take the pic) & not after you have synced it back to the library. Editing an image from the library will result in small grainy iPhographs which are not much use unless you need a small iPhograph for the web

Tip # 5 - Google Street View (2.2 update)

Combine The new Google Street View with screen capture & you will be able to take street level iPhographs of any place you have ever been to (Assuming google has street mapped that area).

First open your maps app then drop a pin in your desired location. to the left of your dropped pin in the title, you will see a little man in a red circle, click on him to get into street view. Now move by tapping the arrows & swiping to swivel the camera angle until you find what your looking for.

Then it’s just a matter of using the screen capture. Which is holding the home button & taping the sleep button to take a screen shot of your iPhone, you will here a click noise & it will save to your photo library.

We’re in the space age baby! After I got home from Japan I had wished I had taken pictures of more places I had visited, like all of the cool alleyways etc. I cant believe that in this day & age I can sit in my been bag in Australia & take a picture of a window of a house I stayed in, in Tokyo??

I’ve included some iPhographs from that place. The iPhographs are over bright or to dark in some places & low res, so you may want to tweak them with iPhoto or your favourite iPhography editing app

View of my old Tokyo Nerima bedroom window from my beenbag in Coffs Harbour Australia!!

Tip #6 - Polapaddle™

Ok your all going to start thinking that I’m the reincarnation of Macgyver because all of my tips & projects so far seem to revolve around getting your Swiss Army Knife out & using common household objects to save the day. Well this tip is no exception. Many of you may be familiar with photographic practices but were wondering simple ways to transfer them to iPhography. You might want to take your iPhography to the next level by adding a polarizing filter but thought it was to bulky & impractical.

What many of you may not know or have forgotten is that they also make polarizing lenses for video cameras that have a much smaller lens size & are much cheaper. My local photographic shop sold me this 27mm circular polarizing lenses for $20 AU (Just look for CPL printed on the lens) & you can even get smaller ones. Polarizing lenses have a few useful features like darkening the sky, deepening colours & removing reflections from glass, water & foliage. What makes polarizing lenses so important is the effects are totally dependent on how it manipulates the light & the effects can’t be added or replicated afterwards with software. Polarizers are great for enhancing black & white images also.

So without further adieu I will show you how to make the extraordinary Polapaddle™ using a mint tin, a ruler, a circular polarizing lens & a drill / Swiss Army Knife

How to assemble - Firstly if for some reason your a child with rich enough parents to buy you an iPhone & you have become an avid iPhography.com reader, then please get adult help before attempting this. This step is a little tricky but first you need to drill a hole in the ruler (Not the hard brittle rulers) then whittle & sand away until you get a hole that is slightly smaller than the screw thread on the lens. You then basically screw & force it into the hole. After completing this I discovered that if you use a black ruler or paint it black, you will be able to prevent light reflections from getting behind the Polapaddle™ a little better. “So what’s the mint tin for?” I hear you ask. Well it’s simply a way for you to carry your Polapaddle™ around in a lint/sand free environment that makes it easy to get to quickly. A good idea is to place a small piece of foam or a cotton ball in the bottom to stop the Polapaddle™ rattling around & it’s much easier to get the Polapaddle™ in & out than with a pouch.

The main reason for using the Polapaddle™ is that it enables you to more easily rotate the lens to get the desired effect your after

The finished Polapaddle™

How to use your Polapaddle™ - if your right handed, hold the iPhone in your left hand & using the first 2 fingers, press & hold the Polapaddle™ to the back of the iPhone. With your right hand you can rotate the Circular Polarising lens until you get the desired effect. You can then click with your left thumb or just tap with your right index finger, depending on how big your hands are. Note that a polarizer works best when you are facing 90º to the sun.

Example 1. The Polapaddle™ has made an overall enhancement of the image with deeper blue skies (not that we have much trouble finding deep blue skies in Australia) also the image is brighter, but I don’t think it’s totally the Polapaddle™ but the effect that the slightly grey lens has on the iPhone’s image sensor, tricking it into making it a bit brighter

Example 2. You’ll notice that not only has the sky deepened but because the reflections have been removed from the leaves, the hedge is also more vibrant.

So get to it & Macgyver yourself a Polapaddle™ to take your iPhography to a new level

Tip #7 - Spread the word

Here’s a tip about SEO (search engine optimisation). Because we don’t write iPhone Photography in every single post, we won’t rank as high in search results. We’re kind of OK with this because we want to unify iPhography together as a movement but at the same time we’d also like to see iPhography grow as much as possible.

The more we spread the word about iPhography & the more it grows, the more hints tips & information we can bring you. We think there is a bright future for iPhography as not only will the iPhone become more advanced but so to will the Apps, Accessories & skill sets of iPhographer’s worldwide

Here is where we need your help in 3 ways

1. Tell your friends. Word of mouth is one of the best way to spread something but better still write it down for them ‘http://iphography.com’. Let your friends know about ‘the worldwide movement of spontaneous life recording & untethered digital artistic creation’ & the joy you get from iPhography
2. Link to us - http://iphography.com You can either just paste the link everywhere you can think of or you can get some great iPhography.com buttons here that are perfect for sticking on your blog, myspace, facebook etc. There’s plenty of sizes to choose from. If you use Tumblr your welcome to reblog us if you leave all links intact.
3. Start labeling any images or discussions about iPhone Photography as ‘iPhography’. This helps us to both unifying the movement of iPhography as well as find iPhographs, iPhographer’s or iPhographic Equipment & Apps that we may be searching for to feature on our site.

You’re welcome to use the term iPhography (as well as iPhographic, iPhographer & iPhograph) in any non-commercial or even commercial way to describe an iPhone Photograph without infringing our copyright or trademarks.

Yes that’s right, you can use it anywhere because it’s our aim to bring together iPhographer’s worldwide. The only condition is that you don’t use it to name anything other than an iPhone Photograph without our permission eg. you can’t use it as a title for your website but you could use your tag line or slogan as ‘the iPhography of John Doe’ & you couldn’t’t name a book iPhography but you could have a book title like “it’s a small word” with the description as “A book full of the worlds iPhography”. So just to clarify, you can use it to describe your iPhography or iPhographic products but not to name them.

Another good reason for this is in some situations you may be infringing on Apple’s copyright for iPhone & as such it’s just shorter & easier to use iPhography that instead refers to the creative movement or what you can do with an iPhone rather than just the iPhone itself.

So now you have 4 new words to add to your lexicon

1. iPhograph - An image captured & edited on an iPhone. Also a Pseudo-iPhograph is an image captured with another device & edited on an iPhone or captured on the iPhone but edited on a computer with software like Photoshop, iPhoto or Aperture
   eg. “A new auction world record has been set by an Australian iPhographer for his iPhograph entitled ‘I did it iWay’”
2. iPhography - worldwide movement of spontaneous life recording & untethered digital artistic creation through the use of iPhographs
   eg. “Have you ever thought about getting into iPhography?”
3. iPhographer - A person who uses Apples iPhone & 3rd party apps & accessories to create iPhography
   eg. “My Mum’s a fanatical iPhographer”
4. iPhographic - Refers to the technique or equipment to produce an iPhograph or the general style & look of an iPhograph
   eg. “Honey, I’ve gone out shopping for some more iPhographic equipment” or “I think this image is interesting, very foggy with lots of movement. It looks very iPhographic”

You will notice that iPhograph.com, iPhographer.com & iPhographic.com all point to this site (iPhography.com).

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So there you have it. Our round up of ‘7 tips to better iPhography (iPhone Photography)’

If you would like some more simple tips visit our tips page