The past few months have been different than the rest of 2020.

They’ve felt… normal.

We’ve adapted to social distancing, to wearing masks, to interacting with people in different ways. When bigger things happen, like new restrictions on indoor dining, they aren’t as big of a shock as the were in the first wave.

Life continues on. College football came back, but without fans. The election happened, but more people than ever voted by mail. Holidays were celebrated, mostly without the traditions we are used to. It’s not the same, but doesn’t feel like the monumental shift that occluded in the Spring.

The biggest event this season was the election, but that faded away from our conscious rather quickly. Other struggles continue and in many ways they’ve intensified. Businesses, bars and restaurants are having more difficulty than ever. People are still struggling with their mental health, especially around the holidays.

But Thanksgiving and Christmas are markers of how we’re living in this new world: we still celebrate, even though it’s different, and what we can do matters more than ever.

These recent images of our journey in 2020 aren’t as stark or bold as the previous galleries, but they reflect how our lives have continued after six months of the pandemic. I’m sure looking back they might seem odd, but they feel like the “new normal” everyone is talking about. As we take some time at the end of the year to reflect, I hope they serve as a reminder of everything we’ve gone through together. It’s to forget just how much has happened.

Whether this is the end of our hard times or a prelude of more to come, we’ve gone through something together. Hopefully we can be more kind to one another and realize that all of our small, individual actions can add up to something greater. If 2020 taught us anything, it’s that the impossible can actually happen: we should be prepared for it and also work to turn our dreams for this world into a reality.

As I’m waiting for the iPhone 12 Pro Max to arrive, I’ve been thinking about how great of the camera the 11 Pro has been, and all the photos and videos it’s captured in the past year.

As a photographer, the iPhone X was a major leap forward. It was first time I had a phone with telephoto lens, but also all the camera and screen improvements rekindled my passion for iPhone photography. The XS was a noticeable refinement, but the 11 Pro was falling in love all over again.

Looking back, a lot of the feelings I have about this phone have to do with the historic year we’ve lived in. The 11 Pro was my main, go-to camera for almost everything: the empty streets during the lockdown, social justice marches, violent white supremacist rallies, taking pictures of the same things every day but in new and interesting ways while on a walk.

The 11 Pro was there for all of it, and constantly exceeded my expectations. It has been the most versatile camera I’ve ever used.

Some of my favorite photos from the past year

Lens system

The most consumer-facing feature added to the 11 and 11 Pros were the Ultra Wide lens. Clocking in at 13 mm, this lens was added to both new phones, while the 11 Pro kept the telephoto, making an at first funny looking, but extremely powerful, camera system.

iPhone 11 Pro’s camera

As I noted in my first review, a fisheye lens like this is one of the last lenses I would invest in on a DSLR, and the last I would carry in my camera bag. But it’s now one of my favorite parts of an iPhone camera, ever. A core principle of my approach to photography is to capture the world in a way we’ve never seen it, and the Ultra Wide has allowed whole new types of photos and videos that were previously prohibitive.

The whole three lens camera system together is something to note. To capture those three ranges (wide, ultra wide and telephoto) I would need to lug around a bag with a camera and three lenses, not to mention switch them, which takes you out of the moment. But the ability to switch lenses with just a tap, and even during recording video, was a game changer and the most underrated part of the 11 Pro. Especially for video: Being able to get close AND capture more of the scene WHILE being stable is a photojournalist’s dream.

Covering a large, Black Lives Matter march downtown, I was able to quickly and effortless, and most of the time without thinking, switch between the three lenses. Being able to capture the full breath of a darkened and closed city. The Wide Angel lens allowed me to get some of my favorite shots of the year. The quality of the lens was severely lacking compared to the other two, but distortion is common in fisheye lenses, and frankly, the overall effect was worth the trade off to expand the scene of a moment. And if the composition, lighting and moment are good, quality really doesn’t matter. I’m excited to see how the lens has improved in the next camera system, and the next, but I’m not doing a lot of cropping on these shots.

I’m incredibly glad to have gotten the Pro because of the telephoto lens. Is it really a “telephoto” at 52 mm? Not really, if you compare to other cameras, but that extra distance, the little bit of visual compression, added up. Looking at the stats of the photos I’ve taken, I’ve used the telephoto lens a lot. Switching between the lenses is natural. I can’t imagine giving up the telephoto lens.

iPhone 11 Pro Stats

Total photos and videos taken: 44,692

• Ultra Wide: 10,072 (22.5%)
• Wide: 14,144 (31.6%)
• Telephoto: 9,013 (20.2%)
• Front Facing: 1,013 (2.3%)

The other images were a mixture of multiple lenses

Oh yeah, and the expanded front facing camera was great for selfies.

Background processing

In the background, the iPhone 11 Pro had some serious upgrades, mostly with Deep Fusion and Night Mode (more on that below), which increased the overall image quality through computational photography.

For video, the handheld stabilization was the best I’ve used, and many friends were surprised that video I shot was handheld… they thought it was with a big cinematic camera. I’m not sure how much of that smoothness came from switching to shooting 24 FPS in 4K mostly, but there is a feel about the video system that is super smooth.

The advancements to the software, Smart HDR and the chipset on the 11 Pro gave me the confidence to know that, with little adjustment while shooting or in post, the image would come out as I saw it. It keeps getting better every year.

A marketing photo for work… Looks at the details captured of the crashing wave and sunset!

Shooting outside the frame

When the 11 Pro came out, one of the features I was most exciting about was Shooting Outside the Frame. When enabled, this feature used the other lenses to capture information outside the frame, which allowed you to add parts to the image in during editing. It was like the inverse of cropping. This was a dream come true for someone who shoots a lot of action photography. You had 30 days to made edits with information captured outside the frame. I remember the first weekend with the phone at a friend’s wedding (I was only late 15 minutes to the rehearsal dinner to pick up the phone), adding the bride’s trailing wedding dress into the frame that was cropped out as we were quickly walking down the beach.

But when Deep Fusion was released in an early iOS 13 point beta, it disabled shooting outside the frame, and I abandoned the new feature for an increase in quality I didn’t really understand how it worked. The other week I looked in the settings to enable it again and found out it was cut entirely in iOS 14, which is a shame, but I think has to do with overall performance of the Camera app. I hope it returns in the future on iPhones with more memory because it was one of those hallmark features that only an iPhone could offer and changed how photographs were taken.

Deep Fusion

So, I gave up one feature for another, quality overcoming convenience. Deep Fusion was introduced during the 11 Pro announcement and when it came out, I was super excited. As soon as it was available in beta I turned it on…. and frankly haven’t noticed the benefits. It turns on automatically in low light and captures more details in the image. Some folks did comparisons when it was released, and the differences are noticeable, but it’s not something I think about when shooting or editing. I’m sure I’ve reaped the benefits, but it’s not something I really think about when considering a year with this phone.

Night Mode

Another hallmark feature of the 11 series was Night Mode. In a nutshell, these are handheld, long exposures that are put together through computational photography. The results can be stunning… and strange. Personally, I enjoy photos at night taken without it. Night mode can make the images seem fake. But it does come in handy and I’ve been happy with several shots. I’m looking forward to see how the feature improves.

