Crazy App TrigonScope Just for Fun!

Single Shot TrigonScope app This is actually a shot of what was on my monitor when I first opened the app I was looking at a Flicker site.

A fellow iPhone photographer mentioned this app so I searched it out on the app store. Its the craziest iPhone app I think I have seen. Its like a real time kaleidoscope. I loved those when I was a kid and probably spent hours looking into the tube of cut glass rotating it all around to see what new fascinating patterns appeared...well this app is a digital kaleidoscope. The images here were made in my den. I have lots of patterns in the den so it was very much fun to move the phone all around and see what appeared. You can shrink or enlarge the image on the screen and you can rotate the screen to fit the patterns. Trying to capture them is a little different, as you have to freeze the screen and take the image at the same time. I think I'll be having more fun with this app in the future. I ran these all through the ArtistaOil app for some painterly effects and texture. Happy New Year everyone!

Single  Shot TrigonScope app my den

This image was mirrored in PhotoStudio for the balanced look.

Just doing some night work.....

Last night was the Baltimore Camera Club meeting and I arrived an hour or so early, after doing some errands so I decided to walk around with my iPhone and see what it would do at night. I chose to use the Hipstamatic Camera app and made some shots around the square of shops and buildings. I also experimented with some flash choices.The Hipstamatic app uses the square format. None of these images were cropped, this is the way they are shot.The cog shot above was shot close up using the Lemon Gel flash in Hipstamatic.

The images below were shot with Hipstamatic and processed in PhotoStudio to give them a different toning.

 

This one is not focused properly I think as the foreground is softer than the background so I will have to pay attention to that next time in close up work and see if I can't shift the focus point.

  

All these shots are hand held at night... when my tripod mount comes maybe I can get them a little sharper..it was a fun experiment.

Working with digital Art filters on the iPhone

On the beach run I also made some iPhone shots with the idea of using some digital art filters I have come to enjoy: ArtistaOil, ArtistaHaiku, Photocopier and ArtistaSketch. Maybe its the frustrated painter in me, but I do enjoy seeing a photo altered in this way. It is a little hard for me to actually see all that is happening on the small screen of the iPhone, processing brush strokes, textures, canvas and strength adjustments, so I have taken to transferring the image to my laptop to check the results after I have finished processing it on the iPhone, I don't have an iPad, yet. I think other photographers are using that to "see" their work on a larger scale while processing.Work flow is another whole issue, as with any process it makes sense to try and establish one...

So here are a few for fun renderings of some scenic images shot on Kent Island.
The funny thing is I was actually using the iPhone to determine if I wanted to bring  my Nikon camera over to the spot and set up. It was a good tool for checking the possibilities before getting all the gear set up. But I will admit, I missed getting the opening image here on the Nikon; whether I didn't see it again when I returned to the spot, other interesting options presented or what but I only have that shot on the iPhone. I am going to make a print of it when I get the printer turned on and see what it looks like and how big I can go before it deteriorates...
Below are examples of slightly different versions of the same image: Toning is also an option. There are so may options to make adjustments...one can get carried away with the process and then not have the result and have to repeat it in a different way...this does take time, just like processing any image and maybe more, because it is sooooo small. Gee now if someone could invent a little wire that would connect the iPhone to the laptop just so you can see what you are doing that would be cool!!! Gee where do I put in my request??? I wonder... My "Real Camera" blog will also be a painted one today.

Sunny Experience with the iPhone

Straight Shot CP Pro Camera app.

On yesterdays beach run I also experimented with the iPhone a bit. Since it was a very sunny day, I found it really hard to see the LCD and make the appropriate settings as well as compositions. I use glasses. I can't see close up small details with out them. They are photo gray so they act as sunglasses in bright light and that did not even help. Even trying to turn my back to the sun and shade the iPhone's display it was hard to see my selection for making camera settings. I was using the CP Pro camera app for shooting at the time. When I downloaded the files I had a movie!!! no two movies.....; - ) Well I don't usually take movies but this is a fun accident so I am posting them here so you can see the environment we were shooting in. In the movies I was trying to make a camera setting selection, and capture a picture of the shadow of my tripod and camera in the snow, as I liked the way the light was making the shadow very angular on the snow.
After that I tried to really pay more attention to make the right settings..oh the apps are so small...

