8 tips to help improve your phone photography

In a perfect world we'd all be carrying around DSLRs and would know how to master every aspect of the camera to document our lives and our children, but we don't live in a perfect world. We live in a world where people don't even think twice about owning a camera (which is sad to me) and where the only documentation people have of their lives are snapshots they took with their cell phones. 

Even with how far cell phones have advanced (photography wise), so many of us don't know how to master what they can really do for us and we're not getting the full potential out of them. I'm so passionate about capturing memories, it's all you'll have one day, that's why I'm sharing some of my personal tips with you. 

Get the Lighting Right SOOC (straight out of the camera), or in this case straight out of the phone. Fixing lighting is one of the hardest things to do post processing, especially when you're shooting with a phone. With that said, if you have to go one way or the other, underexpose the image (go darker). It's harder to recover images that are too blown out (bright). Hot spots are almost impossible to recover and it's such an eye sore to see bright white patches in your image with lost detail.

too bright, lost details vs. exposed correctly

My favorite app to make any exposure corrections in is Lightroom, I use the curves feature. If you don't know how to use curves you can just use their simple exposure adjust tool, it's super easy, just slide right for brighter and left for darker. It also has options to adjust your highlights and shadows, use those lightly, you want to keep good contrast in your image. When it's too flat it's not eye catching.

Shoot in Natural Light, as much as you can. I know it's impossible to always shoot in natural light (and we'll get to that), but do it when you can. Always turn off any lights around you and use the windows/doors in the area to light your photo. Make sure you pose facing towards your natural light source. If the light source is behind you, it'll make your background too light and you (or your subject) will be too dark. When you can't turn off the artificial lights, still try to use natural light as your main source and still use the same tips. Pose in front of the natural light source.

backlight vs. side/front light

indoors, posed in front of natural light.

Make Sure the Subject is in Focus. This one, this is so important to get right, it makes all of the difference. Now with that said, there are tons of photos out there that are out of focus and still perfect, but if you can, get it in focus, you'll be thankful. When my photo is in perfect focus my favorite editing app to use is Lightroom, I use the sharpen tool to get my details a little clearer. Don’t get carried away with sharpening though, that can be a bad thing.

Don't Over Edit. This might be the most common thing I see people do. They take a photo, slap a strong filter on it, and call it good. Or people will use too many photo editing apps and that kills the quality of the actual photo. Stick to 2 photo apps MAYBE 3 for one photo. When you edit a photo it should look as if you took it that way. People should have to wonder whether or not you edited it.

My three favorite phone editing apps are: VSCO, Lightroom, and Tezza. My favorite Lightroom presents are BPS Presets. My favorite filters in VSCO are the C series (I typically stick to C6, C7, C8, and C9), and my favorites from the Tezza App are Vintage, Moody, and her textures. Sometimes I switch it up depending on the photo but those are the ones I typically stick to.

C7

 Use the Shutter Burst Feature, especially when taking photos of your kids! If your kids are always on the move don’t be afraid to press and hold your shutter so it keeps capturing images, then you can go back and find the best one from the burst to keep. The faster your shutter speed, the better you capture movement.

 Don’t Over Zoom and don’t over crop either. If you want the subject closer then move closer. Our phones don’t have the greatest zoom feature (I don’t care what phone you’re using) so try to move yourself closer to the subject when you can. As far as cropping, same rules apply. Don’t take a photo of someone/something from far away then crop it in tight on the subject, you’re killing  your quality.

Change your perspective. Move around, get low, stand on something, shoot at different angles. This seems so simple but it can really help you out a lot. 

Last but not least, if all else fails you can always slap a black and white filter on it and 99% of the time it'll look good.

indoors using artifical light, no natural light avaialble, blurry.

Ultimately you have to shoot what you love, so don't take these tips as dictations, just friendly suggestions to help improve your images. Shoot for you and shoot what you love. 

Full disclaimer, I shoot with an iPhone, but I'm going to assume the same tips and tricks will work for you Android users as well.