Making better cell phone photos

Everyone has a cell phone with a camera. And when people take photos, they want to post them on social networks. Many times those photos are coming from reporters or “citizen reporters” too. I see a lot of great photos posted on Twitter and Facebook every day. But something I’ve noticed lately in my social media streams is a lot of bad cell phone photos too. I especially noticed it during the NHL Winter Classic. Far away photos of nothing or they’re blurry or they’re yellow.

So how do you make those cell phone photos better?

First, ask yourself what’s the purpose of taking this photo and sharing it. Don’t take a photo just to say “hey, I’m here.” Show your audience something interesting you’re seeing. Why is where you are special? Is there a celebrity there? A news event, like a fire or car accident? Or maybe it’s just really pretty. Show us what’s happening so your photos are engaging and worthy to be clicked. If you have a purpose in taking the photo, you can make a better photo to share.

Second, make sure you know the limitations of your phone camera. My phone camera isn’t the best in low light with a flash (I attempted to take photos at my family birthday dinner and they came out awful), but it can be excellent when there’s enough light and I don’t need to use the flash. But don’t just automatically turn off the flash because sometimes you do need it.

Know what the white balance does on your phone camera. Turning it from auto to a specific setting means you can get rid of some of the yellow hue on your photos. Just make sure you change it when your lighting setting changes. I forgot to do that once and ended up with blue outdoor photos.

Also know your surroundings. So often I see camera phone photos where there’s glass or something reflective behind the subject and the flash bounces off of it. Either move to a different position to take a photo or move your subjects. In fact, this is true for every kind of photo you take.

And finally, consider how to make your photos interesting in their composition. Don’t be afraid to move closer to take a better photo or to use the zoom on the camera. Or move to a different location to get a better angle. You don’t need to hold your camera at your eye level either. You can move it up or down to get a different, more interesting angle. Also consider standing on something and shooting photos down or getting low on the ground and shooting up. It give a different, more interesting perspective. Also it’s something to consider when you shoot with a real camera too. I’m very fond of getting low to take photos. Eye level isn’t always the most interesting angle.

Have other tips to share for shooting better cell phone photos? Share them in the comments below. Have questions? Post them there too so people can answer them for you.

Tradition sometimes has mysterious roots

For my entire life, my family has always made ravioli on New Year’s Day. Dad pulls out the pasta maker, presses the dough flat and cuts it into squares. Then a handful of volunteers would fill the ravioli. You spoon the ricotta mixture onto the square and then fold it over and press it with the prongs of a fork. It can be time consuming, although not as bad as when my grandfather (an Italian immigrant) went through the process. He rolled the dough by hand, and it took him all day.

I always assumed it was only made once a year because of the time needed, but that’s not what I was told when I asked on New Year’s Day this year. Apparently there were other days my grandfather made ravioli, but he did always make them on New Year’s Day. So I asked why that was the New Year’s meal. Neither my aunt or my father knew. When I pressed, my aunt asked “Why do we have turkey on Thanksgiving?” The answer mainly is it’s tradition and no one is ever quite clear why.

Below is a sample of the photos I shot this year. You can see the whole set on Flickr by clicking here.

So you got a new camera — Now what?

You ripped open all the pretty paper this last week and there it was — a new camera. So now what? It can be pretty overwhelming to get a new camera, whether it’s your first one or your third one. I’ve had three SLRs in my life, and it’s always a new experience with each one. Even getting a new point and shoot camera (like I did this year) can be overwhelming as you try to learn the new settings and the capabilities of the camera.

So what do you do now?

Well, first get the camera out of the box. You have done that, right? Of course you have. But that box is going to be a little overwhelming with all the cords and books. The book itself is overwhelming because I have yet to see a manual that isn’t an inch thick. And that book isn’t going to tell you everything.

There’s plenty of reading material out there about what you should do with your camera outside of the manual. I like Photojojo’s round-up of how to take care of your new camera (plus get on their newsletter). There’s also this list of the seven things you should do with your first DSLR.