Favorite shots and memories

This past year has been one unlike any other, and photography and videography have been a constant for me. So much has happened and are some highlights to how I used the 11 Pro during it.

Pandemic shut down

When our state shut down to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, I was one of the few people walking the streets of my downtown. I was able to capture what was going on in our community and share it with people who were at home. The Ultra Wide was really good at showing the emptiness of the downtown. I can’t imagine telling this story without it. I’m glad I captured it for posterity. This is what photography is all about.

The first weekend of the COVID closure

Black Lives Matter

After the murder of George Floyd, protests and marches began across the country. There were several that happened in my town, and I would stumble upon them with just my iPhone. The ability to quickly switch lenses on a camera that was powerful enough gave me the confidence as a photographer to know I would get the shots. And also during the pandemic, the telephoto lens allowed me to get shots while keeping a distance.

Violence in the streets

This summer, a White Supremacist group held a march in Kalamazoo… and violence erupted. I was there in the middle of it with my iPhone. I captured raw images of the events. The iPhone 11 Pro was up for the task. I didn’t have to worry about focus, stabilization or any of those other concerns that come with larger cameras. Again, all three lenses were vital, and the ability to take pictures while recording video was convenient to get images quickly to share with local media. The photos and videos were seen around the country and documented a darker part of the year.

Spring… Summer… Fall…

This year I’ve spent a lot more time walking, before work, during lunch and at night. I’m shooting a lot less for work than I normally do, so I kept my photography skills up by capturing images on my walk. The flexibility of the 11 Pro allowed me to create images I never imagined.

One more thing… the Smart Battery Case

I’ve always loved using the Smart Battery cases to get a little extra juice while shooting. But the 11 Pro case introduced something new: a dedicated shutter button. And boy did I use this. Press the button to open the camera and press it again to take images. It really made the phone feel more like a camera. I will miss this on the 12 Pro

A camera unlike any other

The iPhone 11 Pro was really the first Pro iPhone camera. I know the term Pro gets thrown around in marketing and many people think it means “more expensive.” That’s true, but the 11 Pro gave photographers and videographers everything they needed for most things in one package. Instead of a heavy bag full of lenses, it was all just a tap away.

Spending more time at home in the past few months, the only way of getting out of the house has been walking through neighborhood. Not only have my exercise goals been “crushed,” but I’ve been able to finally listen to all of those podcasts that have accumulated — and found more!

The other morning on a walk, I felt a strong urge to rip the buds out of my ear. For the remaining mile of my stroll, there was nothing to hear besides what was around me. The sidewalks I have frequented felt new and alive in a way they haven’t in a long time. And I felt a part of them.

As energizing as it is to get the latest information and insights as the day begins, the birds are pretty great at it too.

There’s a new manual exposure control in the Camera app in iOS 14 Beta 2.

I discovered this by accident while shooting video earlier today. The icon, a plus and minus sign within a circle, appears in the row of additional settings within the Camera app on iPhone 11 and 11 Pro.

When you select it, a familiar slider appears, similar to editing adjustments in Photos. There’s also small histogram also appears that reflects the exposure changes you make.

To get a manual exposure previously in iOS, you would press on the frame and a box would appear with a small sun on a line. You would have to press that line to adjust the exposure. It was always finicky and not really reliable.

In my first test of it, it does not appear to link with the square and sun exposure adjustment. In fact, it seems that you can use both simultaneously. I will play around more with this in the future.

Making manual exposure easier to use is an important addition to the iOS Camera app. While the auto exposure has gotten better and better each year, sometimes you want to accentuate a certain part of the image you are capturing.

A dedicated and easy to use manual exposure control is a welcome addition to the stock iOS Camera app. I often use other apps like Halide because of its ease to manually adjust exposure.

While there was a lot to get excited about in iOS 14, there wasn’t much for Photos or Camera apps, so this is exciting to find.

www.youtube.com/watch

• A lot of people got dogs and are training and walking them.
• A lot of people keep routines going on walks the same time every day.
• A lot of cars drive the wrong way down the one way.
• A lot of cute birds are actually mean and fight with each other.
• A lot of squirrels do the same.
• A lot of people stared running and have noticeably gotten better.
• A lot of people are looking out the window like me because when the mail comes there’s a rush to the mailbox.

Entering the third week of sheltering from the world, I’ve fallen into a new rhythm of day to day life, one that is much more slow.

While things in our world are moving very fast, they are also very slow at the same time. Work is face paced, keeping up with new information is a new area of study, and buying goods is a micro odyssey. A lot of energy is required. But at home, the pace of life has slowed. As most of society has shut down, small things have become a refuge, like meals, a cup of tea, talking to a friend and, yes, even cleaning.

There’s a TV show I watched this week that speaks to this time: Joe Pera Talks with You. It’s the quirky comedy that chronicles about a middle school choral teacher in Michigan’s Upper Penisula. At first watch, it appears to be the soul of a 70-year-old man inside the body of a 30-year-old going through the mundaneness of daily life, but it really is a celebration of those simple things that are now taken away from us. Oh, and it’s hilarious.

As my habits in quarantine have become those of an old man, this show has become much more relevant and relatable.

A Saturday morning breakfast, a relaxing trip to the grocery store visiting friends and family for a cook out — all things that became routine and then for granted but we so desire now. The way Joe talks to you about them are soothing. As we’re looking at the world through a different lens, his perspective is, frankly, inspiring. While each episode is only about 12 minutes, they feel like a full half an hour, a statement of the peace we can find in these things. Time has a different meaning now.

Much of Joe Pera Talks with You celebrates what we can’t do right now, it also highlights things we can do: staying up all night watching internet videos, going for a hike, reading what peaks our interest, lots of reading.

The things he gets excited about are things I am excited to experience again. A story of a simple man with simple pleasures all of the sudden becomes something like an aspiration.

Closed Kalamazoo Week 2: Looking at everything differently

Another week of Kalamazoo being closed. It doesn’t feel as strange as last week, but there are still daily moments that are dissettling.

Like today. I just came back from a walk downtown and it was eerie to see all the churches empty on a Sunday morning. It was very windy, closed signs were flapping on doors. It felt like a storm is coming. Coming home and briefly turning on the news, it appears one certainly is intensifying.

I’ve increased the number of walks I take to two or three a day, mostly in the same area downtown, trying to come to terms with everything that is happening. I’ve walked these streets daily for years, so the changes are stark. As the initial shock of everything being empty has become the new normal, I’m beginning to notice new things in the silence.

The world feels tangibly different in a lot of ways. The birds and other animals seem to roam more freely — maybe they always have, but it’s noticeable with less noise and people. I saw some friends on the Kalamazoo Mall and, as we talked across the street, our voices echoed.

Stores that were open just weeks ago are blending in with those that have been vacant previously. Walking past them, they are like distant landscapes that can only been seen but not interacted with.

Crosswalk signs are really just recommendations now. Social norms and small rules seem to have been put on hold. This week as I was walking around 5:30 p.m., a group was skateboarding on the steps of City Hall. On the Kalamazoo Mall, a woman was walking her dog off leash. A man riding his skateboard, on the sidewalk, whole being pulled by his dog. I don’t know if anyone would have said anything during normal circumstances, but no one is even thinking it now.

