It amazes me the megapixels that come on a phone today. Every few months phone companies are coming out with something new, and what is the one thing they are always improving? The camera! To be honest, for the past couple of years I have been basing my new phone decisions off of the camera’s quality. Today iPhones can take panoramas, live shots and even time lapse videos! I use my camera everyday, and I’m a huge fan of Instagram. I have decided to go over a few tricks I swear by when taking photos and editing photos on my iPhone, so listen up!
Something you should do everyday and make a habit of is cleaning your camera lens. Now you don’t have to buy special cleaner or do anything fancy, but simply just wipe it off. I usually take my glasses lens cloth and clean off my front and back camera. This way you are assured to get a clear picture!
Secondly, lighting plays a big factor in picture quality. I always make sure that whether I’m using the front or back camera, that I’m always facing some natural light. That could mean if I’m outside then I am facing the way the sun is shining, or if I’m inside, then I’m facing a window. Everyone knows that when you have bad lighting, the picture usually turns out pretty grainy which isn’t very appealing. When you have good lighting in a photograph, you have a better chance to add some great color in there.
The first steps that I take to edit a well-lit photograph are, adjusting the brightness and contrast. This will make your photograph look more crisp and lively. Before I upload any photos through social media, I usually upload them to my VSCO account. This is a great app where you can edit photos and share them as well. I actually prefer to use the contrast and brightness settings through this app than I would through my basic camera app.
Also, something else I’d like to point out is when it’s best to transfer a photograph to black and white. The key is clarity and lighting. If your photograph is already lacking good lighting then it’s most likely going to be grainy, and those photographs look the worst when they’re black and white. So follow those steps I spoke about before. Make sure you have some good, natural lighting, then your black and white filter will give your picture a bold exterior.
If you really want to explore your editing options on your iPhone then go on and upload a few editing applications. Some of my favorites are VSCO, Instagram, PicTapGo, Afterlight and DeluxeFX. Take one photograph and play around with it on every application, save them, compare them and then chose your favorite. This is my favorite thing to do on a rainy day or if I’ve got some spare time before bed. I hope this has guided you in the right direction when in comes to getting your sharpest shots, and have fun with the color! To me, finding the perfect color for a photograph is the best part!