Photography Tip: Stop. Pull Over. Pay Attention.

Today’s photography tip doesn’t require you to buy any special equipment of grasp any concepts or even practice to get it right.  I just want you to slow down in life, notice what’s happening around you and find things you want to capture in your photography.  Sometimes when you’re driving, you might want to pull over and park, because you see something that you want to take a photo of.  You might want to walk a new area or even your own neighborhood, to seek out interesting subjects.

When you get in this mindset, you’ll see photo opportunities everywhere.  While you’re doing that, you’re also training your “eye” and your photo framing will get better and you’ll find interesting perspectives.  Don’t worry about any of that now, just remember: STOP. PULL OVER. PAY ATTENTION.

The past few days, I’ve been doing just that with my Lumia 1020.  Let’s see what I found! 🙂

Lumia Gets REAL…estate

I have to tell you that the Nokia Lumia 1020 puts in work.  I’ve used it on paid video jobs and paid event photography jobs.  Now, it just got REAL.  My friend asked me to do a shoot of his new real estate listing.  I brought along my trusty DSLR because  “size matters”, when people are paying for pictures.

I took about half of the photos with the DSLR and half with the Lumia 1020.  The Lumia had a wider angle, which is great for capturing smaller rooms where I couldn’t back up any further to frame it properly with the DSLR.  That wider view was also great for capturing the totality of the yard spaces.

I’m only going to post pictures taken with the Lumia in this posting.  If you are interested in the house, please check out the listing here: 10521 Northvale Rd – Represented by Cory Holtzman.

Lumia 1020 Photo Roundup

It’s been a while since I’ve done a entry that’s just about photography on the Lumia 1020.  It’s not that I’ve stopped taking photos, but I’ve settled into a posting them in a places with a built in photographic community.  You can regularly find my pictures on my Flickr account and my Phonetogaphs Blog and in the Fhotoroom community.

The picture above is one of my favorites from this device. I love the contrasts of color and texture.

OK, let’s dive into some more…

Contrast in Venice – California

Contrast in photography is technically the difference between the lights and the darks.  I look for contextual contrast, as well.  The soft petals of this flower resting peacefully on the hard, cracked pavement of the alley is a prime example of something that catches my eye.  Let’s see what else in the proximity of this moment caught my eye.

All pictures were taken today with the Nokia Lumia 1020, using the Nokia Camera Pro app.  There was no post-processing, other than cropping/reframing, which was done inside of the same Camera Pro app.

My Walk With Nokia Lumia 1020 to the Movies

I saw TWO screenings of films today.  I just got back from seeing “Captain Phillips”.  That’s an intense ride based on the true story of ship raided by Somali pirates.  Earlier in the day, I saw the documentary.  This one, you may not have heard of, but trust me…it’s excellent.  This film is an example of film and music coming together to make something great.

The picture on the left here is the actual theatre of the Director’s Guild of America, where I see these films.  This picture was obviously taken by the Lumia 1020, currently in my care and I used the Hipstamatic Oggl app to capture the squared off wonder.

I took 1020 with me and I walked to the DGA.  Back when I was a Marine, we would call hikes, “humps”.  I guess I took the hump on a short hump. Cue the Beavis and Butthead chuckling.  Along the way, we stopped and took notice of things and more importantly we captured them in 41 megapixel glory.  Don’t worry, I’ll share some of the good stuff, after the break.

Finding Creativity/Beauty/Opportunity EVERYWHERE

Since I started my phone-tography blog… What?  You don’t know about that?  OK, stop what you’re doing and bookmark http://phonetographs.wordpress.com.

As I was saying, when I started my phone-tography blog, I knew that I was going to need to keep the content fresh.  That means that I would need to find things to shoot wherever I find myself.  This scene here seems pretty uneventful and not a likely subject of a photoshoot, right?  Well, check after the break for what I was able to find in this spot.