It is quite a strange, but freeing feeling to walk and not see anyone, especially at night — similar to walking in the woods. And when there are other people, I try to avoid them by crossing the street. It’s hard to maintain the six-foot distance when passing someone on the sidewalk. But more times than not, they will move over too.

The warm weather is making everything feel more open — the spaces felt larger and the emptiness felt deeper. But there’s also signs of good things to come — Oberon is released, flowers are starting to sprout, the sun is making an appearance. Illuminated windows are welcome signs as people are connecting digitally.

While’s so calm and quiet, seeing ambulances drive by and walking past Bronson are both reminders of why this all is happening. It’s impossible to imagine what is going on for those people and for the folks affected by the virus.

What’s going to come in the few weeks? More of the same, I assume. But how we react will change.

Here are some photos from the past week.

Today is my birthday, and I’m celebrating with a list of 32 things I’ve learned as in many years.

This isn’t a definitive list of the most important things I’ve learned, just what came to mind.

1. You can only have as many true friends as you have fingers.
2. “Good” coffee is a balance of quality and convince.
3. Semper ubi sub ubi (Always where under where — it’s a Latin joke, but also good advice when you read it aloud).
4. Η ΤΑΝ Η ΕΠΙ ΤΑΣ (Come back with your shield, or on it)
5. There’s always something different, you just have to look for it.
6. Discipline is a vehicle for joy.
7. Make time to spend with people you care about.
8. Tweak your system, but don’t have a system that’s just tweaking.
9. There’s good food in every town, you just have to look for it and enter with no expectations and an empty stomach.
10. It’s a lot of work to have long hair.
11. Don’t over subscribe to RSS feeds or over follow on Twitter
12. If you think you have something funny or edgy to say, text it to your group of friends first.
13. You slowly pick up traits of the 5 people you spend the most time with or talk to.
14. You can only physically be in one place at any moment — don’t try to be at both.
15. Turn read receipts on for Messages.
16. It’s easier to find a job when you have a job.
17. If you have an idea, write it down.
18. Our minds aren’t filing cabinets for information and to-dos, have a system.
19. Making broth is one of the most fulfilling things you can cook.
20. When you look at WebMD, remember that they need to say “see your doctor” for liability reasons, you might not need to.
21. Seeing your favorite band multiple times on the same tour is incredibly rewarding.
22. When two cars hit each other, it’s a crash, not an accident: You don’t know the intent of the motorists.
23. Movie theaters are really the best way to see a movie.
24. Study what interests you, not what you think will get you money.
25. Don’t drive too fast.
26. Turn off most of the notifications on your phone and computer.
27. If you do anything with social media for work and post personally as well, get two phones.
28. Some folks just can’t grow a beard (myself included).
29. File organization is important on computers.
30. Back your files up, and back up the backups.
31. If you see something that catches your eye, take a picture, it might never occur again.
32. Don’t get mad at other people, there’s no way you have any idea what they are going through.

One more: The best way to do something is often just to do it.

The one thing that drew me to Apple’s latest Smart Battery case has nothing to do with extending the life of the phone: it’s all about what it adds to the camera.

The Smart Battery Case for iPhone 11 and 11 Pro includes, for the first time, a mechanical shutter button for taking pictures and video.

My short review: it’s amazing.

My long review:

The shutter button

I’ve often used the volume controls on the side of the phone in the past to trigger the camera. However, their placement often requires using two hands. Having this new button for the camera near the bottom of the phone makes taking pictures an ease.

The button fits the index finger well. It feels natural and sturdy, like something you’d have a larger camera.

Holding the button for about half a second will open the camera app anywhere you are on phone, even if it’s locked. I do wish the camera launched quicker, but it’s super simple and has become the most frequent way I get to the camera. I’m not as concerned about accidentally triggering the shutter as much as I am missing the moment I’m trying to photograph.

While it makes sense that the button will open Apple’s Camera app, one downside is that you can only use it to take pictures in that app. There have been times when I’ve lauched a third party app like Hailde or FiLMiC and tried to use the shutter button to no avail. Apple could open this up to developers, since they currently can use the volumne control buttons to trigger the shutter.

Something else I noticed that was frustrating was not being able to use the camera trigger when I had directons throgh the Maps app. Hopefully this is a software bug and will be fixed.

I would love to have a regular case with a shutter button or even have it added to the iPhone hardware. I know Apple doesn’t like to add buttons to their devices (they’ve only removed them) but, as someone who uses my iPhone as their main camera, it would be a welcome addition without the bulk of the battery.

I’ve taken the case off or used a different case a few times and missed the button: my muscle memory adapted quickly. I’ve kept the case on most of the time because of this and have a hard time imaging taking pictures with my iPhone any other way.

The extra battery

I recently took it on a four-day trip to Las Vegas and I only really needed to charge my phone twice. It was great to have the camera shutter (of course) but also to have the peace of mind that, no matter what happened, I had enough battery life to get me through 24 hours plus.

The case is bulky, as expected, but the design feels sleek. You only really notice the bulk when a) you first put the case one b) you take the case off or c) you have another phone that is ceaseless or has a case. I’ve stopped minding the extra weight and size.

What makes the Smart Battery Case so good is the intrigation that Apple includes. You see a battery status when you connect it and the percentage of battery shows up in Control Center. My favorite feature of previous versions of Apple’s case is the iPhone also knows when it’s drawing power from the case and will not perform intensive backup or other processes. Using other battery cases, the iPhone will think it’s charging connected to the wall.

For all the other “smarts” fo the case, Rene Ritchie has a deeper dive over on iMore.

At $130, the Smart Battery Case is a pricy upgrade, but the only battery case to consider if you use your iPhone as a camera. A forewarning: once you start using the shutter button, it might be difficulty to go without it.

One of my guiding principals of photography is to capture the world as I see it. This was core to my training as a photojournalist and the iPhone has been perfect camera for this: a single 26mm lens, no optical zoom and a sensor that allowed little editing.

While being a good snapshot camera, there have also been tools and methods that photographers have used to capture images beyond what the eye can see. The iPhone 11 and 11 Pro are the first to really do this for Apple’s camera system. Night Mode and the Ultra Wide Lens are two hallmark features that bring the iPhone into a different category of camera.

Through the iPhone’s processor, Night Mode captures colors and light in darker scenes while holding the camera in your hands. Any other camera would need a tripod and a long exposure to achieve this. The Ultra Wide lens captures a much larger scene than the eye can see and gives an effect that only an expensive fish eye lens could. Both features provide new ways to capture images with just the camera in your pocket, no additional tools required. 

These are my impressions of the new iPhone having used it for three months. Like any iPhone update, the improvements are noticeable throughout the camera system. But with the addition of the Ultra Wide lens and processing power of Night Mode, the iPhone 11 and 11 Pro take portable photography into a new era.

Ultra Wide

When I worked in my local newspaper’s photo department, there were two rules for interns: You could only take one photo of the downtown fountain surrounded by mirrors and you could only submit two photos taken with the fisheye lens.

Cashing in: a photo o f the mirrored fountain taken with the Ultra Wide lens.

