Ace - I was watching that yesterday But we mustn't confuse the messenger with the message must we. If we were to decry camera phones and instagram because of the quantity of derivative, unoriginal, banal, photographic dross that is produced with them.... ...... I don't think the mass body of work produced by dSLRs would stand up all that well by comparison! What is worse ANOTHER pic of someones meal, or ANOTHER pic of a Lone bloody tree.... As has been said the most important part of any camera is located about 6 inches (or arms length in the case of a camera phone) behind the view finder. What we see with mass photgraphic sharing on Facebook, or instagram is a greater AVAILABILITY of banality, I doubt the absolute percentage of crap photos has changed much since the box brownie. They are just far easier to share. And there is the simple truth that is becoming more and more important in our "connected" world: if you don't like it, don't look at it!
I just saw that on your ig Phil...well shot mate....As far as IG filters, etc are concerned, I never actually use the IG camera app or filters, I have loads of apps that I like to use instead, sometimes, Hipstamatic or Joy Camera or Noir or Lo Mob or Photo Toaster or Snapseed of course...Different things demand different treatment...
Indeed, the OP appears to have missed this in my original 'Really?' link I'll overlook the ref to AN Other mag who felt the need to try and pinch the AP moniker m
I've seen Mark's link, it is hardly representative of the wealth of processing apps available and if that's all that AP has to say on the subject of phone photography then it's pretty minimal...I do actually buy the magazine fairly regularly so I keep an eye on what's reported.
So...one picture taken with an iPhone....considering the amount of pictures captured daily with the device it's scarcely any representation at all. Amateur Photography is now in the hands of phone users, the title of the magazine:Amateur Photographer would suggest that it might appeal to "Amateur Photographers" perhaps you are missing a trick here?
I don't believe you read a single word of what I said, or followed my link... You've made your mind up, and no way are you going to be influenced by anything so inconvenient as facts.
AP can hardly be held to account for the choice of kit that entrants choose to use can it? Perhaps you should submit a letter, a 'Backchat' or perhaps enter a photograph in one of the AP competitions. Have you read the comment for the winning image of that APOY round? m
That just shows you haven't really looked at it....Do you have a smart phone?...Do you use it to take pictures?...or do you only feel you are a photographer when you go out with your big bag full of cameras and lenses or your Leica?... It's just another thing, a way of expressing yourself visually...I'm not suggesting it's rocket science but you can be creative with it and you can connect with other people who are too... Here's my instagram feed, you can view it on your computer.. http://instagram.com/jeffslade May not be to your taste but this is what I do with it, it's fun, but it IS creative....Personally I don't use the instagram app to take and process, I have a stack of other apps that do that better, I just upload these pictures to instagram and also share them on facebllok and twitter at the same time...
I wrote a whole article for AP about the exciting prospects for phone photographyback in 2003 when I got my first 1mp Sharp 300gxi camera phone..I spent a lot of time on it and illustrated it it with pictures I had taken with that phone. I predicted then the potential for the technology to come.My article was rejected without explanation and was returned without so much as a compliments slip...I presumed, at the time, that either it wasn't sufficiently well written, in which case some editorial advice would have been useful, or, that you weren't interested in publishing anything that deviated away from what your traditional readership might expect, or, that you didn't want your advertisers to imagine that you might, for one moment, show an interest in anything that didn't involve their products.
http://instagram.com/kebablog - I've not been using it too much lately, but occasionally I remember it's there!
Oi - I resemble that remark! For me, Instagram is more like Facebook - I use it for chat and family gubbins rather than 'photography' - but I follow plenty of folk on there who do use it for more creative work, and they produce some very, very good stuff. As you say Phil - you can't blame the tool for the content folk publish. If you're interested in my food or pics of my kids, I lurk here: http://instagram.com/nosamluap