Breaking the silence
Platform Staring
After a short hiatus of photographing, restudying my catalog filled with images, simplifying some post processing techniques, I stumbled upon photographs I took with my mobile phone in the last year. I kind of like the mobile phone for its simplicity. The fact that you only need to aim and press the shutter button. It is free from technique and you can focus completely on the composition and the subject. I know there are great apps available nowadays for post processing your photographs, but I still prefer to do so on my notebook. I however created an action in Photoshop in combination with a Silver Efex Pro custom setting that gives me quick results that I like.
Track 15
The quality of the images (technical IQ) is still not quite comparable to my Ricoh GRD III, but they might eventually get really close. Yet, it doesn’t really matter ’cause I kind of like “LOMO” lowtech simplicity and look. And I plan to use my mobile phone for a lot more occasions, especially for street photography.
Dividing Clarity
And it is amazing what some photographers are doing with their mobile phones. Just check some here at The Mobile Photo Group.
Where to go
Suspicious Stare
All photographs by Wouter Brandsma
Fascinating street photos!
Thank you.
Lovely work as ever, Wouter. I find myself using phones more and more.
Lately the HTC one s. Which do you use now?
Lili
I try to keep it simple, Lili. I mostly use a LG E900 (with WP 7.5). It lacks a good camera app like Camera+ for the iPhone. Additionally I use an iPhone 3G sometimes, but with 2Mp it is pretty basic and very noisy. The current version of Camera+ is highly unstable on the 3G, so instead I use QuickPix (which takes pictures very fast on an iPhone). All above photographs were taken with the LG though.
Wouter, thanks for the reply! I just got the HTC, its draw is different that my Nokia N8. I posted my above comment from the One S under my wordpress account, you know me from twitter as @lilitu57. I still have my Lumia and, of course the N8. I find the N8 to give superb IQ in good light, very close to that of my GRD, but without the superb User Interface. Sadly, while it has a rather good in-camera processor Symbian seems to lack decent flickr uploader
WP7.5 has an excellent one however as does Android.
http://liliputianlens.blogspot.com/ my cellphone blog
Apparently the N8 has a really good camera (and your blog has some very fine examples of proofing that). And recently I saw the iPhone 4s can do and I was very impressed too. I really like the immediacy and it works really well for my black and white photographs. Ciao!
Wouter, thanks! I admit I am a gear head, I buy too many cameras and shoot not as much as I ought to. One of the reasons i started shooting with phones was for simplicity’s sake; one camera, one lens, with you all the time. Sadly I then bought several phones as well
Patterns you know?
Ah well, I am having fun
Lili
Oh, you’ve got GAS patterns Lili! Thankfully I don’t have to worry about that. The best cure is having no money
Very inspiring article and photographs!
Thank you Inge. Most of the time we nowadays have a mobile phone with us, which makes it the best camera of all.
Wouter,
agree cell phones can be used for bxw streetpics. These kind of pics require some mystery, BxW, with some grain or noise and or unsharpness makes them even better,
so aperture control is absolutely not needed, but shutter control is something i really lack in mobile phones, they often are a bit slower, resulting in unwated smeary images.
So even using a cell phone requires me to stop, freeze, aim and shoot, something which a GRD does not really need.
For the pics; love them all but TRACK15, i do not see anything interesting in this pic, but the other i envy as most of your pics.
Bart
Thank you Bart for your honesty. I appreciate that so much. The Track 15 is a photograph I had considerable doubts about (and still have). Despite its ordinary presence I like the lightning and the moment that I saw the seagull through the window. It is true though that it is a completely different kind of photograph.
I rather like track 15, but it looks more like falcon than seagull; shorter head, longer tail etc..
It is actually a Herring gull, Lili. Track 15 certainly is different, but I still like it too.
And it’s amazing what you are doing with your mobile phone. But what comes through clear is your very own signature, Wouter. That may have to do with the processing still on your notebook but I think it’s depending on that very unique point of view of yours & the stories one can find behind every single frame. That makes all the difference & that’s what makes your imagery so one of a kind! Thanks for that!
All the best & safe travels, Fritsch.
Thank you Fritsch. I was very surprised to realize that even with my significantly simplified post processing still enabled a look I wanted to achieve.
Hello Wouter! Ek het na jou hele blog gekyk en dit ongelooflik geniet, al is ek self geen fotograaf nie! Jou foto’s herinner my baie aan my vriendin se foto’s. Gaan kyk gerus by keranphoto.wordpress.com. Alles van die beste vir jou werk!
I hoop dat je mijn Nederlands ook begrijpt Yolande. Gelukkig begrijp ik wel veel van jouw Afrikaans. Dank je wel voor je aardige reactie en wat een mooie foto’s maakt je vriendin.
Hi all,
I love using my iPhone, like your blog says it breaks photography down into is simplest elements, all you need to worry about is composition and really focus on the purely creative side to photography which in my opinion which is the most important aspect.
Keep up the good work,
Luke