Why these rules? Sometimes, as a photographer, you can overuse a certain lens or location, and these were two that interns consistently overused, especially when they had access to a fisheye lens for the first time

Like one of those young photographer, I found myself immediately drawn to the Ultra Wide lens on the iPhone 11 Pro and have used it for about 37 percent of the pictures I’ve taken.

With my DSLR, an ultra wide or fisheye lens would be the last one I would carry with any regularity. First of all, they are expensive and I only rent one a couple times a year for special projects. Second, even if I had one, it’s another lens to carry. Using it would also require switching lenses or carrying a second body. I don’t know many photographers who have this lens as part of their daily kit. They produce a nice effect, but they do not offer a lot of versatility for the cost and extra bulk.

Without the constraints listed above, it’s been a joy having this lens always available on the iPhone. It really opens up so many new kinds of photos and videos that were impossible to capture previously on a camera that fits into your pocket.

The day the phone was released, I headed to Northern Michigan for a good friend’s wedding. Right away I saw the benefit of being to capture groups of people and the surroundings.

But I also quickly remembered that just because an image is wide doesn’t make it good. I would take a dozen pictures with the Ultra Wide thinking they were great because of the new perspective I was seeing only to be disappointed later when I reviewed them.

There’s also an issue with quality. The Ultra Wide angle lens reminds me of the iPhone 4s camera. It captures stunning images in daylight, but indoors or at night, I was a little disappointed with image quality. A lot of this has to do with the distortion that comes shooting so wide. It doesn’t benefit form some of the same low light sensor as the other lenses, not including Dark Mode.

While the quality isn’t the best, the Ultra Wide lens was able to capture this moment of snow falling during a production of Elf: The Musical. I’ll take the perspective over the quality. Distortion with the Super Wide.

As the quality of iPhone lenses and sensors have continued to get better each year and I expected the Ultra Wide to be on par with the rest of the camera system. This isn’t anywhere near a dealbreaker, however. The moments I’ve been able to capture with it, even if they weren’t as good of quality as the other lenses, is worth it.

For landscape images, Ultra Wide is stunning. Something to keep in mind is that the wide angle lens distorts the image, especially if you put it close to something. It’s very easy to take images that do not look like what the eye sees. This can be a fun effect, but isn’t something you can do for every photo. (It’s a lot of fun with dogs).

For a lot of people, this will be their first time holding a camera with such a wide view. If my excitement any indication, I can only imagine theirs.

The greatest benefit of the Ultra Wide

My absolute favorite feature of the iPhone 11 camera system is being able to capture outside of the frame of images taken with the Wide and Telephoto lenses.

This is something that no other camera offers — additional information. If you take a photo or video at 1x or 2x, it will use the other lenses to capture information surrounding it. So if your taking a picture of a running dog and she moves outside the frame, you can crop and add in part of the image outside of the frame.

This is really revolutionary in a lot of ways, something all photographers have probably hoped for at some point. It really is a photography-shifting feature that I thought I was going to miss when going back to other cameras. However, my use of it was relatively short lived. A month or so after the phone was released, Deep Fusion was released in iOS 13.2. This is a new feature of the iPhone 11 and drastically increases the quality of images by “computational photography mad science,” in the words of Apple senior Vice President Phil Schiller.

There’s no way to easily toggle it on or off outside of the Settings app or to see if an image uses Deep Fusion. So I’m back to taking images the old way. I’ll choose the quality of Deep Fusion over the additional information that is captured. This is probably because I’ve been taking pictures without the extended data collection for decades.

I hope Deep Fusion and outside the frame collection comes in future releases.

Night Mode

One of the three pillars of photography is Shutter Speed: the longer the shutter is open, the more light can hit the sensor. At night, you almost always need a tripod to get a sharp image that’s properly exposed. But if you leave the shutter open for one, two or three seconds, you can capture light and colors in a way the human eye does not perceive because you are allowing the sensor to soak up the light a longer period of time.

I’ve dabbled with night photography in the past, but didn’t get into it too much because I didn’t like having to carry around a tripod with me. iPhone 11 Pro changes that.

I didn’t realize I was using Night Mode the first time I used it. Unlike turning on the flash manually, Night Mode will activate when it notices low light. When you hit the shutter, it will tell you to hold the phone still for one to three seconds. You can turn it off by swiping on the viewfinder to see the redesigned control panel.

I held the image up to what I could see and they were drastic. The Night Mode photo looked as if there were large baseball field lights nearby.

Regular exposure (left) vs Dark Mode (right)

It’s amazing to be able to capture that level of detail. It creates a stunning image that’s free of blur. But after three months of using it, I don’t know what I like more: the standard image or the Night Mode version. However, I’ve noticed friends have been blown away by what Night Mode can do.

One thing Night Mode doesn’t do is capture movement. One neat thing about night photography is when cars or other lights move by, it creates streaks. Night Mode really captures what you see when you press the shutter button and enhances that. If you’re looking for a long exposure app that captures light streaks, check out Spectre.

There’s something about capturing night as we see it. I don’t like the increased colors as I do the more muted and dark ones. I like something in between.

A few steps away for reality

So what do these two new features mean for photography on the iPhone? Is is bad for a camera to capture the world in ways we can’t naturally see it? Not inheritly. A camera is a tools like a pen or a paintbrush — you can create art that is realistic or more fantastic. One great thing about photography is also showing people the world in a way they’ve never seen it, and this iPhone offers two major new ways of doing that.

Using the iPhone 11 Pro is a little jarring at first that it can capture things in ways beyond which the eye can. These are all tools I have used as a photographer, but given the need to carry an extra lens or tripod, rarely used. Now that they fit in the phone in my pocket, I will utilize them more often.

The promise of Computational Photography made with the release of the iPhone XS come true with the 11 Pro. Smart HDR was a stunning addition and has gotten even better. The iPhone 11 camera system is a huge step forward, offering more tools for anyone who takes pictures with it. Night Mode and the Super Wide lens have ushered in the next era of mobile photography, replacing yet again tools and methods unreachable to most people,

Other iPhone 11 Pro observations

• As with other iterations, Portrait Mode has improved significantly.
• The UI redesign of the Camera app is overall nice, but some areas are taking some time to adapt to. Other areas leave me with questions, such as why does the lens selection have three circles in Photos mode but only one in Video? You need to tap it to toggle the different lenses. Strange. But so happy that an iOS 13 update allows you to change the video format settings right in the app.
• All of my selfies are now taken in the wide mode. With the ultra wide lens on the rear camera, I want to the front camera to go even wider.
• I remember the Slofies announcement during in the keynote, but it took me a while to figure out it wasn’t a specific setting, but just shooting slow mo video with the front facing camera.
• Videos are absolutely stunning and the upgrade should be noted.
• I’ve noticed some delays in using the app and switching between different modes on longer shoots. Usually it comes during heavy shooting. No app crashes, just some delays.

Interesting news the other week: Apple released technical specs for flash assessories that work directly with the iPhone.

I’ve never been a big fan of using the flash and rarely use it on my iPhone. However, having a flash that can be positioned or bounced is really promising, especially for portraits and product photography.

A major downside of the built-in iPhone flash is that it’s fixed to the phone (obviously). With it’s position next to the lens makes it nearly impossible to bounce the flash.