Some tips here I agree with:

• Protect your lens — Just a UV filter on your lens is better than nothing. But if you’re going to use other filters, know what you’re using. A polarizing filter is good for those outdoor shots, for example. Each colored filter does something different (which I’ve never used, so I can’t give advice).
• Use a tripod in low light — But you might not always have a tripod handy, right? And they can be a pain in the butt to carry around. In a photography class in college, we were taken out to shoot the Washington monuments at night. None of us had tripods. Instead we used whatever we had handy, including our camera bags. Find something sturdy to lean against or to set your camera against. Door frames always are good for this if there’s one around.
• Do read the manual — But also do some research around the Internet about what exactly everything means in practical terms. I didn’t truly understand the difference between One-shot AF and AI Servo AF until I read about it on several blogs. The key here is to read. A great place to keep reading is Nikon’s tip of the day.
• Know the limitations of your camera — My old point and shoot camera is fantastic to use in bright light and daylight. But in low light? It’s pretty awful. My first DSLR had problems when I was using the zoom lens. Every camera isn’t perfect, and it’s important to know what your camera cannot do. Then you can get around those problems.
• Get out and shoot often — You’re never really going to know your camera well if you don’t shoot photos. Use your new camera early and often. My first SLR years ago came with free film and free processing because the camera shop wanted me to test out the camera to make sure it worked well for me. But this is the point of having a camera, right? To take photos!

For advanced items, check out this article of 13 Things Your Camera Wishes You Knew. Even if you know a lot, there’s things to learn in here. It’s where I finally grasped the difference of the auto focuses on my camera. And, really, you don’t need to take three shots of the same photo. That’s a very film-minded approach to photography, and even then you didn’t need three shots.

And getting a new strap for your camera is a glorious thing. It doesn’t even need to be expensive. I have this split strap on my DSLR. And I have this adapter to turn my strap into a sling because that’s how I prefer to carry my camera.

Plus make sure you have your camera’s serial number written down somewhere. There’s a new service that allows you to track your camera if it ever gets stolen. It is based on knowing the camera’s serial number. But want to prevent theft? Don’t leave your camera in your car or at least lock it in the trunk out of sight. Most people I know who have had their cameras stolen have had them taken out of a car.

Want your photos to look good once you get out shooting. Know how to compose them well with the rule of thirds. This video is a good tutorial on the rule of thirds and how to make it work for you.

Happy shooting!

Read a rumor on social media? Check the sources

Jon Bon Jovi isn’t dead. If you were on social media on Monday, though, you might have heard otherwise. A rumor started circulating about Bon Jovi’s death. But, like so many other death rumors that run crazy on social media, it wasn’t true. And Bon Jovi went so far as to post a photo proving he was alive.

I always find it fascinating to learn where these rumors start, and this one was from a fake press release. In today’s world of news it’s pretty easy for someone to start a rumor that quickly becomes truth to some people. It’s why we all need to examine the source of any news and use a little news literacy. Take nothing at face value unless it’s coming from a trusted news source, and even then we’ve seen some fooled by a fake news story.

In this case, the “news” was posted on an unknown WordPress blog that wasn’t even filled out properly. Plus it was the only item posted on the blog at that time. If you clicked on the “about” page, there was no information there on who was posting this information about Bon Jovi’s death. All are giant red flags to me that this is fake.

There are plenty of questions that need to be weighed when you’re analyzing if something is true or not. Is this news source reliable? What does their about page say about them? What other news have they posted? Do people I trust for news trust them? I also do a quick Google News search if I see something posted on social media without a link to try to confirm if something is true. I also analyze the people who are posting the information on Twitter in the same way I would analyze a news site — who are they, where do they work and how could they have this information?

There always will be people who just retweet information without confirming it or analyzing it, but that doesn’t mean the rest of us shouldn’t check the sources and weigh the truth of the news. Heck, I even check things my parents send me. There always will be people out there spreading fake news and trying to trick people. Don’t be tricked.

Follow Friday: You’re pretty split on if you use the suggestions

Last week I posted asking if people actually use Follow Friday any more on Twitter to find new people. I also wanted to find out how people find new people to follow on Twitter. I posted a poll, posed the question to my Twitter followers and got some good response from a few people.

If you recall, my problem with Follow Friday is how people just give lists of people with no actual recommendation. Why should I follow these people? I don’t remember the last time I actually followed someone that was recommended through Follow Friday, although I have found people through Kevin Sablan’s Romper Room style of saying good morning to people he follows (I have suggested Kevin even on non-Fridays as a good person to follow).

The poll I posted didn’t have a lot of votes, but the results are pretty evenly split on if people use those recommendations. And the the response I got from people in the comments and on Twitter were pretty evenly split too.

@jenconnic If it's a person I think is awesome, I follow their suggestions immediately. But always say why I should #FF a person.

—
Yuri Victor (@yurivictor) December 09, 2011

@jenconnic I wish more people I love on Twitter did #FF. I've found so many gems from others.

