iPhoneography for Natural SubjectsGudrun Schulze Ebbinghoff
When I plan to photograph, I dutifully lug many pounds of camera equipment, especially if my intended subject is a wild animal (you know how heavy big glass can be). So I'm happy to put it all down from time to time. This is Mr. Murphy's cue to action.
I do, however, always have a camera at hand. It took me a couple of years to discover it, but over the course of the last half year I have gained tremendous appreciation for it. It's my iPhone; an older model too: the 3GS. This 3.2 megapixel quick draw marvel generally resides in my pocket, providing me with helpful (photographic!) information like GPS coordinates, and the precise time and location of a sunset or moonrise anywhere in the world. It's even capable of remote-releasing the shutters of some cameras. I don't generally intend to take photographs with my phone, but you've heard that the best camera is the one you have at hand. I have images that would only be memories had my silicone-ensconced umbilical cord to the world not been attached. Internet groups and coffee table books already exist, brimming with beautiful images that might otherwise never have been made.
It's fun, too. There are powerful and inexpensive apps like Nik Software's SnapSeed that can turn your image into art with a few quick swipes.
The current 4S model has 8-megapixels. Do you recall how many megapixels your first digital camera had? My husband's shot 640x480 and saved files to a floppy disk! In addition to a faster processor, the 4S also has an LED flash. Autofocus (and tap-to-focus/expose) simply doesn't get easier, and images are all geotagged, so even if you don't use the image from your phone, you can make a reference shot for the images from your big cameras and add the information to the metadata later. Add-on lenses are even available to give you telephoto capability from the built in 4mm up to 12x that focal length. The biggest drawbacks? The operating temperature is only down to freezing and it has a maximum operating altitude of 3000m -- not so good for the mountaineers -- but I happily snap through the summers when I have my family in tow as it can be real work to pull out the heavy equipment. I really enjoy adding these images to digital albums, and my kids love paging through the resulting books.
Her new BFF, well within operating specs. And I now take photos when before I would never have thought to shoot. This image of a storm over Canmore was shot while speeding by on the highway. I wasn't driving. I promise.
Canmore I even have images I snapped with my phone that I quickly revisited with one of my SLRs yet I still prefer the phone image to my attempted recreation of it. So don't discount the camera in your pocket. While you may not capture the exact position of every whisker on the coyote's face as it leaps to catch a mouse, an aerial coyote can still make for an interesting image.
|