While Anker has a flash that will ship next month, I’m excited to see what devices are released. It appears the flash will connect to the phone via the Lightning cable. Will there be flashes that then link to other strobes, making a wireless network? Do the strobes use the same technology as Apple’s built in flash?

First the camera button on the Smart Battery case and now this? An great end to 2019 for iPhone photography accessories.

I take a lot of photos. Currently in my iCloud Photo Library, there are 236,167 images, 6,429 videos and 8 items. And I’m running out of cloud storage.

While Apple has made major improvements in Photos and the iCloud Photo Library in recent years, such a large photo library is difficult to manage. It takes what seems like months to have the library scanned for faces and items.

For years, I’ve tried to bring the size down. There are apps that scan for duplicates and similar images, but they haven’t really worked well with a library of my size in the cloud.

Over Thanksgiving, I set up a new MacBook Air for my Dad. In Photos, I saw how beautiful the app is when there’s a more curated library there.

Photos has become the dumping ground for all of my images in the past decade. I want it more like a curated photo album that is more enjoyable to browse and use.

So in 2020, I’m embarking on a goal to downsize my library one day at a time, and you can too.

Each day, I’m going to look at all of my images that were taken on the day, delete duplicates, export similar photos, and make my library more manageable and enjoyable.

Every Day Photo Housekeeping

Find today’s photos

• Tap the search icon in the lower right corner of Photos on iOS or the upper right corner on MacOS.
• Type in the day’s date.
• Select the date in the drop down menu. You will see a box surround it.
• Below that, you will see how many photos were taken on that day. Tap “See All” to the right of it.
• There’s all the photos from the specific day over the years.

Select the ones you want to delete or export

After having all the photos, I scroll through looking first for duplicates and selecting them. I delete those.

Then, I’ll look for similar shots, selecting all but the ones I want to keep. Blurry and rapid shots are selected. I add those to an album called “January Export and Delete.”

At the end of the month, on my Mac, I’ll export the originals to a folder in Dropbox and delete the images from Photos.

Reflect, share, make albums

When looking through these photos, I’ve found it’s a good time to reflect, edit and share memories from the past. I’m planning on adding older images to my Day One journal and also share some with friends and family.

While the automatic album and Memories feature is great on Photos, I’m planning to use this audit as a time to make my own, curated galleries of events, trips and people. There’s something about handcrafted galleries that I really like and want to have more of in my digital life.

Going forward

It’s one thing to clean house, but another one to keep it clean. I’m planning on doing weekly reviews of my Photo Library going forward and do the same things I’ve done each day.

I’ve done this on and off over the past couple years, but am going to do it for the whole of 2020. If I miss a day, I’ll make sure to come back and knock it out. I’m going to make a mega project in Things to keep track of each day of the year.

Photos in iOS 13 offers more refined organization of pictures and videos as well as expanding editing options for photos and, for the first time, videos

Photos in iOS 13 received significant updates in two primary areas: organization and editing. While it might not initially seem like much has changed, this is one of the most important updates in several releases for all types of photographers.

The organizational overhaul still focuses on the overall timeline of when photos were taken but curates them in a new and smart manner based on days, months, and years. Using machine learning, Photos can pick images and videos that are relevant to your location and time of year. Also improved are the search abilities and how terms are suggested. This organization system finally feels like it makes sense on both iOS, iPadOS, and MacOS.

For what Photos offers in organization, it balances with editing features. Eight new adjustments have been added, with a focus on color and image clarity. The layout for editing brings the adjustments to the forefront, removing the basic Light and Color adjustments in previous releases. Without a doubt, the most welcome addition in Photos is the ability to edit videos. Now you can perform all of the same edits on videos as you can for photos. Previously, you would have to use third-party apps or the iMovie extension, which took a lot of time and crashed often.

This review will look at the what’s new for Photos in iOS 13 and my impressions using the betas over the summer. From Apple’s recent event, it appears there will be a lot of new features in the Camera app, which I will cover once they are released.

Dark Mode

Before we jump into the two main areas of improvement in Photos, I need to mention a third, and one of the greatest: system-wide Dark Mode. It’s a significant improvement for browsing images and video, letting them stand out. Common in most photo and video editing and organizational applications, Dark Mode in iOS 13 is one of the best features in Photos. You can toggle this in Settings -> Display & Brightness. You can also add a button to Control Center to turn it on and off. 

Editing

Interface

Photos has always had somewhat robust, but still convenient, editing abilities. While other apps have long surpassed it in the sheer number of features, iOS 13 is where Photos returns with serious power.

The training wheels have been removed editing photos in iOS 13. Previously, adjustments were divided into three subcategories: Light, Color, and B&W. Pressing one would open a bar with a sliding scale, where you could make an image brighter or darker, or increase or decrease the color. To get into the finer adjustment areas, you had to click on a menu icon to the right and see a list of editing options. Clicking on Highlights, for example, brought up a new scale to adjust. 

IOS 13 introduces a streamlined editing process: all of the editing categories are right there. There are no submenus, you scroll through the adjustments and pick the edit you’d like to make. Each adjustment has its own icon, which makes it easy to navigate by sight. Tap the circle and it will activate. Once edits are made, there is a nice yellow bar around the circle icon that represents the edit, reminiscent of the rings for Activity on the Apple Watch. When you press it again, that part of the image will revert to the original.

I’ve found that my editing speed has increased significantly under the new layout. Less taps are always welcome, and having all of the adjustments together is helpful when making decisions on what you want to edit.

One of the best cases of the new design is when a photo is automatically enchanted. Previously, the Magic Wand was located in the upper right-hand corner. You could only see what adjustments were made if you tap down to the Color and Light layers. With the single line of adjustments in iOS 13, you immediately see what was done to your image. This is not only an excellent way to make additional changes but also to learn what different adjustments will do, especially when combined.

New editing features

In addition to the redesign, there are also eight new adjustments you can make in iOS 13 that primarily focus on color and clarity of the image. The best way to learn about these adjustments is to load a photo and play around with them. But here’s a breakdown of what each one does.

• Brilliance: Adjusting the brilliance is similar to changing the light and exposure. Brilliance, however, relies on the iPhone to make specific adjustments based on the light levels of the current photo. Think of it as a “smart exposure” adjustment. Brilliance will look at parts of the picture that are over or underexposed. When you move the dial, it will adjust just those parts that need it. It does a better job at maintaining the highlights and shadows than adjusting the Exposure.

• Vibrance: Similar to how Brilliance works for exposure, Vibrance will intensify more muted colors while leaving other colors as they are. If you were to increase the Saturation, all colors would intensify, often resulting in over-saturated images. This has been one of my favorite adjustments to use in other apps and am glad it’s in Photos.

• Warmth: This setting mimics changing the white balance of photos. In a nutshell, white balance is how your camera interprets what kind of light is in your photo. Ideally, whites should be white, not bluish or orange. When you increase the warmth of your photo, the light in the image becomes more warm, and decrease, more cool. Warmth handles light that casts on the orange and blue spectrum. Pictures shot in the RAW file format can have their white balance edited fully by other applications. Adding Warmth and Tint are helpful adjustments for photos taken with the iPhone’s native Camera. The iPhone’s camera does an excellent job of automatically adjusting for White Balance, but sometimes you need to manually make adjustments to reflect what you see.

