While lots of folks think of their smartphone as a camera first, there are other photographic applications for your smartphone. Let’s look at a few of them.

Consider that you are driving around and see something interesting, but don’t have all the right kit with you to make a photograph. If what catches your eye is the light, while it will change, it may be similar on another day at around the same time. You may also want to be able to remember exactly where you are. Grab a shot or two with your smartphone. It will encode the date, time and GPS location of the shot, providing you with very useful information if you want to go back with more sophisticated gear.

I have often been really inspired at a time to make an image or three, but as I tend to leave days between image capture and image culling, I may not always remember what I was feeling at the time. I also may forget why I made certain choices when I made the image. Your smartphone has at least one, probably several dictation apps. I used to carry an Olympus Pearlcorder for this purpose, but now I just record a quick memo right into the smartphone. No typing, no fighting with autocorrect, just a very simple way of reminding myself.

There are a variety of things that I may need to know when planning for a shoot outdoors, or when making decisions on depth of field or similar settings. I have come to rely on an app on my smartphone called PhotoPills. I have tried and purchased lots of different applications for these purposes and have not found anything as powerful or as agile as PhotoPills. It is not a free app, and that is more than fair because it has tons of useful information that is pretty easy to find. There are also myriad tutorials available on getting the most out of the app. If you do not have it, get it, and if you do have it and find yourself not using it, consider doing some of the online tutorials to learn how to get more out of this incredible tool. You can find more information about PhotoPills at PhotoPills | Shoot legendary photos

I find value in using neutral density filters to achieve creative goals such as motion blur, or showing movement in what is a static scene. Users of high density ND filters have discovered that the in camera light meter will often give bad readings when a heavy ND is used. This is perfectly normal as all camera light meters have a low light limitation measured in EV. If your camera’s light meter can only handle light levels of EV 0 or EV -1, I can promise you that if you use a 10 stop ND, the camera’s light meter is going to struggle. I solve this problem by taking a meter reading that suits my intent without the ND filter in place. Then I change to manual mode and make those settings. Grab a quick shot to make sure that all looks decent on the LCD. Then I go to an app on my Smartphone called NDTimer. It will tell you the actual exposure change needed by your selected ND filter. You make the change in your manual settings and attach the filter. Make your image and you have a consistent exposure with the filter of your choice. If it’s a really long exposure, the app also has a timer for when you are using Bulb mode and a cable release to hold the shutter open the appropriate time. The other real advantage is that it supports the stacking of two ND filters. I use an iPhone and got the app here ‎NDTimer on the App Store (apple.com)

If I am going out to do very low light or night sky photography, there are going to be times where there is not enough light to see some camera settings, or even to see pieces that I have put on my white towel that I use to hold kit for long night shots so it is easy to find. I used to carry a headlamp thing with a red light so if I needed more light, I didn’t wipe out my night vision or disturb the work of other photographers doing work at the same time. Now I simply tape a piece of red gel to the back of my phone case to cover the LEDs used as a flashlight. My lock screen is a darker image and I can activate the flashlight via an onscreen button on the lower left of the lock screen without unlocking the phone and making it very bright. The red gel protects my night vision and I can use it when I need it and easily turn the phone light on and off. Pretty simple.

I hope that some of these ideas for more uses of your Smartphone for photography are of help to you.

Do you have an idea for an article, tutorial, video or podcast? Do you have an imaging question unrelated to this article? Send me an email directly at ross@thephotovideoguy.ca or post in the comments.  When you email your questions on any imaging topic, I will try to respond within a day.

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I'm Ross Chevalier, thanks for reading, watching and listening and until next time, peace.