The next set of images were all made in the camera app Hipstamatic.

Lucifer VI: Black Keys Super Grain film: Bad Camera for effects

Johns S Lens: Kodot XGrizzled film

Kaimal MarkII Lens: Dream Canvas Film; PicGrunger Effect

Lucifer VI Lens; Black Keys Film selection no flash

 This is a 7 shot stitch, made with Autostitch. The camera app was CP Pro, ArtistaOil was applied for effect.
Whew that's it for today!

Slow Shutter

Slow Shutter:Iris:PhotoStudio:Impression

Today I made a run in the late afternoon to the grocery. The sky colors were really beautiful as the sun was setting. I stopped a block from home where there are some really tall trees with the beautiful sky behind them and made a few swipes with the slow Slow Shutter app. set to 3 seconds.

But now I have a problem...my photo down loader is crashing when I try to download from my iPhone to my laptop, so I will have to get to the Apple store and have them figure it out...very strange it was working just fine before....argggghhh!
So these I had to e-mail myself.

Whimsy Christmas

ShockMyPic:PhotoStudio;PhotoForge:Impression

Last one for the holidays...well unless I get some good stuff on the road tomorrow........heading to the shore in the Jeep to catch some snowy beach images with my friend Annette.......could be a big adventure.......
These two shots were made at Lucketts in Virginia on Christmas Day. They had so much fun stuff I could have stayed there all afternoon, but I had to get to Christmas dinner so I grabbed a few quick shots with the iPhone. Like some images they had to percolate a little until I found the apps I wanted to use to make them what you see here. Since it was snowing a little yesterday I was inspired to find some fun treatments. The snowy, starry treatment's were effects I found in PhotoStudio. I overlaid them on the image and reduced some opacity until I had the strength of the effect I wanted. I had to laugh as it seemed like some page out of a children's book. The image below was processed the same way. The plywood Santa and his pals were so reminiscent of childhood days I could not pass it up either...and I hope everyone had a happy holiday! I sure did!

Diptic Application

ArtistaOil:Diptic:Impressionism

I like this app! It makes it very easy to make combo images....you can change the layout, the border colors and width and even adjust where the image fits in the frames. You can also transform the image in a mirroring way. Here I show three possible combos of many. The one above is made from one image, processed in ArtistaOil and then in Diptic. It was fitted into the four separate frames.

SketchMee; Bad Camera: Diptic

The bench, was made using the same image, but the image was processed in many different applications and then lined up in the frames as the original was.

SketchMee: Bad Camera: PicGrunger:Diptic: Impressionism

 

The Chair image was made by taking three separately processed images, the top image in this is a crop of the whole image and the bottom two images represent the image in its entirety, however the lower right image was flipped on the horizontal to face the opposite direction. Impressionism is an app to add a copyright watermark and signature to your work, a very simple but nice app and touch....and I think that's enough for one day! Hope to make some snow images tomorrow, even though we did not get much a little dusting can be pretty.

Too Many Options

SketchMee: BadCamera: PhotoForge: PicGrunger: ArtistaOil

Been working on learning more by doing...I shot some images with the iPhone yesterday at the fun antique store in Lucketts , Va. They have lots of old things just sitting around on the property outside. So on the way to my niece's house I had to stop and play a bit.
After processing some a couple shots today, the first thing I can say is its very difficult for me with an astigmatism to see clearly on the iPhone's display. Even though you can enlarge the image on the screen, its not like looking at it on a larger screen. So sometimes what looks good on the iPhone, looks a little different large on a larger screen after you have downloaded your files. Some apps have the ability to undo or back step and some don't. I wish all of them did! You can really go from app to app and get carried away with the process. So today I tried some experimenting with just three apps here.

