Cameraphone Tips

Lifehacker’s new Geek to Live article, Take better cameraphone photos, starts off with a complete BS statement: “Serious photographers might scoff at the cameraphone as a viable device for taking great photos, but for civilians, it’s a perfect tool for documenting your life.” The but in that sentence is completely wrong! Not a single civilian thinks a cameraphone can take the great photos referred to in the first part of the sentence. Would any civilian be willing to make a trip to Italy or Scotland with just a cameraphone in the backpack?! In rhetoric, there’s a word for such false reasoning but it escapes my mind now. Anyone knows?

Anyway, the rest of the article is pretty uninteresting. Nothing really good or noteworthy. Here, let me give you a real tip: When indoors, do not rely on your cameraphone (or regular digital camera) to pick up the correct white balance for you. Auto white-balance is fine outdoors but it’s a big gamble indoors. The device will make a mistake more often than not! e.g. check this vs this. So when indoors, remember to select the correct white balance setting manually. I hope your camera phone allows you to do this, I know my N73 does :-D Of course, any reasonable digital camera will have such an option.