How to take better travel photos on your smartphone

THERE are simple rules you can follow to improve your Instagram photos. Simon Tsang asks the experts about their favourite smartphone shooting tips.

How to shoot for social media. Picture: Lauren Bath

AS THE saying goes, the best camera to have is the camera you have with you. And for must of us, that’s a smartphone.

Mobiles with built-in high-resolution cameras have changed the way we shoot holiday snaps. For a start, it means we’re much more likely to have a camera with us to take photos of those unexpected moments.

Then along came Instagram and sharing travel photos on-the-fly quickly became the norm. And along with it, bad photography. Taking a snap became all too easy and that’s part of the problem.

Lauren Bath, a travel photographer regarded as “Australia’s first professional Instagrammer”, says the biggest mistake people make is not thinking about the shot.

“Because smartphones are generally automatic, people tend to just snap without thinking,” she says.

Here are a few tips from the pros for improving your smartphone photo skills.

1. Light it up

Lauren Bath advises against using the phone’s built-in flash. Instead, use the phone’s HDR (High Dynamic Range) feature if it has one.

“HDR can be a helpful function if you have a steady hand as the phone will take three exposures and stack them together. Remember that all photography is better in nice light so always look for clear and soft ambient light in the mornings and afternoons,” Bath says.

2. Pick and choose

TV host, model and prolific Instagrammer Jason Dundas says it pays to take plenty of shots.

“Take more photos so you have options,” he says.

“Take a variety of candid photos, then take your time choosing which ones to post and when. Curating your Instagram feed is just as important as the photos themselves.”

Bath advises: “Pay attention to the finished shot and learn the ability to tell a good shot from a bad shot. Choose the best one or two to upload to Instagram.”

3. The professional touch

Use a proper photo editing app, photographer Dominic Loneragan from Citizens of the World (hellocitizens.com) says.

“Sometimes using the standard Instagram filters do more harm than good. There are a number of truly amazing (almost) professional quality apps that people can use to give their snaps just a little extra oompf. I like VSCO the best. But if in doubt, I think no-filter is always best,” he says.

Bath is also a fan of apps: “I always suggest some basic editing whether you’re shooting on a mobile or a camera. There are so many great apps for editing but my favourite is Snapseed and I use it to crop a square and make colour and contrast adjustments.”

4. The phone has limits

“A phone is never going to get the quality of shots that a digital camera can but if you stick to the right light and scenes some people wouldn’t even be able to tell the difference,” says Bath.

“Know your device and its limits,” says Sarah Harrison, who runs online lifestyle and travel profile Little Miss Melbourne (littlemiss melbourne.com). “You can’t always get the best long distance or wide angle shot that you might be able achieve on a regular camera – if it’s not working, try taking the shot from a different perspective.”

5. Up close and personal

“My opinion on Instagram photography is to keep compositions quite simple,” says Bath. “I like detail shots and close-ups and, when I do shoot landscapes, I make sure my composition is easy to look at.”

Loneragan says to steer clear of the zoom on smartphones: “It’s a digital zoom, not an optical zoom ...while it seems like you’re getting closer to the subject, you’re just decreasing the pixels.”

FUN EVENT

If you love Instagram, you’ll love the Instagram relay created by integrated travel group, helloworld, to mark United Nations World Tourism Day on September 27. Instagrammers across more than 60 countries will be Instagramming photos from sunrise to sunset, passing from one destination to another. The public can join in as well. See relay.helloworld.com.au or search #helloworldRELAY.

Follow Escape.com.au on Instagram for travel pictures from our writers and photographers at Escape_snaps