Even the most casual readers of this blog will have guessed that I’m a teeny bit obsessed with iPhone photography, or to use the correct terminology, iPhoneography. Having a phone with a decent camera has allowed me to document my life in a way that I’d never have considered before. I’m now more convinced than ever that good photography is much more about capturing an interesting image than about using high-tech equipment and getting everything just so.
I started out taking pictures with the basic iPhone camera, but was quickly seduced by the charms of Hipstamatic. This iPhone app looks like an old plastic camera, and takes photos with a beautiful retro feel.
The basic app price includes (I think) three lenses, with the option to buy more to achieve different effects. Be warned, this can get addictive – I have just about every lens going and get excited when I new one becomes available to purchase. I loved Hipstamatic dearly, and used it faithfully up until Christmas, capturing some lovely images.
That is, until I discovered Instagram. Ok, so it doesn’t have the fancy interface of Hipstamatic. It doesn’t have the flexibility to be as creative: in Hipstamatic you can combine any lens with any film, plus one of several flashes, whereas Instagram has a fixed set of filters. But Instagram has two big plusses.
1. You can ‘Instagram-ise’ existing images. So you can take a photo with your iPhone’s regular camera
then play around with it afterwards, zooming in and choosing the right filter.
You don’t even have to take the original image with your iPhone camera; you can use any image stored on your phone.
2. Instagram is social. At first I didn’t get it. I was a bit sceptical about the idea of signing up to another social network. I wasn’t sure if I wanted people to see my photos, or what the point was. But I started seeing more and more people posting photos on Twitter, with these instagr.am links, and I decided to give it a go.
I linked Instagram up with my Twitter account straight away, which meant that I could see which of the people I follow were using the app. Following them on Instagram means that I see their photos in my feed. I absolutely love it – I see little works of art each day. Because the app is on your phone, people are taking photos all the time, of their day-to-day lives. My feed is full of witty, beautiful snippets of motherhood, of hectic, fascinating lives and of the world around us.
I follow a lot of brilliant people on Instagram, and I’m taking this opportunity to recommend a couple of my favourites. @tiddlyompompom takes consistently excellent images, sometimes funny and sometimes beautiful. @cosmicgirlie, as you’d expect from the talented photographer who started Silent Sunday, is always entertaining and impressive. @youngmummyuk takes some classic images of motherhood, as well as the rest of life, and @softthistle always makes me smile.
The only downside of Instagram is that once you’re public, you can’t Instagram an image without sharing it with your followers. So if I want to take something and not share it, perhaps if I’m shooting something particular for my blog, or if I want to take a lot of pictures of the same place or thing, I go back to Hipstamatic.
I’m sure there’ll be another big thing along eventually to grab my photography attention, but my love of retro iPhone photography will endure for a while yet. Oh, and I forgot to mention, a big plus for stingy iPhone-users like myself – Instagram is free. (And nobody is sponsoring me for this post, I’m just wittering about apps that I love).
Aww thank you! I love instagram too. At first I didn’t get it but now I use it all the time. I have also discovered some truly fabulous photographers through it, yourself included
I have also found a way of instagramming a photo without having to share: choose photo from camera roll, crop, filter etc. When you get to the what? where? page select back then exit instagram. The instagrammed photo should be in your camera roll.
Thank you.
And what a useful tip, I’ll try that now.
Ooh I’m going to try that too!
Ooh. I finally got an iPhone and I was wondering what app to use for photography. This post has helped me no end and of course all your pictures always look terrific x
You got an iPhone? Excellent! Search for me when you download Instagram and I’ll follow you back.
My other favourite apps are Evernote, the Guardian and of course Twitter!
Yessssss!! Brilliant post. And yes, it’s a tough call between Hipstamatic and Instagram. With regard to not sharing an image though, I agree with topp – instagram can be a bit buggy and often crashes on that screen, but the image is always saved.
You’ll also find that you can use a whole host of other photog apps on an image, and then send it to instagram to “finish it off”.
Thank you so much for the mention! I’d love for you to do this post (or similar) as a guest post for cosmicgirlie photogblog if you’re interested?
Ooh, I do have some other editing apps (Mill Colour (which was free, always a plus!), Photo fx and PS Express) but I hadn’t thought of combining more than one app. More things to try!
Guest post – coming soon, delighted to do it!
My heart melted looking at the gorgeous photo of your babies!
I’m so jealous! D just got an IPhone and I made him download Instagram and he takes some fab photos. I want one!
One day I’ll join you…
I’ve got a feeling my lomography film strip is going to be pretty dire and at £1 a print it won’t be replacing my dSLR!
L.xx
£1 for each photo?! As someone who thinks hard about spending £1.79 on an app, I’d be frozen with money-wasting fear and never take anything! Next step – create a darkroom in a cupboard and start developing photos yourself!
This was a fantastically helpful post–I love the hipstamatic app but haven’t bought any extra lenses. I haven’t bought the Instagram app yet (only because I keep forgetting) but I love the option of being able to change images afterwards, including images not taken with the app–thats a great feature. Oooh! Thanks for this! Very inspiring!
Excellent, glad it helped.
Being the owner of a boring phone Hipstamatic and Instagram are not available. However there are a couple of good free apps online for computer users who don’t or can’t Photoshop their pics.
Picnik.com has loads of easy to use functions and effects, although the free version bungs an ad in the corner. You don’t have to register if you’re using it for one offs.
Poladroid is a brill desktop app which enables you to drag and drop files and create Polaroid-style pictures complete with white borders a la Instamatic photo papers. The file even “develops” before your eyes, just like an instant camera pic.
Very helpful, thank you. I’ve seen some great montages on blogs using picnik, I’ve been meaning to check it out as although my husband is a Photoshop expert, I’m not very good at being patiently taught!
Aw thanks for mentioning me. I’m exactly the same as you – started out using Hipstamatic not really understanding what Instagram was all about , and now I’m completely hooked! I really, really enjoy your pictures.
Thank you! I got the picture fear after doing this post, lol, but was back to photographing random crap yesterday.
There is a way of editing photos on instagram without making them public. All you need to do is to turn off your cellular data and wifi and the photo will not be sent to instagram but stored on your phone only.
Thanks Kim. A couple of other commenters have figured out another way: filter the photo, go to the ‘what, where, etc’ screen, and then go back. I’ve been trying this and it only works for me when I have both the ‘save images’ settings turned on (settings are in the main phone settings list). Hope this helps!
That’s about the only time I regret having my beloved iPod Touch & not an iPhone – no camera. That sounds like a lot of fun; I love how you can instantly share any photo you take with all your twitter friends