Posts in Category: iPhone4
8/7/2010
Across the Harbor Mouth
iPhone HDR. Kennebunkport Harbor where the Kennebunk River reaches the sea, taken from Parson’s Way. The low sun of evening in the summer with the foreground rocks already in shade. This shot breaks the compositional rule of horizon placement (rule of thirds), but I think, with the mass of clouds and flash in the sky, and enough interest in the foreground, it just might work. I could crop it, but however I did it, I would lose. IMHO.
Captured, processed, and posted on the iPhone 4. Pro HDR and PhotoGene used for processing. SmugShot for posting. Auto blend in Pro HDR, with no adjustments. Slight tweaking of levels and sharpening in PhotoGene. Horizon straightened.
From iPhone4 HDR and Pano.
8/3/2010
No Name Creek: iPhone Panorama
This is 12 images from the iPhone camera, representing over 220 degrees of view, taken from the same spot as yesterday’s HDR (you might want to compare). It really needs to be viewed as large as your monitor will allow (click the image and use the size controls at the top of the new window). AutoStitch on the iPhone makes this kind of shot easy. You just take roughly overlapping images and the program does all the aligning, stitching and exposure blending for a very polished result.
Often I use a panorama matrix that is two shots deep…4 across and two down for 8 images, or 5 across and 2 down for 10, but with this sweep I kept it simple. I was not about to attempt 24 overlapping shots. When you do two shots vertically you get an automatic HDR effect, since the upper shot is generally metered off the sky, and the lower off the foreground, and the AutoStitch exposure blending routine does an excellent job of preserving the best of both. With a single layer pano you lose that benefit, and, indeed, this set correctly rendered the sky but left the foreground too dark…even with levels adjustment in PhotoGene, since I was not willing to sacrifice sky detail for the landscape exposure. In Lightroom I would have used the dueling Graduated Filter effects I have outlined in the past, but I was determined to keep all processing on the iPhone for this iPhone shot. Therefore I used Tiffin’s FotoFX app to add a .6 Graduated Neutral Density filter effect to darken the sky. Once saved, I reopened the image in PhotoGene and adjusted curves, exposure, contrast, and saturation for the finished image, which is a pretty good rendering of this huge sweep.
From iPhone 4 HDR and Pano.
8/2/2010
No Name Creek: iPhone HDR
So I admit to still being slightly amazed and muchly delighted that the iPhone can do this! Such a great toy. Of course it is actually rapidly becoming a tool…just another piece of equipment with its set of inherent possibilities that I can bring to bear on photo opportunities. It is still all about the eye. That is not to diminish the simulative effect of a new toy. Having the HDR program and a decent camera on my iPhone certainly stimulates my eye to look for possible HDR-worthy scenes, and leads me to compositions I might not have attempted with my standard gear. This shot, for instance would have required considerable manipulation in post processing to pull off. The iPhone just makes it easy.
Lots to like here (imho), beginning with the range of tones in the foreground water…the way the camera has captured the play of light across the surface and even where it penetrates the water to bring up the creek bottom. That, to my eye, is way cool! Then we roll back over the various textures and green tones of the marsh grass, lead by the curve of the creek, to the horizon and the little bit of beach balanced between the dark mass of houses on the left and the few trees on the right, and then we shoot out over the ocean under a ceiling of clouds that recedes to infinity, with the blue of the sky pinning us to the top of the frame.
Of course, I did not think or see any of this when taking the picture. I did not get much beyond “I like that. Wonder what it would look like as an iPhone HDR?”
Captured and processed on the iPhone 4. Two exposures in ProHDR, one metered and focused on a bright cloud at the top, one metered and focused on the shadow under the bank of the stream in the left foreground. Levels and sharpen in PhotoGene, and the red channel pulled back a bit. Uploaded direct to Wide Eyed In Wonder in SmugShot.
From iPhone 4 HDR and Pano.
7/30/2010
Marsh by the Mousam
This is another iPhone HDR using the Pro HDR app. Two exposures, tap, tap, one for the sky and one for the foreground, auto processed in the app. Slight adjustment: horizon straightening, levels, and contrast…red channel pulled back a bit…in PhotoGene on the iPhone, then uploaded to Wide Eyed In Wonder (SmugMug) using SmugShot. Could not be easier. Everything was done right there in the field at the time, with the scene before me. Though it is not an intentional feature of the Pro HDR app, selecting exposure areas in the sky and background also alters the iPhone camera’s focus point, which makes for a processed image that is sharp, as here, from immediate foreground to to the distant clouds. Like I have said before…I really wish my Canon SX20IS could do this!! (And there is absolutely NO reason it could not…it is just software.)
As far as the shot itself goes…well it has just about everything going for it. Glorious sky, reflections in still water, strong horizon with the mass of houses leading in on the left, wonderful detail and interesting texture in the swirling marsh grasses, subtle effective color tones throughout…even that bit of stump sticking up to anchor the eye in the foreground. Add the HDR effect and you get a photograph that strikes the eye like the best landscape painting…in the sense that we are not used to seeing this kind of range in a photograph.
It almost makes me laugh out loud when I remember that it was produced completely on the iPhone 4! Who could have imagined it?
From iPhone 4 HDR and Panos.
7/28/2010
Mousam Mouth Pano
Continuing one more day with the iPhone theme, here is an AutoStitch panorama made up of 10 separate images…5 across, and two down. It needs to be viewed as large as your monitor will take it. Click the image and use the size controls a the top of the window that opens. AutoStich could not be easier to use. Take any number of overlapping images with the iPhone’s camera so they are saved to the Camera Roll. Then open AutoStich and select them from within the app. That’s it. AutoStitch then intelligently assembles the images into a panorama, blends exposure, renders the finished image and gives you the option to auto crop. The image is not perfect…but it is very close. Since I often, as in this shot, have to straighten the horizon a bit, and I want to sharpen slightly and maybe adjust curves, I generally do the cropping in PhotoGene, again, right on the iPhone. Finally, I upload the image to my Wide Eyed In Wonder site directly from the phone using SmugShot. Could not be easier.
This, by the way, is the mouth of the Mousam River, seen from the Kennebunk Bridle Trail across the marsh…Great Head, Parson’s Beach, and almost out to Route 9 on the right…close to 180 degrees. Taken and processed with the iPhone 4.
From iPhone HDR and Pano.
7/22/2010
iPhone 4 Possibilities
I have been having fun with the iPhone 4 camera. This is the first phone I have owned with anything approaching a real camera: 5mp with a focusing lens, etc.
Couple that with the excellent photo software available for the iPhone and you can have some fun.
The first shot is a panorama of 6 images, 3 across and 2 down, done in AutoStitch. You shoot roughy overlapping images, load them into AutoStitch, and it does the rest. And does it very well. Better really than any panorama software I have used on my laptop.
The second image is a two exposure HDR done in ProHDR. Again, you just shoot two shots, touching the screen where you want to take the exposure readings, first light, then dark, and the program combines them to an extended range rendition. It also has slider controls to tweek the result for contrast, saturation, and warmth.
I generally take the output of these two programs and crop and sharpen, and sometimes adjust the curves, in PhotoGene…also right on the iPhone.
That is a lot photographic power and a lot of photographic potential. Like I said, having fun!
Clicking either image should load a larger version for your viewing pleasure.