Although the iPhone camera is not the best by a long shot (although the recent addition of the Clarifi has helped, in the case of close-ups anyway), it is still possible to do some interesting things with it. The App Store helps a lot here. There are one or two really handy applications for playing around with images – I actually have a whole page of them. I’m not going to list them all, but my top picks are probably Photogene, which is a small photo editing program for cropping and adjusting levels etc.; and CameraBag, which can apply a number of different processing effects to images either from the camera roll, or taken straight on the camera.
Consider the shots below – the first one is the original, and the others were all created with CameraBag.
For uploading I tend to use Tumble to post snapshots to my tumblelog, or FlickUp to get them up to Flickr.
4 responses so far ↓
skink74 // December 11, 2008 at 20:38 |
Now, this is antagonistic, but all this shows me is that the iPhone camera is “not the best by a long shot “. No matter what some tweaks do, there’s not enough clarity and contrast in the original image to give you much to work with in post.
I mean, sure it’s better than my 6310i, but what isn’t? IMO – the limit here is the original lens/sensor combo and for anything other than impulse snapshots I’d want a camera not a phone. No amount of post is going to make up for that…
Andy Piper // December 11, 2008 at 22:00 |
That’s a fair comment. I completely agree that the iPhone camera is rubbish – it’s a real shame they didn’t take the opportunity to update it for the 3G model. It is fixed focus and poor. The only thing the apps do really is make it a little more “fun” to use. And there’s no way I can carry my DSLR everywhere I go for a quick snapshot, so this has to do.
heidi // December 11, 2008 at 23:58 |
Sure the iPhone camera could be better, but I’m honestly ok with it. I really enjoy using Photogene, and I actually like some of those shots Andy got with the CameraBag app.
For a quick camera this works for me, and most of the time I’m just sending pics to TwitPic or Tumblr. The iPhone camera is a million times better than the camera on my old phone anyway… at least I can make out what I’m taking a picture of when I’m done with it.
The apps do make taking pictures on the phone more fun, even if they’re not perfect, I think that makes it worth it
Dave // January 2, 2009 at 11:56 |
I agree. The iPhone camera is poor in quality but better than some phone cameras of the same era. Camerabag has given my iPhone camera a new lease of life for out-of-the-pocket shots. I use a Canon 5D D-SLR plus extra battery pack so its the size of an elephant (but not a white one). Horses for courses huh? I wouldn’t take prized shots with the iPhone camera and I wouldn’t/couldn’t keep the 5D on me all the time.