—
Yuri Victor (@yurivictor) December 09, 2011

And then JD posted in the comments:

I used Follow Friday lists a lot when I first started tweeting, but now I mostly ignore them. In fact, I follow two people (who I like) who carpet bomb my timeline each friday with the same lists. I had to mute them both and as a result I miss some good tweets from them. I’m much more likely to follow new people that are retweeted by people I already follow than via an #FF mention.

JD and I have had a lot of back-and-forth on Twitter over months about our hatred for Follow Friday, so I wasn’t surprised by the response. I did ask him how he thought we could bring Follow Friday back to what it used to be.

I think the only way to actually change it would be to get some of the more famous users to mock it. You need to reach the less-savvy twitter users, and they usually follow the famous people. I doubt that will happen, so I think the most practical way to do it is the way you do it: remind the followers that you have how silly #FF can be. It’s incremental at best, but it’s probably the best we can do.

If The Oatmeal can’t remind people how to properly use Follow Friday, I’m not quite sure who can. So to JD’s point, I’m sure you’ll see me (and hopefully a few others) remind people about how to properly use Follow Friday and how it otherwise can be silly.

By no means is any of this scientific research. It’s an Internet poll with low results and anecdotal conversation. But, as always, I’d love to hear more from you about Follow Friday and how you find new people on Twitter. Post your thoughts in the comments or send me a tweet.

Bill of Rights Day: How are you using your rights?

Did you know it’s Bill of Rights Day? Maybe not. It’s one of those days we many times overlook on the historical calendar.

Today marks the 220th anniversary the Bill of Rights — the first 10 amendments to the constitution — went into effect after three-fourths of the states ratified it. You can read a full transcript of the Bill of Rights on the National Archives website, and they also have plenty of other information about the document too. As a side note: If you’ve never been to the National Archives to see the Declaration of Independence, U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights, you should. Yes, the line will be long, but it’s worth the wait to say you’ve seen these important documents.

Obviously the First Amendment is something near and dear to my heart as a journalist and writer. Freedom of expression is one of the things that makes our country great. But there are plenty of other things important to our culture in the Bill of Rights, like how we are free from unreasonable searches and seizures. But we always come back to the First Amendment because of how powerful those rights are.

But we shouldn’t be using our rights just today. As has been pointed out by many, including some Twitter followers, Bill of Rights Day should be every day. Use your rights every single day to celebrate.

How are you using your rights today and every day? Share your thoughts on how you express your rights in the comments.

Want to be inspired? Watch this amazing suicide-prevention video

Two Quinnipiac University students — juniors Lauren Taylor and Michelle Brandow — created this video as a final project for their Global Perspective on Death and Dying class. The two had already created a Tumblr and Twitter accounts for the class, and they said in two campus press articles they felt this was the natural next step. The video has received over 61,000 views (it also was featured on Perez Hilton’s blog), and Brandow said it’s gotten bigger than they thought it would. She also told the Quinnipiac Chronicle about one response to the video:

“Someone emailed us a ‘thank you’ from a suicidal high school student who saw our video,” Brandow said. “She is now working with her counselor on her own 100 reasons to stay.”

You also can read more from the Quad News about their video.

I attended Quinnipiac for graduate school, and my grad school friends have been sharing the video all over Facebook today (and beyond to our non-grad school friends too). Obviously we’ve been inspired and we’re also very proud to say we attended the same school as these two girls. Many people I know (including myself) have had a rough time in recent months, and I’m sure this is something that would lift us up a little bit.

Suggest a blog post (Alternate title: Don’t make me write about Dave Grohl again)

If you haven’t figured it out by now, I am trying to update my blog more often. It’s something I promised to myself a long time ago, and now I’m trying to follow through on it. But I’m curious as to what you, my readers, want to see me write about.

So this is the time to suggest a topic I should write about. Is there something you’re dying to hear from me about? Or maybe you have a question for me about something. I certainly am happy to answer questions. I already received one great suggestion over on my Facebook page, but share more of your thoughts either here in the comments, on my Facebook page or on Twitter.

And of course, the threat is that I’ll post more about Dave Grohl on here, which wouldn’t be unusual. But do you really want to hear more about why I think Dave Grohl and the Foo Fighters are one of the best bands around right now and you should never miss one of their performances? O.K., some of you do. Someone said I should write about Bamboozle, and I got this tweet too:

@jenconnic I vote for writing about Dave Grohl!