• Tint: In addition to editing the orange and blue light in a photo, you can adjust the light on the green and magenta spectrum with Tint. You often don’t need to make changes here, but it’s good to know if you are editing photos that were taken under artificial light.

• Sharpness: Sometimes, photos can come out a little blurry; either the focus didn’t snap fast enough, there is a smudge on the lens, or there’s some camera shake. Sharpness will adjust the overall focus and contrast of a photo, making the picture appear to be more in focus.

• Definition: This adjustment will increase your photo’s overall structure, defining edges within your image. A word of warning: a lot of photographers will ramp up the Definition to make their picture seem more dramatic. But when you look closely, it just looks fake.

• Noise Reduction: When pictures are taken in low light, the camera’s sensor is working harder to capture light. To do this, it will increase the ISO, resulting in noise, or grain, on the photo. When applied, Noise Reduction will remove this to make the image more clear. As a result, the effect often makes the image a little blurry. When I need to get rid of some noise, I usually increase the Definition by the same amount to balance it out.

• Vignette: One of the more artistic editing features added to iOS 13, vignette is either darkening or lighting the corners of an image. This effect naturally occurs with some lenses under certain circumstances, but it’s a great tool to draw focus onto the subject of an image.

There are also new features for cropping:

• Vertical and Horizontal perspective transformation: This editing feature allows you to change where the perspective of where the photo was taken. Transforming an image’s perspective helps photos that might have been captured off-center or pictures of tall buildings that seem to be tilting. Be warned; this is one of the quickest ways to make your photo look fake.
• Flip Image: Basically, this will flip the photo to a mirror image of itself. 

You get all of the same cropping aspect ratios. However, 5:4 has been renamed to 10:8.

Portrait Mode

Two new features have been added for Portrait Mode. A new lightning filter for iPhones XS and XR called High Key Light Mono, which takes a subject in black and white and replaces the background with white. 

You can also change the strength of the artificial light that is applied to the subject, increasing or decreasing it. I seldom use any of the lighting features but have found to use them more with the updates because I can roll back the lighting. 

Adjust strength of filters and auto enchantments

All of the built-in filters have remained the same in iOS 13, but added is the ability to adjust their intensity. This helps create an image that looks a little different than the filter. I often like to add a little color to black and white filters or add a bit more to the color filters. Also, you can adjust the strength of Auto Enhance, which is helpful if Photos doesn’t give you precisely what you’re looking for. 

Video editing

The most exciting part of editing in iOS 13 is the ability to make changes to videos. Previously, all you could do was trim a clip or open an extension for another app like iMovie.

Now, iOS 13 allows all of the same edits to videos that you can make on images. It’s hard to signify what a significant addition this is for the app. You can edit a video shot in 4K, adjust the color and exposure, crop to a square, and change the perspective all within a few taps. This was previously nearly impossible to do on iOS with any ease. Something that could take anywhere between 10 to 20 minutes now takes a matter of minutes.

Also, when you trim a video, you are not forced to save it as a new clip. The original file is preserved so you can revert later, just like images.

I have been amazed at how seamless editing videos are. Previously, you would have to use several different apps even to get close to what you can quickly do in Photos. In a lot of ways, I didn’t realize how good videos shot with an iPhone could look. Most videos I shot would be texted or tweeted soon after taking them. 

I feel like, with this base of editing in Photos, Apple could launch a rewritten version of iMovie that would be more functional. In my experience, the iOS app has been limiting and buggy.

Live Photo features added in iOS 13

A somewhat hidden feature added for Live Photos is the ability to export as a video. Live Photos – introduced with the iPhone 6S – record a short video of the time before and after a photo is taken. This allows you to see the picture move but also choose which keyframe you want (it helps taking pictures of lightning).

The quality isn’t at the same level as a video you’d shoot with your iPhone, but it’s nice to have the flexibility of the format. Previously a third-party app would be used to extract the video on iOS. 

One part of this new feature I stumbled upon is that Photos will play a series of Live Photos together as one longer movie. If you take a series of Live Photos and press down on one of the images to play it, the Photos app will play a continuous video of all of the connected videos. Also, you can select the same series of photos, hit the share button, and export them all as a single video. You can actually do this with any Live Photos you’d like, creating a 1 Second Each Day-sequel video.

Knowing this came in handy recently when I was talking a photo of a friend who started saying something funny. I knew I wanted a video, but it was too late to switch camera modes. So I kept taking Live Photos and was able to export the eight photos together into one seamless video, audio and all. 

Another step in the right direction

Editing photos is one of my most common tasks on iOS, and I’m glad to see the redesign of the editing panel and the addition of new adjustment tools. While previous versions hid the complexity of photo adjustments under three categories, Photos in iOS 13 embraces all the essential photo editing tools and invites users to enhance their photos in ways they may have never thought of.  For those who often get down to adjust the fine details of a picture, the new design makes it even easier. The latest adjustment tools make it less likely to switch out of the app. 

Oh yeah, and video editing is the greatest. After a few months using it, I can’t imagine going back without it. 

Organization

People have been using iPhones to capture images and videos for longer and their collections have continued to grow. As cloud storage makes libraries grow, many have become confronted with the problem of photo management.

Apple has aimed to make organization in iOS, both simple and powerful. Since the beginning of iOS, there have been different organizational views for the chronological grid of photos, which has grown over past releases to include zooming in and out.

In recent releases, Photos has used metadata and on-device scanning to make the library smart, offering collections of images from locations (trips, the office, home) or themes (holidays, pets, people). While impressive, these features always felt secondary. 

This machine learning and categorization is now in the forefront. The entire core of organization in Photos has changed with iOS 13, injecting the chronological view with machine learning to create something less of a camera roll and more of a curated photo exhibit.

I like to think of it like this: viewing your photos in previous versions of iOS was like looking at a large topographical map. The iOS 13 updates to Photos breaks that map up into points of interest, includes roadways with information on traffic, and brings up relevant information you might not want to know until you are traveling. 

When you initially open Photos in iOS 13, you will need to update your library. You will then see the same tabs on the bottom: Photos; For You; Albums; and Search. But there is a new menu above that with Years, Months, Days, and All Photos.

Photos

Years

This is the broadest view you can have of your Photo Library: there is a title and single image for each year. What picture is picked? Photos pulls an image from around the same time of year that you’re currently in.

If you keep the screen up, the year will cycle through a photo from each month, displaying the name. It also uses your location to try and pinpoint images that are relevant to the time of year and location. I’ve found I’ve seldom looked at photos in this mode, but it’s helpful when drilling down to an exact time period.

Months

When you tap on a photo in the year mode, you are taken to the next panel: Months. 

Here, you see several large photos from each month. These are collected moments from what Photos deems as highlights. 

I’ve found about 3 to 5 moments per month. These are organized by a particular date or location and can span a couple of days or a week. I’ve found Moments are created for trips, sporting events and times when I’ve taken a lot of photos at a single time.

When you tap the menu button — the circles with three dots in the middle — you can view a video of those images or share the photos. 

Months are kinda like Moments. Introduced in iOS 7, Moments are the smart ordering of photos into something like an album: it uses the dates and locations of pictures and videos to create digital albums. They’ve never really stuck for me, scattered in the For You section. The collections in Days are like make sense in iOS 13 organized under Months. 

