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| Kodaikanal Diaries | Mobile Landscape Photography | Piller Rocks |
Welcome to Candyklickz. In our last post, we gave tips for effective smartphone flower photography. In this post, we shared our suggestions for Smartphone landscape photography. You can also utilize the tips given in the “15 vital factors for effective Smartphone flower photography” post for landscape photography. The photos we shared in this post had taken during the Kodaikanal trip.
Kodaikanal is a famous tourist spot in Tamilnadu. I hope you all know about this place. This Kodaikanal excursion was an unforgettable family trip. It gave an immense experience to us. We bagged good numbers of moments using our smartphone. We used some landscape photographs in this post. We will post the other genre of photographs in our upcoming posts.
I just want to clarify something before moving into the topic. There are things that are "Good photos," but there is no such thing called "Good methods" for taking photos. Both the Auto and Professional modes are essential for photography. The thing is you have to learn to use it wisely.
Kodaikanal is a famous tourist spot in Tamilnadu. I hope you all know about this place. This Kodaikanal excursion was an unforgettable family trip. It gave an immense experience to us. We bagged good numbers of moments using our smartphone. We used some landscape photographs in this post. We will post the other genre of photographs in our upcoming posts.
I just want to clarify something before moving into the topic. There are things that are "Good photos," but there is no such thing called "Good methods" for taking photos. Both the Auto and Professional modes are essential for photography. The thing is you have to learn to use it wisely.
Clean the lens
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| Kodaikanal Diaries | Smartphone Cleaning cloth |
The common mistake we do while taking a photo is not cleaning the lens and screen properly. You should keep the lens clean. You can use soft microfiber cloth material or any other soft cloths to clean it. The dust in the lens can affect the quality of the image.
If you are using an additional lens kit, then wide-angle lenses are the best suited for landscape photography. There are different kinds of external lens kits with different focusing ranges are available in the market for an affordable price. The default camera lens in our mobile is too good, but still, the external lens kit can help to improve the range of your camera lens and boost the quality of the pictures.
A little shake or hand movement can create blur in the scene. Investing in tripod helps to stabilize the camera so that you can shoot the exact shot which you desired. It is an ideal option while taking photos in low light and faster shutter speed.
The zoom and flash options are useful in a specific occasion, but it is not advised to use in most of the scenarios. Zooming affects the pixels by scattering it which reduces the quality of the image. Zooming with your default lens is just another way of cropping the picture. You can do the same in post processing. Flash at low light conditions creates noise in the image. It adversely affects the quality of the scene. So, it's better to go with another source instead of a flash.
I know, most of the beginners prefer an auto mode to take pictures. An auto mode is fine, but you can’t experience an alluring beauty of nature in different ways without using manual control. Especially, you can enjoy the moments even before clicking the photos. Always remember one thing; your mobile phone is no better than the human eyes and brain. So, you can get a better outcome through manual processing.
Equip wide angle lens
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| Kodaikanal Diaries | Mobile Landscape Photography | Lens kit |
If you are using an additional lens kit, then wide-angle lenses are the best suited for landscape photography. There are different kinds of external lens kits with different focusing ranges are available in the market for an affordable price. The default camera lens in our mobile is too good, but still, the external lens kit can help to improve the range of your camera lens and boost the quality of the pictures.
Tripod
A little shake or hand movement can create blur in the scene. Investing in tripod helps to stabilize the camera so that you can shoot the exact shot which you desired. It is an ideal option while taking photos in low light and faster shutter speed.
Say No to Zoom & Flash
The zoom and flash options are useful in a specific occasion, but it is not advised to use in most of the scenarios. Zooming affects the pixels by scattering it which reduces the quality of the image. Zooming with your default lens is just another way of cropping the picture. You can do the same in post processing. Flash at low light conditions creates noise in the image. It adversely affects the quality of the scene. So, it's better to go with another source instead of a flash.
Mobile Manual Controls
I know, most of the beginners prefer an auto mode to take pictures. An auto mode is fine, but you can’t experience an alluring beauty of nature in different ways without using manual control. Especially, you can enjoy the moments even before clicking the photos. Always remember one thing; your mobile phone is no better than the human eyes and brain. So, you can get a better outcome through manual processing.
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| Kodaikanal Diaries | Mobile Landscape Photography | Camera 5 FV lite App |
The most common manual settings you have to learn is metering, aperture, Shutter speed, exposure, white balance, and ISO. Aperture measure is the lens opening size, which controls the amount of light reaching the sensor. Mobile camera modules have fixed aperture settings, so it can't be adjusted. Shutter speed is the duration of a lens opening time. It is a time duration that the sensor exposed to the light. It's also known as exposure time. It's usually measured in seconds. Normally the shutter speed ranges from 30 seconds to 1/8000th of seconds. ISO is the sensitivity of the lens to the light. We can select the ISO based on the amount of light source. The higher the ISO leads to grains in the picture. It ranges from 100 to 1600 in mobile camera apps. The above parameters lead us to the exposure composition (brightness). Generally, in Smartphone exposure ranges are available from -2 to +2.
