^^^ Well this is about the best I've managed



See what I mean - crap. I can't hold the camera steady & pose, or hold the watch in front of the camera on a tripod.

I started taking photos like this on my CameraPhone [see first pic], pretty dire.
I fully understand that you can't make a silk purse out of a Sows ear, but I'm working with what Ive got.



Now with some simple changes to the way I use the CameraPhone I have progressed to the second picture, which I think is miles better.
The changes were, use natural light, make sure the object being pictured is still. If taking a wrist shot ensure your wrist is resting/supported on something steady. And always have your CameraPhone supported too, as even the slightest movement from pressing the shutter will ruin the shot. Also I have found that surrounding the watch with white card helps to surround the watch with light and almost diffuses the light/makes it less harsh/reflective.




CameraPhones rule....

I dunno about that. My iPhone 4 takes staggeringly good pictures for what it is.

Only fair if you make a call, send a text and browse the web on your camera.

And your point is?
What's the difference when the picture was taken.

As for the other reply - well, that's what I agreed on - it takes goodish pictures for a camera in a phone. Just please let's not try to compare it to a dslr.


End of off topic?? Let's not ruin a very good thread.

I hate to say it.......but he's the mod, he ends the topics

Sorry yes I see what you mean now

That's all good then. So as you say back on the subject...

...Somewhere I've seen an article where at 50mm lens is taped on the front of a telephoto...back to front giving a super macro. The DoF was amazingly small. A couple of mm I remember. That'll be interesting to try. Also I've got a microscope somewhere. Hhhmmm...

From the above - this is awesome!

The iPhone 4 is only 'staggering' because all iPhones before it were preposterously, laugh-out-loud appalling I've had and hacked them all, and the iPhone 4's camera is in a different league to all previous iPhones.

However the iPhone is not the only smartphone. I'd expect the top end Sony Ericsson units to have half decent lenses for phones, but I've never used 'em.

There's always the argument about how it's the photographer that makes the photo, and not the kit - but this is only true for images where you're not in control. Something like the sunset this evening as I got out of my car - by the time I'd rushed back home, got out the DSLR and tripod, messed about trying to remember what settings to use, and taken a photo, the light would have gone. So iPhone it was.

With watch photography - completely different argument since you have complete control over the subject. So use the best kit you've got, makes sense, no?

Of course, that doesn't mean that this thread should only focus (ehh) on DSLRs because we don't all have one. Tips on shooting with a cameraphone are *very* useful because a lot of us will take better *wrist shots* with a cameraphone than their DSLR… However I'd recommend that nothing inferior to, say, the iPhone 3GS be considered as a 'camera' phone - the 'camera' unit in previous iPhones was simply SO poor quality that I can't imagine any way of getting a reasonable photo out of one...

Mwuahahaha!!!!

Sod the recession, in fact sod anything relating to being sensible. I walked into my local camera shop looking for these £10 'extension tubes' so I could turn my latest acquisition 'one lens to rule them all' Tamron 18-270 into a macro-capable lens.

Here you go sir, said the friendly chap. Extension tubes - £169. WTF? Surely I can get a proper macro lens for not much more? Yup, I can.

So now I am furnished with a proper macro lens for my Nikon. Prepare for 'all the gear, no idea' cyberface to take some bloody average movement and dial closeup shots with equipment that a talented photographer would turn into magazine-advert quality stuff!



Anyway - had to learn about aperture. So I tapped up my uncle, who is a retired professional photographer (they never retire). He slagged off my Tamron lens, pointed out that he had the Nikon model better than mine, and when I complained that he was a pro, he dropped in 'well, I wasn't going to mention the £100k+ collection of Hasselblad medium format cameras I used to use professionally' - he's that sort of guy. However, even though he picked a fight he was always going to lose at the end of the night (family get-together - always bad news in the cyberface household), he taught me very succinctly firstly why (a) my Tamron 'one lens' was having trouble focusing (my fault - slapped a circular polariser as combination lens protection on, without realising it saps 30% of the available light. Idiot), and (b) what aperture settings mean and how to control them on his camera (which was very similar to mine, being the next model up Nikon digital).

So…. let's see what I can do, somewhat inebriated, in completely artificial light and utterly inappropriate surroundings…. (there will be a photo here in 15 minutes or so)