When you click on the collections, you move to the Days view.

Days

Days view is my favorite when browsing for an image. It has curated collections of photos from each day.

Days view has photos collected for that day and location: if you take pictures in the morning in one location and then travel and take some more, they are organized separately

The view in Days has images, and video fill the whole screen, with some being smaller and others larger, which gives a beautiful curated view. Videos also autoplay, which is a nice touch to highlight the content.

There does seem to be a limit at how many photos are included for each view. At the bottom, the last image has a number with a plus sign, indicating how many more photos were taken on that day. Tapping that will move you over to the All Photos panel.

Organizing photos in this way is better than the previous grid of days. For general users, this will be a welcome change. As someone who takes a lot of similar shots of the same thing, it’s nice to see a bird’s eye view of all pictures from that day.

All Photos

This is moved from an album in the Albums tab to the main photos tab, where it was called Camera Roll. 

The Camera Roll was all of your photos in a grid organized when they were added to your library. The Camera Roll has been split up in iOS 13: All Photos is your overview of all images and videos, while the new Recents album shows all of your recent media as it was added to your library. 

The standard and my most used view in Photos. This is a chronological listing of all the photos you have taken. 

Pinching in and out is much smoother, and there are more levels to view photos, from pictures that stack upon each other, an individual image takes up the whole width, to having three in a row to 5 and 13, which is not a way I like to look through images. 

For You

This is the area that I’ve found the most welcome upgrades to the organization of Photos in iOS 13. The suggestions are better, and they all make more sense the way they are organized.

For You has become the curated dashboard for your photos and videos that Apple has always wanted to create in previous releases. 

This section is dynamic for each device. Using two iPhones and an iPad, there are different suggestions on each device, as well as a separate order of the following categories. They are mostly similar, but the differences are sometimes nice, other times annoying. 

By no means are these suggestions perfect, but they offer a good starting off point of browsing photos and a great way to explore memories in your library that you may have forgotten about.

Memories

Memories have been around in the past few releases of Photos. They are collections of images and videos that Photos thinks will be relevant to you.

Shared Album Activity (with recent activity) 

The same feed of uploads, comments, and likes from your Shared Albums. I use these with family, friends, and coworkers. 

Sharing Suggestions

Introduced in the last release, sharing suggestions will look at photos taken that include other people and suggest sharing with them. It’s still not perfect: the suggestion will consist of pictures and videos unrelated to the ones I would want to share, but you can select photos for the collection. I will see a selection of photos that include a friend, but also include pictures I snapped before and after we saw each other, as well as different graphics and photographs from that day.

Featured Photos

I don’t know how Photos picks these images, but I’ve found they are often images with smiling faces, of nature, sunsets, and animals. They also are usually photos that have been Favorited. Whatever is happening behind the scenes, the images picked are pretty spot on with some of my favorite snapshots I’ve taken over the years. 

Recently Shared

This shows recently shared photos, both that you’ve sent and received. iOS 12 introduced a new way of sharing multiple photos and videos with people via an iCloud link, automatically setting an expression date. It includes media shared on Shared Albums and through iCloud links, which were introduced in iOS 12 as a way to supposedly securely send a lot of photos to friends. This feature is excellent when you’re sending a large amount of pictures to people, but gets annoying when you’re just sending 4 or 5 photos to someone via iMessage.

Effect Suggestions

I’ve found these are mostly related to Portrait photos and changing the light effect, such as Studio, Contour or Stage. I often don’t use these editing features, so it’s nice to see what they can do for an image, and a few times I’ve taken the suggestion.

Albums

The Albums page has been given a similar redesign as the rest of the app has. First, you see two rows of “My Albums” with Recents and Favorites the first two. Recents is one of most used albums as it shows photos that have been recently added to your library. If someone sends me a bunch of pictures, this is the easiest way to access them. As you swipe to the left, you see your most recent, manually curated albums. Hitting “See All” in the top right corner will bring them all up.

As you scroll down, you see  Shared Albums and then People and Places, which are smart collections of images based on faces that appear in photos and videos and their geolocation.

Past these are my favorite collections: media types, such as videos, selfies, time-lapse, slo-mo, etc. This is how I often drill down and quickly find a particular piece of content. 

Search

By far, my most commonly used way to access my photos is by searching. iOS 13 has improved on something confusing and challenging in the past: finding pictures that were taken on a specific day.

The suggestions when you open the search tab help train you to understand different things you can search for. Some of these included moments, people, places, categories (such as cars, stadiums, snow, and dogs) and groups, which are smart collections of photos that include more than one person. When you tap one of the suggestions, it takes you to the search bar with that phrase, subject, or location as a highlighted keyword.

When you see the search results, you can hit view more to see all of the photos. 

Search features a lot of the on-device categorization of images, has had mixed results for me. When your device first links up to your iCloud Photo Library, it analyzes the contents of your image. Unlike other photo services, all of this is done on-device, meaning whenever you get a new phone, it needs to do it all over again. As someone with a relatively sizeable iCloud Photo Library: 215,155 Photos, 5,472 videos, and 8 items, totaling 1.3 TB, this has never worked adequately for me. I often blame the bugginess I encounter using Photos and other different apps — both on and off betas — on my library size.

Photos Wishes

Copy edits to multiple photos

I’ve come to use Photos for more editing in iOS 13 over other apps, given the simplicity of the design and system-level access. However, when I make edits to one photo, I often want to copy those and apply them to other images taken under the same circumstances. I wish there were a way to copy those edits and paste them to other photos. To do this now, I use Darkroom if I know I want to make bulk changes to several images. Adding this would be a significant workflow addition for

Auto-hide photos with selected Faces

The iPhone is the best camera to capture all kinds of moments in our lives. Sometimes, after a breakup, death, or other traumatic event, you might not want to see photos of a particular person or memory. There is a way I wish there were a way to select a Face or Place in the Albums section and mark all those photos as hidden. I never want to delete any images, but sometimes, for personal health, it would be beneficial not to see those photos pop up, especially with the new curation. 

iOS 13 Camera

There are very few updates to the Camera app in iOS 13 at launch. I’m sure that will change when Apple releases new iPhones in a week. I’ll have some initial thoughts posted with the release, followed up with a fuller review of the new camera system, depending on what’s available.

Conclusion 

Photos has matured in iOS 13. A lot of the features Apple introduced beginning in iOS 7 feel like they have fully bloomed.

Initially, the addition of Dark Mode made Photos feel like a professional organization and editing software. The more I used it, the more I realized how good and useful the machine learning had become given the Photos organization and the For You suggestions. Search has become more refined and has worked the best of any iOS release I’ve used.

I am excited to see what updates come with the release of iPhone 11 and iPhone 11 Pro and how they work within the updated Photos app.

Photos has always been the primary destination to view, edit and share photos and videos on iOS. With this Fall’s update, it has become more powerful and intuitive. I hope that these updates will allow more people to discover images that have previously been hidden in their camera rolls and make edits to them that they may have never realized were possible.

Lightning can be one of the most difficult and time consuming things to photograph. It’s hard to predict when it will hit and there’s usually adverse conditions that make it potentially dangerous.

