From Terry Burnes: Phone Photography Followup

Photo by Terry Burnes (not taken with a phone)

Terry Burnes wrote the post "On Phone Photography" last Friday. As a followup to that post, here's the key for the pictures on his website that were taken with a phone vs. a dedicated camera.

First, here's Terry's online album, 199 photographs.

Next, here are the ones that were taken with a phone:

• 11–22
• 76
• 77
• 79–89
• 97–137
• 140
• 143–186
• 188–190
• 193–4
• 197
• 199

That’s 118 out of the 199, by Terry's count.

Even if you didn't try to sort them out without knowing which was which, it might be interesting now to go look and see how much difference you can detect.

Finally, here is Terry's response to all the Comments on his post:

I want to thank everyone for the thoughtful discussion of phone photography. A few clarifications: Several commented on the phone's ergonomics. I just want to be sure that everyone knows that on most phones, pushing either volume control (up or down) will trigger the shutter. So, use the touch screen to set your focus point and adjust exposure if necessary. But then trigger the shutter with the volume buttons that feel more like the release on a traditional camera. Likewise you can plug in the simple ear buds that come with most phones and use the volume control on those to trigger the shutter. The Shuttergrip is quick to attach and remove and allows easy, stable one-handed operation of the phone, leaving your second hand free to shade the screen from direct sunlight if necessary. I sometimes use my second hand to shade the lens from sun too. I rarely take the kit pictured in my post with me. Mostly I just use the phone, but if I do want an accessory, like a lens or two or the grip, with me I just slip them in my pocket. The lenses are smaller than a ping pong ball, the grip a bit bigger.

Thanks again to Terry for sharing his experience in his post!

Mike

Original contents copyright 2018 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

longviewer: "I've chosen not to invest in a phone for its photo capabilities, so none of these images could be made at my price point. Glad it works for many, but it's not my cup of cocoa +coffee +Irish cream."

Herman Krieger: "In regard to phone photography, don't call me, I'll call you."

Comments

[Oskar Ojala]

Looking at the photos, some show the telltale sign of being taken with a phone and some are not obvious in this reproduction size. The telltale signs are loss of fine detail, chunky gradients and oversmoothing minute color changes. And on iPhone the green ghost blob, but I didn't see that one in the photos I looked at.

Having experimented with phone photography way back in 2005, I haven't really felt that it's a novelty for a while. The crucial changes, adequate image quality for small prints and the ability to edit well enough on the phone came in the last few years, however. In light of this, the phone is today just a tool for me and the big limitation is not the resolution (how often was resolution the main hindrance in producing results in the history of photography?), but the chunky gradients and overpowering noise reduction even at base ISO. Digital artefacts rarely end up looking good.

[Manuel]

You know, Mike, all these articles about the iPhone are getting a little tiresome.

[T. Edwards]

Okay, I wasn't even close.

[Richard Jones]

Very interesting and informative!

Having seen examples of phone camera photography in the past from friends, I've concluded that the phone camera is an excellent general purpose tool, but falls short in many cases (according to my standards, anyway!).

I found the photographs very revealing. I use Micro Four Thirds for many situations, and Full Frame for landscapes and closeup/macro for greater resolution. I notice that both the phone camera and M43 photographs suggest small sensor, especially in the landscapes, and not a lot of difference between them in some cases.

Example of landscapes: #140 (phone) and #142 (M43)

Some of the closeups of flowers photographed with the phone look nice at this web size, but lack of resolution of the small flower parts would be obvious when viewed at a larger size, IMO.

The comments about the younger generation are pertinent. Photography is a much different activity for many younger people, for sure, as I observe almost daily. The convenience of the phone camera is the main attraction, as I've discovered when talking to people who use the phone camera as their only camera. They wouldn't consider even a small P/S!

Richard

[Mark Hobson]

here's an important tip for cell phone picture making - http://lifesquared.squarespace.com/blog/2018/4/7/civilized-ku-5174-never-feel-embrassed-again

[Joe]

How's my project going?

I never talk about my projects, not until the day I release each one into the world.

Is that a superstition? Partly. But from the first project I obsessively pursued, I discovered that my own feeling of excitement about what I'm shooting, that I-can't-wait-to-drag-my-equipment-to-this-place feeling in the morning, is the most trustworthy judge of whether the completed project will be worthwhile. It's not infallible, but I've learned that it's a much better judge than any of my most trusted friends, colleagues, or portfolio reviews.