—
Judy M (@realestatechick) December 14, 2011

You guys are enablers. Here’s a photo of Dave from a performance earlier this fall from Stephen Eckert on Flickr.

The new Twitter: Better access to lists needed

There was a lot of buzz last week as Twitter rolled out its new look and as people slowly got on board with the new web interface. In order to get the web interface upgrade, you needed to upgrade your phone app. I did so on Friday and got the new web interface within a  few hours. Others had to wait longer to get the upgrade on the web.

When the announcement was made I said I needed some time to use the interface before I formed an opinion, but I immediately found a problem that others have expressed complaints about. I can no longer easily find my Twitter lists. The quick links on both the phone app and the web interface on the main page no longer are right there. I now have to click over to my profile page and then click on lists to get to them. On the web interface, you can get to lists from the drop down menu too. But it’s not inherent that the lists are there.

Twitter lists are a powerful yet underused tool on Twitter. For me, it allows me to get at the news or information I want most quickly. I can check in on the latest news from my sports teams or the news organizations I follow on Twitter. I can see things a specific group of people that could be lost in a steam that has more than 500 accounts feeding into it. Not to mention for journalists it allows us to put sources of news in a list, whether it’s journalists or other sources. Then we can get at quickly the updates on a specific topic on which we may be reporting or following along.

Plus lists are sharable. There are a few people who are subscribed to a few of my lists and I’ve never shared them with anyone (you can find my lists here, some of which are works in progress). During Hurricane Irene, I created a list on the work account that we shared with our followers so they could get to everyone who was reporting and providing information about the storm easily.

I noticed a trend a few weeks ago of a bunch of new followers who were following more than 1,000 people, sometimes even more than 2,000. So I posed the question of how anyone was able to follow along (I sometimes have trouble with just 500 people), and the unanimous answer was lists.

Twitter should be leveraging this powerful tool and pushing people to use it rather than hiding it away. Bring out a link to Twitter lists onto the main page or allow us to place our top lists there so we have quick links. In an effort to make Twitter easier for everyone to use, this would be something helpful.

There’s going to be some growing pains as we get through the changes to Twitter. My phone app (on Android) seems to crash far too often when I try to actually tweet something. It’s sometimes hard to find where to get the embeddable tweet link (you can now get the code to embed a link, which is a very awesome new feature). I haven’t even gotten the new Tweetdeck yet, so no idea how that will affect me yet. But in the end Twitter will be better for the changes.

They just need to see they’re ignoring a powerful tool here. They shouldn’t be hiding the use of lists. They should be pushing their use more.

What are your thoughts on the new Twitter? Post a comment below or send me a tweet to @jenconnic.

Follow Friday: How do you find new people to follow on Twitter?

I’ve harped several times on how much I have grown to dislike Follow Friday on Twitter. I’ve written at least two posts about it (here and here) and why I have grown to hate it.

The Oatmeal really summed up the problems with Follow Friday well. If you’re not familiar with it, Follow Friday (with the hashtag #FF typically) is when people are supposed to recommend people they find to be good follows on Twitter. We all follow people on Twitter for a lot of reasons and we find new people in a lot of different ways. The origins of Follow Friday was a way for people to find new, interesting people on Twitter to follow. Typically people posted the recommendation to follow someone with reasons to follow them. “If you want to know what’s going on with local news, you should follow this person,” for example.

But people today just give a long list of people to follow with the hashtag and no reasons to follow them. Sometimes there’s a short “journalists” or “funny people” tag. But it’s not very helpful. I’m more likely to find new people to follow based on who follows me or what the people I follow retweet.

I know a lot of other people have made the same complaints about Follow Friday, and I’ve always wondered if there’s a way to take it back. What if we just started making Follow Friday recommendations the way it’s supposed to work? But would this be helpful? I’m curious. Do you find any Follow Friday recommendations helpful? Would you use them if people went back to giving thoughtful reasons to follow someone? I’m curious, so this post is about research. Vote in the poll and post a comment below. Tell me how you would like to see recommendations happen on Twitter. Tell me how you find people to follow on Twitter.

Update: Great comments from Yuri Victor  on Twitter in response to my post.

@jenconnic If it's a person I think is awesome, I follow their suggestions immediately. But always say why I should #FF a person.

—
Yuri Victor (@yurivictor) December 09, 2011

@jenconnic I wish more people I love on Twitter did #FF. I've found so many gems from others.

—
Yuri Victor (@yurivictor) December 09, 2011