Categories
Instagram Photography

How I learned to stop worrying and love Instagram

These are the latest 20 images on my Instagram stream, If you like them, you’re invited to follow me

I like Instagram. I think I do because it sends me back to the days I was listening to records, holding the 12-inch colorful square album covers, admiring the artwork.

Instagram reminds me of my first encounter with the legendary 500-C Hasselblad camera, that square window to the world that made everything look beautiful.

No doubt these covers allured me into the field of commercial photography.

Today, I don’t really need the camera to have a square frame, I crop to measure and it’s all good, I still use 1:1 frame when I see fit, but since the music business changed a lot, the commercial use of a square frame became more rare, until Instagram came and gave it a renewed breath of life.

Growing up into being a professional photographer, I trained myself to capture interesting frames, I could see them all around me, and went through many (many!) rolls of film, until I developed the “eye” for a good composition, slowly assembling a worthy portfolio, I wish I had Instagram back then…

Not many professionals are as “obsessed” about their work, enough to practice it in their free time, I can’t think of an accountant making calculations for fun, or a farmer plowing a field just because he likes it.
When you’re a photographer, that’s a different deal, at least for me, I just can’t help it, I need to be ready to click at all times.

I used to carry a compact camera with me wherever I went, when I found anything frame-worthy, I’d snap it.

When Nokia came out with their Lumia 920, the platform was ripe enough for me to try, they also promised an excellent camera, promised and delivered.

Soon enough many photography apps became available, allowing some serious ways to manipulate images, many Instagram like apps too, but not THE Instagram, the one many people were on. I started worrying, I got the Lumia 920 for its camera, and I wanted to share it and Instagram wasn’t in sight, until a month ago (*Nov. 2013). As soon as it was available I installed it, and it became my new composition playground. I shoot, I post, all done.

Instagram selfie in an elevator
Categories
Los Angeles Photography Smartphone Urban

Smartphone camera, you don’t leave home without it

Happy new 2012 everyone!
Here’s my current favorite smartphone camera snap, I’m having too much fun with this smartphone camera.

Cafe 50's Los-Angeles,CA.

I’m using a Nokia Lumia 920, What are you using?

Posted from WordPress for Windows Phone

Categories
Art Phodigraphy Photography Smartphone Street art

Smartphone photography is fun

Smartphone photography is fun, I stopped using my snapshot camera a year ago, shortly after I started using a smartphone. Up to that time I always carried a compact camera with me, even when I had my Professional DSLR camera with me, it was usually a Canon PowerShot.
Now I always have with me my phone/snapshot camera/music library/phonebook/portfolio/…. well, you get the idea.

Thanks to Steve Jobs for refining the concept, and thanks to all the rest who picked up the ball and started running. The best is yet to come.

The smartphone images are about as good as any snapshot camera, less the zoom capabilities.

I never use the phone’s digital zoom, I prefer to crop an image after taking it, that’s if I really need to. In order to satisfy my kink for constantly framing the world around me, the smartphone is a great solution.

The huge variety of cool apps out there is a bit confusing at first but I narrowed it down to two apps that I find are fun and helpful. The one I can’t do without is Thamba photo editor, it’s a feature-rich “Photoshop” substitute, the other is LoMob which allows me to mimic different film styles. Here’s a couple of recent shots.

I shot the first one at my doorstep this resilient little thing was growing from the concrete two feet in front of my door. I consider it lucky even though it has only three leaves. I shot he fire hydrant a couple of blocks from my house.