The man who taught Argentinean journalists at an FM radio station about using Nokia 3650 camera phones to post news photos on the station's moblog, has written an interesting article about his experiences with camera phones, how to take better photos and the relationship of camera phones to traditional photography.
Julián Gallo was the person who tipped me off about how journalists at a morning FM radio program in Argentina were using camera phones. He also then alerted me to how the station was posting maps of the location of the photos taken by the journalists.
I now learn that Julián teaches new media at the joint master's degree program of journalism of Universidad de San Andres, the School of Journalism of the University of Columbia and the news group Clarin. He's also an accomplished photographer and posted some of his camera phone photos (see below) in his article, "On-line Photography."
Testing the limits
Julián writes, "I realized that the instant on-line distribution of photographs has caused the past production needs of news photography (even the digital one) to look ridiculous, it has modified it radically, changing its role and significance."
He is trying different techniques and notes that camera phones are "'natural' pinhole cameras with a great depth of field."
Julián also is developing a special tripod for the Nokia 3650 (that I believe still produces some of the best and most interesting camera phone photos) that would enable users to take 180-degree and 360-degree photos. The sequence of photos would be transmitted to a database that would create a Macromedia Flash display.
Experimenting
One photo he took (not using a tripod) was a self-portrait (see below) where he took a sequence of photos of his face, blew them up 700 percent and cropped them to fit on A4 sized paper.
If you've been reading Camera Phone Report, you know I can't wait until VGA camera phones are replaced by higher resolutions (and better lenses and image processing software). But no matter how good the camera, the photo is only as good as the photographer.
People like Julián, Dr. Bill Koslowsky and Mike Lee are pushing the limits. Indeed, when you see these photos, you don't think "they're good for a camera phone," you think, "hey, these are great -- camera phone or digital camera."
Just the start
This is just the start of a camera phone art community. Already there have been a few exhibits around the world showcasing camera phone photos. But I predict we'll see the emergence of great camera phone photographers over the next year or two.
Indeed, camera phone photos will be sold as artwork. The best photos will take advantage of the "quirks" of camera phones and the advantage of their on-the-spot availability for taking photos anywhere and any time.
Comments