But the results can be, well, striking.

With DSLR cameras, the standard way of photographing lightning is placing the camera on a tripod, set the shutter speed to the longest you can, under expose the and keep taking pictures. When lightning strikes, the bright flash of light will appear in the exposure. You just have to keep pressing the shutter.

How do you recreate this with a handheld iPhone? Live Photos.

I recently figured this out sitting on a plane that was delayed for two hours because of a storm. I was the only person sitting there on the runway OK with the hold up.

I was able to take these photos of lightning as I was waiting for the most intense part of the storm passed. I help the phone in position looking out the window, and when I saw lighting strike I hit the shutter. Then, I open the Edit settings of the photo and hit the Live Photo icon. From there I could pin point the exact time when lightning struck.

Note: if you are taking pictures of lightning, please be careful. One of my favorite places to set up is in parking garages.

The downside is that you don’t have any control over the exposure, so you don’t get the pure black sky and lightning bolt. There’s several apps that automatically take pictures of lightning (I’ve used iLigntningCam), but you need to have the phone stabilized and that was not an option on the plane.

But for taking pictures of lightning handheld, it’s quite remarkable. Another great use for the iPhone’s image system, something I would not have been able to do with any other camera.

There’s a really cool feature in iOS 13 that allows you to watch a series of concurrently taken Live Photo’s simultaneously as one long video.

I noticed this a few weeks ago when I was watching a Live Photo and it kept on going through the others I took. It took me a few minutes to realize what was going on.

As a bonus, you’re also able to select a group of those same Live Photos and extract them as one long video.

This is a huge feature I hadn’t heard about before stumbling upon it. I almost always shoot with Live Photos enabled in case something happens that I want to turn into a GIF later. Can’t wait to see what other hidden gems are in the release.

The days are getting longer and the temperature is rising, it’s summer in Michigan. Here are some of my favorite photos I’ve taken in the past month. Lots of beautiful sunsets and some quality time with my family’s dogs.

One of the biggest things that holds new photographers back is feeling comfortable taking a picture of something. It can feel strange to stop, take out your phone and photograph something, especially if there’s people involved, especially strangers.

I’ve learned you need to become comfortable with this, because some of the best photos will come in these moments.

Here’s a story about a tree I see on my drive to work. There’s nothing special about it, it’s like other trees. But when autumn comes, it’s leaves change to a color different than the surrounding trees. Some mornings, the sun poke through in a striking way.

I always thought: I need to stop my car, get out and photograph it. But I never did, telling myself I’d get it tomorrow, or it will always be there and I can always get a picture.

Three years later, I never taken that picture and I never will. Driving to the office today, I noticed a new building is being constructed on the piece of land. The tree is still there but the backdrop has totally changed. I will never be able to get that photo.

This is just one example, there are many more. Honestly, it hurts a little to think about the pictures that have slipped through time.

This is a part of being a photographer and will continue to happen. But, a general rule should be if something catches your attention, follow your curiosity and take a picture of it. You might never have the opportunity again.

Apple announced a whole bunch of new software on Monday during its WWDC keynote, and Camera and Photos were well represented. While many of the big new features come with the release of new iPhones in the fall, there was a good amount announced for

I played around with the new iOS — I installed the beta last night and used it for 12 hours before switching back (I got scared).

Here’s a quick overview of what’s coming for photographers in iOS 13. Watch the full keynote here, the section on Camera and Photos begins around the 48 minute mark.

Camera

Portrait Lighting

The one big addition that is coming to the Camera app has to do with Portrait Mode’s Portrait Lighting. These are the filters you can apply to Portrait photos. There is a new High Key Mono mode, which looks stunning. You will also be able to change the intensity of light in the different modes.

Apple

Photos

Photo Editing

The editing interface has been redesigned in photos. It looks more suited for smaller screens and more detailed. Instead of having a text based menu, it appears it is more visual.

There are also new areas of the photo that you can edit:

• Vibrance
• White Balanace
• Sharpen
• Definition
• Vignette
• Noise reduction

Apple

These are huge updates for editing — vibrance is one of my favorite adjustments, white balance can really make a photo stand out and vignettes will be amazing to have for portraits. I can’t wait for these.

Video editing

All of this is coming to video, according to Apple. Finally, you can do more to a video than just trim it! iOS 13 will allow users to rotate video, apply filters and make other adjustments like you can for photos.

Apple

Organization

The organization of photos is the most noticeable change of iOS 13. There is a redesigned front tab called Photos, which will use machine learning to remove the clutter, such as receipts and white board shots. Craig said it becomes a “diary of your life.”

Photos will take the best photos and organize them in a grid, including videos and Live Photo’s that will auto play. When you go out to the Months view, photos will be organized by events in that time period.

The Years view gives a birdseye view of your library based on the day you are viewing them. Some examples given by Justin Titi included showing photos from the same time of year based on your current situation. In the examples showed, photos from previous WWDC conferences and his daughter’s birthday appear. This is something like TimeHop for photos. Titi said it “brings your library to life” and “makes it easier to browse the greatest hits of your library with one view.” I can’t wait to use it over the course of a year.

This looks like a huge update to Photos. If the iPhone XS was a step forward into computational photography, this seems to be one for computational photo management. In my limited time using it, it felt different than previous versions but I’m excited to spend more time browsing my library with it. Pair all of this with Dark Mode and Photos becomes an even more powerful tool.

The questions I have: Does it automatically give suggestions to delete these duplicate photos? Will it sync across devices?

Apple

Let’s use it!

iOS 13 will come out in the Fall when new iPhones are released. There is currently a developer beta, but Apple strongly warns against “thrill seekers” using it. There will be a public beta in July, and I can’t wait to install it and start using it.

I’m starting a new monthly feature highlighting my favorite photos I’ve taken with my iPhone.

This month, I fell back in love with shooting in black and white. I never really used the built in filters in the Camera app, but my girlfriend sent me some photos using the build-in Silvertone filter and have fallen in love. There’s something about seeing the world without color as you are taking pictures that really has gotten my creativity flowing.

Check out my Instagram @fritzklug for more photos as I take them. Enjoy!

I recently spoke at Kalamazoo Social Media Week about one of my greatest passions: mobile phone photography. It was great to share my philosophy and tips and tricks I’ve gained over the years. I have notes and a video over at Pocket Camera.

As someone who takes a lot of pictures with his iPhone, I love the ease of iCloud Photo Library backing up all my images and video. I don’t really have to consider it anymore.

At a concert last night, I had taken several photos and videos, and thought: everything is backed up to iCloud besides the photos I’ve taken tonight. I’m on a cellular connection. What if my iPhone is lost or stolen? I can get a new device and everything will be as it was, except my most recent

What if there was a feature to back up the most recent information when an iPhone is missing? There should be a way to force backup your device if it goes missing.

It would work in the Find My iPhone app. When you put your device in lost mode, you could trigger something to do an immediate backup over the cellular network. You would have to initiate it, in case you didn’t want to do it. This could drain a lot of data, and if you’re on a smaller plan could wipe it out, but I would love to have those photos and videos even if it meant paying my cellular company more money they month.

I’m sure there would be pitfalls — if the device has a poor connection or is low on battery. But to have the option to retrieve that data would be amazing.