The best camera is the one you have with you.
This may sound like heresy, but it is true. Most of us are rarely without our phone, and the camera in today’s iPhone is an excellent camera. Learning to use the camera and its features to its full capability may even make it your camera of choice.
What is going on between your ears is more important than what is in your hands. You almost always have your iPhone with you. This class will help you put the two together.
In this class, we will introduce how the iPhone camera functions. Topics may include:
- Introduction to your iPhone
- What it does and what it doesn’t do
- Shooting modes: Portrait, Time Lapse, Live, Pano, Low Light
- Lenses in the iPhone
- File types: HEIC vs JPEG vs RAW
- Storing and editing images
- Popular apps: Hipstamatic, Tintype, Lightroom, Halide, Camera1, I Love Film
How did an iPhone become my camera of choice when traveling these days?
I am often asked this question, and the answer is simple: When digital cameras gave me more information in a negative than I could get with film. I make large (26x36”) platinum/palladium prints, which require negatives with a great amount of information.
However, the switch to digital still left me with bags of equipment. I wanted to travel more lightly, with less gear, avoid “no tripod” restrictions, and still come home with quality images.
The more I explored what the iPhone could do, the more I used it—and the better my images became. It hasn’t replaced my medium-format Fuji for professional work, but it has changed how I travel and photograph with joy.
My career as a photographer spans many years. I focus on fine art platinum prints and teaching workshops in the U.S. and abroad.
I’ve published five books: Tillman Crane/Structure (2001), Touchstones (2005), Odin Stone (2008), A Walk Along the Jordan (2009), and The Alchemy of Light (2016), with exhibitions accompanying each release.
My platinum prints are included in the collections of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Portland Museum of Art (Maine), Farnsworth Museum of Art, University of New England, Irish Museum of Modern Art, and others worldwide.
I’ve also contributed to many book anthologies, including Workshop Stories, Photographic Alternative Processes, Maine Photographs: A History, and Why Photographs Work.
Two professional milestones include a solo exhibit of 100 platinum prints at the National Art Museum of China and my induction into the inaugural class of the Artist Hall of Fame at the Alabama Center for the Arts.
Even after all these years, I continue finding joy in making and teaching photography while living in beautiful Maine.
