Durban - Globe-trotting photographer Stephen Alvarez is a man on a mission. He believes everyone can take great pictures and he wants to show them how.
“Until quite recently you needed to invest thousands of dollars in cameras and lenses. Now all you need is a good quality smartphone,” Alvarez told me on a recent visit to South Africa, hosted by Microsoft. And he proved it by showing a selection of stunning photos he’s taken in several African countries, in Rio de Janeiro, in Nepal of Mount Everest and in the US of the Grand Canyon, all captured with Nokia (now branded Microsoft) Lumia smartphones. Many have appeared in National Geographic magazine.
Here are Alvarez’s top tips for snapping magazine quality photographs with a smartphone.
Always have a camera on you
“The best camera in the world is the one you have in your hand when the picture presents itself. These days that’s likely to be a smartphone,” says Alvarez. That bulky DSLR will probably be in its case, or worse still, back at home or in the hotel room safe.
Take lots of pictures
Alvarez, who takes thousands of pictures on each of his expeditions, believes one of the biggest mistakes rookies make is to take too few pics. “The more pictures you take, the better your chances of capturing a gem.” And in these post-film days of digital storage, there’s no excuse not to go wild.
Be an early bird
Alvarez got up at 3.30am to capture his breathtaking pictures of Rio and the iconic Sugarloaf Mountain. “The lighting is best just before dawn and sunset, but you’ll see far more sunset pictures because most people are awake then. If you want your pictures to stand out, get out of bed early.” Once the sun’s properly up, the light is “hard”, so Alvarez suggests you seek out scenes with strong colour and build an image out of colour and graphics instead.
Shoot into the night
The early crop of camera phones were terrible in low light. But recent models are a lot better. If you have one of these, says Alvarez, shoot into the night and see what yours is capable of. For best results, rest your phone on a solid surface to minimise camera shake. He demonstrated this to me at the Cape Town waterfront well after sunset and the results were impressive, both on his Lumia 1020 and my review Samsung Galaxy Note 4.
Work the angles
“Shoot high, shoot low, shoot sideways,” urges Alvarez, who believes the small, light form factor of a smartphone is ideal for capturing the kind of quirky angles you’d have to lie on the floor or stand on a ladder to achieve with a DSLR.
Watch your edges
“Most people put their subject into the middle of the frame. That is fine, but it’s often more interesting if the picture isn’t symmetrical.” Alvarez prefers to focus on the edges, framing his picture with interesting objects or landscape features.
Choose the right smartphone
Alvarez is a big fan of the Lumia range, particularly the 1020, 1520 and 930, which all meet his exacting criteria for the ideal camera phone: a decent processor to minimise lag; a large bright screen to frame, review and even edit shots; optical image stabilisation to cut down on camera shake; the ability to back images up to the cloud over mobile and wi-fi networks; and a physical shutter button for near-instant access to the camera.
While I heartily endorse his choice of the upper-end Lumia phones – I particularly like the 930 – quite a few other phones make the grade, although not all of them have a dedicated camera button. These include the Samsung Galaxy Note 3, the Sony Xperia Z3 and both versions of Apple’s new iPhone 6, although the bigger 6 Plus takes the better pics of the two.
E-mail [email protected] or follow @alanqcooper on Twitter.
Sunday Tribune