First I tried the SketchMee app. after adjusting some basic controls like brightness and shadow highlights in PhotoForge. Then ran the images through many options in BadCamera. To finish the process I ran the image thorough PicGrunger.  Once again, its hard to stop trying different looks, as they are so much fun to see what they will do. Oh and the first image here I went one step further and ran it through ArtistaOil. Now I have lots to learn about other apps and how to use layers etc....but these will give you an idea of the progression.

SketchMee: BadCamera: PhotoForge: PicGrunger

Original File

Christmas Images

Today was a very nice day visiting with my family in Ashburn, Va. I travel the "back way" down Rt. 15 and every time I do I pass this awesome store called Lucketts. Usually I just drive by and say one day I am going to stop there and do some photography. Well, today I had the iPhone with me and it was easy to jump out and take a few shots of their holiday decorations. I enjoyed seeing the old sleds decorated with some red bows. The treatment here is an app called Shock my Pics, for the vignette I used another app called Photo Studio. For the actual capture of the image I used the CP Pro.

For this image I applied a painterly effect using the app AristaOil. The frame was applied in Filterstorm. The camera app I used was also CP Pro.

The Tree Image here was shot using the camera app: Slow Shutter at a 3 second exposure. The I ran it through the app AristaOil and applied some borders in Filterstorm.
And I will say I'd like to go back and do some more shooting there and also some shopping!

This is addictive...especailly in the beginning...so much to learn..

When I was in the old distillery, a few remains of the factory interested me. I enjoyed seeing the old high power Buss Fuses still remaining in the wall and the boilers still in tact, so I made a few iPhone shots. The Buss Fuse shot was made using the flash, then processed in some apps  and finished with the Pic Grunger for some texture and frame. The Boiler pic was processed in Artista Sketch and then into Photo FX....( I am trying to remember them to share, but when you are doing this your are flowing from one app to the other for different purposes and its hard to stop the flow and make notes). OK now its time to sleep...and hopefully Santa will be good to all this year!

Here we go...first real iPhone shoot

This is just the beginning for me of a photo adventure with an iPhone. I have been watching this art, yes I will call it, art, develop for a while and have enjoyed the creativity of many top photographers as they have explored the opportunities that exist to add a new tool to their work. My perceptions so far...the apps that you need to purchase are pretty inexpensive and pretty darn cool. It was pointed out to me today that all  the apps in the world, well at least the cool photo apps, probably would not cost any where the cheapest lens in my bag of photo gear. The iPhone 4 is pretty expensive, but again, a good  lens costs more. The AT&T service cost is just a little higher than my old phone service, but annually less difference than  software program. So relatively speaking getting into it is "relatively" inexpensive. I have not purchased the Mophie, additional battery pack or the tripod mount..and some other goodies, but I will in order to really hold the phone steady when doing some HDR work I have found I would benefit from the tripod mount, but heck that's only $9.99. I have spent some time learning the phone as well as learning some app. The nice employee at the Apple Store in Towson was so helpful and he spent so much time with me, getting all my info transferred from my old phone and setting up all the needed connections with my mobile me account, I can not say enough for the SERVICE he provided, something very rare!
So I can say at this point its been a real easy  transition, I say that lightly because I am not transitioning from my Nikon work, but adding an extra dimension to my ability to create some fun images. That is what this work is all about. It really is fun!!! Like a game almost, but I can see that it could easily become addictive. Here's a few more images form my first iPhone shoot. Oh and sharpness is not always critical.....it is helpful to keep a trail of all that one does to process an image because the actions are not recorded with the file. So when I can remember to report the apps that I use I will. The opening image is processed with an iPhone app called: Shock My Pic and Filterstorm for the frame. All of these images were captured with the iPhone as all the images I post here will be and all of them were processed exclusively with iPhone apps on the iPhone. The images were made in the old Seagram's Distillery in Baltimore.