If your smartphone camera doesn't have manual (professional) control features, use some other Android apps available in the app store. Plenty of mobile camera apps are available in the Android market. I suggest an app like Camera FV-5 lite, Open camera, Footej camera, Camera Zoom FX, and Manual camera (paid).
Open your eyes towards opportunities
In landscape photography, you don’t need to travel a long distance to take beautiful photos. Even a terrace of your home gives you a good opportunity to freeze the scene. There are plenty of mesmerizing moments are waiting for your camera. The only thing you have to do is take out your smartphone and capture all of them in the best way possible by you.
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| Kodaikanal Diaries | Mobile Landscape Photography | Perumal Hills View |
For example, if you surf for the landscape photos in a web, you can see a lot of simple photos with influencing potential which have followed some specific set of rules. If you have a close look at those photos, the photographers utilize the opportunities like reflections, shady sky, sun flares, symmetry, natural framing structures, leading lines, and the shadow of the subject with the plain terrain backdrop. What I am coming to say is everything is an opportunity for a photography enthusiast.
Get a viewpoint
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| Kodaikanal Diaries | Mobile Landscape Photography | Bryant Park |
The smartphones are not heavier one like the DSLR and its gear. So, it is to carry and place where ever you want. When you are standing in a wide-open space to take a landscape photo, always look out for a strong element. The element can be any landscapes like rocky areas, sky, sun flares, hills, fields, seashores, rivers, roadways, and so on. After selecting a subject, find the best way to capture it by changing your perspectives. Try to shoot from a top angle or eye level or a low-level position depends on your subject and backdrop. Get the best viewpoint to steal every bit of the stunning elegance of nature by your smartphone, and fill the landscape in your frame.
Old school basics
The composition is an essential ingredient of photography. There are some old school rules are there to compose a great image. Some of them are Rule of thirds, Patterns, Depth of field, Background, Balancing elements, Framing, Rule of odds, Color combination and simplicity.
Rule of third
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| Kodaikanal Diaries | Mobile Landscape Photography | Pillar Rocks |
The "Rule of third" is one of the best composition techniques. It's about placing elements in the scene. The whole frame divided into 9 equal rectangle boxes with the help of two horizontal and two vertical equidistant intersecting lines. The intersection of lines gives four intersecting points. The basic idea is to place the elements on off-center positions because our eyes naturally concentrate on the other portion than the center of the frame. To apply this rule, you can use the grid option in your camera app. Placing the subject in the intersecting lines or points produces a more balanced image. Placing the subject in the intersecting lines or points produces a more balanced image. It doesn’t mean that the subjects need to be perfectly synchronized with the grid lines or intersecting points, it can be somewhere near or along with the lines.
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| Kodaikanal Diaries | Mobile Landscape Photography | Saleth Matha Church |
Balancing / Secondary elements
Adding balancing elements in the scene gives support to the subject or fills a negative space in wider and plain landscapes. Having secondary elements like humans, animals, or any other objects on the foreground helps to attract the viewer's eye into the image.
Framing
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| Kodaikanal Diaries | Mobile Landscape Photography | Natural Frame |
Framing is quite a tough task because the framing structures have to be available for the scene, naturally. This topic is about the framing process during the photo shooting, not a task during post-processing work. The artificial structures, trees, branches of the tree, naturally built structures or particular elements in the scene act as a frame for your image. It is not always possible to get one like that, but if you got an opportunity then never misses it.
Lighting
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| Mobile Landscape Photography | Coimbatore - Kuruchi Lake | Sunset |
You can do wonders with perfect lighting. Lighting is the soul of photography. The golden hours such as before the sunrise and sunset are the best suited for landscape photography. You can take great photos with the help of soft and diffused light on golden hours. The bluish sky creates an exceptional cuteness to the overall scene. You can also do a photo shoot during the daytime, but you have to take more care of the sunlight. You have to learn to manage the sun flares and make use of it. Even after the sunset, you can use the darkness to long exposure photography like to capture the stars, light trails, passing cars, and so on.
Post processing
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| Kodaikanal Diaries | Mobile Landscape Photography | Pixlr Online Editor |
It is not always possible to take the photos with perfect settings, so we need to reprocess the captured images for getting the desired result. Almost all the photographers do post-processing to adjust the parameters. Post processing is inevitable in photography. You can find so many software and image editing apps in android or iOS store. We usually use the Google photos application for a simple editing process. We also use mobile applications like Google Snapseed, Adobe Lightroom, and Adobe photoshop express.
My sincere thanks for visiting Candyklickz. I hope you enjoyed reading this blog. If you have any suggestions, write it in the comment box. If you are interested in doing a guest blog, please let us know. We are expecting continuous support from you. Thank you.
Mobile Devices used:
Redmi note 6 Pro
Photo Editing:
Pixlr Online Editor
Snapseed
Adobe Photoshop Express android app
Snapseed
Adobe Photoshop Express android app
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