Taking Pictures - What's The Best Way To Do It...And Why!

A Snapshot

    For the most part, I take "snapshots" for my articles. If I am performing some difficult or technical modification/repair, I take more detailed photos. They're not the best I can do and I know it! Last week I wrote about a new cellphone I bought and it got me thinking about how I take photos for my articles. No matter what they are for, your photos record moments you want to keep. For how long? Well, that's up to you. In any case, there are many ways to take photos and many devices you can use. Each has its pro's and con's. Figuring out what to use and how to compose your photos is really important. Here's how!

A Great Camera In It's Day. Still Works!

The Device. Nowadays, digital photos rule the day. It's increasingly rare to find someone taking pictures on actual film. Hopefully, we all remember or know what that is! I still take pictures using an older digital camera. It's a Sony CyberShot 10.1 megapixel one. Works fine, takes OK shots in a resolution that works fine for online use. The higher the resolution, the clearer the pictures when resized larger, however, the file size gets bigger and bigger! An average 1920x1080 (HD) photo is around 1MB with minimal compression. The more it's compressed, the smaller the file size, but you will give up some in quality. I shoot in a 3 mega pixel mode(2048x1536) so I can crop and manipulate the framing. Makes life easier when you take fast photos in awkward positions. Every week you see the results.

The New Phone

The problem is, I have to remember to bring the camera with me to the RV when I am writing an article or taking a trip. Sometimes I forget. That being said, I RARELY forget my cell phone. My old phone was capable of taking photos at 8 mega pixels but I always used less. The problem was ease of getting them to the articles. With the standalone camera, I pulled out the memory card, popped it into the reader and uploaded the pictures I needed. With the phone, I had to connect the phone to the computer (and deal with drivers and the like) and then navigate to the picture folder and copy each one across. Not all that efficient. Since I'm not much of a "cloud" guy, I like my files on my device, not floating about in cyberspace.

The 360 Degree Spherical camera

My new phone has dual main cameras and a lower resolution camera on the screen side for video conferencing or "selfies." It also has a camera attachment that will take 360 degree spherical photos. That sounds way cool, but I'm not sure how great it will be for an article. The main cameras will take great photos and I've already connected the device to my home computer. That all works fine. What do I do if I want to access the photos for an article on one of my mini-android laptops I take with me when I travel? It's too hard to type up an article on a phone (even one with a bigger screen) and I haven't figured out how to connect the phone to the android tablet/laptop. It's not certain that I can anyway.

Is it time to stop using the old standalone and switch to the phone's camera? It will take nice pictures and most of the time I will be able to easily integrate them into the articles. But....sometimes it could get difficult. Looks like there will be some experimentation. Stay Tuned.

Be Seeing You...Down The Road,

Rich "The Wanderman"
www.thewanderman.com