Good day fellow members,

I wanted to ask this question. Currently I'm wanting to make pictures and video's of my scalemodelling with my smartphone. It is a Huawei P8 Lite. Some years old now. But is this still a good option if you want to make good quality pictures? And if you want to record some things you like. And want to take pictures?

Help would be much appreciated.

No offense but there doesn't seem to be a question anywhere in your statement???

The cameras in older phones are often of lower resolution and rarely have much of any kind of auto focus but still I have seen some modelers have fine results using them.

Do you have specific questions?

From my experience, even old phones/cameras can take decent photos, the most important fact is that you have enough light -and a plain background.

Lightboxes like this are available for little money and are quite helpful:

Thank you for your reply.
I thought I had put some questions in the text I posted.
Maybe a more particular question: Do I really need a seperate camera for recording and/or taking pictures/video's of my scalemodelling experiences?
Always had the idea of willing to put some of my works, experiences etc on the internet. Wanting to share it with other people. But maybe I will post a seperate thread on that topic.
Also, never really did serious photographing of my projects and things before. But would you have any lighting tips and tips for first starting off for example?

Greetings,

Lada_Niva

Modern phones can have quite decend cameras. And in some ways it is actually EASIER to take pictures of a model with them.

The smaller sensor gives a larger Depth of Field reducing the chance that some parts of the model are in focus and some are not.

What the phones are NOT good at is low light conditions. And some stuff that for us humans still is "good light" are actually low light conditions. That is where the "big gear" comes in handy, I can push a modern DSLx to ISO 3200 (APS-C like the Rebell Ti/3-digit number Canons) or even higher (full frame sensor like the Canon 6D) and get away with little extra light. In addition dedicated cameras can work with flashlights in a way that phones and entry level digicams can not (using multiple flashes off the camera, firing them via radio control) and getting them on a tripod is easier as well (they are designed for it and tripods are designed by default for those cameras)

With a phone or a low end camera (Say a Canon IXUS) your best bet is a light tent/box as shown by Carlos (Or an improvised version, there is a thread about that here in this subforum) and permanent lights. A tripod or similar stand will come in handy as well since exposure times might still be too long for handheld shooting.

One small note; if you shoot on either a solid white or solid black background this might throw off the auto exposure meter in your cell phone. These meters sometimes average the exposure over the entire visible area of the scene so a pure white of pure black background, while good looking, can negatively affect your exposure making the model appear either too dark or too light.

When shooting with a cell phone I try to use a mid-toned colored background but something that still offers a good color difference from the model.

Thank you for your reply. I'm sorry that I wasn't answering for some time. Didn't have the time so far. Now I have. I'm sorry, but I'm not really understanding those photograpic terms you are using. I'm really green at this topic. But, wanting to improve. Don't have lot of money at this stage of time. So have to improvise for some time I guess. Any good advices on improvising for some things?

Think about it. As a modeler you should be able to come up with a home made version of the soft box/light box shown above. My first thought would be to try and get you hands on one of those mail carry boxes the post office uses. They are about 24" x 18" x 14" and made of white translucent plastic. The post office loans them out to businesses by the dozens! They would be near perfect.

Or find an old office floor protector. The thing that goes under the desk chairs to keep them from ruining the carpets. Cut that up into rectangles and use duct tape to make a light box.

Finally office products stores sell cheap three ring binders made of various colors of translucent plastic. Cut up a few of the clear white ones to make a light box.

Not saying what followis is the total answer - it's just what I do - I post it here just as an inexpensive idea starter:



I use a home bathroom as my "soft box".

It's small, all white and has a big mirror and six big make-up style lights for illumination.

When shooting I borrow the big cutting board from my kitchen to use as a stage and use 2 sheets of taped together typing paper supported by a handy spray bottle for a back drop.

Sometimes I do use a small hand held light to add some high lights to the subject.

________________________________

Some of the many photos made with this make shift bathroom sized soft box:

This arrangement seems to work well on close ups too.

Do try to rig some sort of support to act as a tripod or steady rest for your phone/camera. Just leaning an elbow against a wall while taking the picture can help sharpen your photos considerably.

Even a child's simple bean bag toy placed on top of an inexpensive camera tripod can make for a nice steady rest to support your camera phone.

Thank you for your reply.
I must say that is very interesting to read about the improvising setups I can use. And I think that I will go experimenting with these pointers in mind.

Thank you for the advice,

Lada_Niva

Hi
Just an idea for a background for your photos using an iphone or anything else. I've had some success usng my computer monitor showing an image such as a landscape or a plain colour or anything. The subject/model cannot be too large however. Just choose an image (there are billions!) set up the subject in front of the screen, get a desk lamp to shine some light from the side and or above and off you go!

Collin, I very much like your idea!

Will be trying this out very soon. However matching the exposure for the model subject with the brightness of the monitor screen could be a bit tricky but of course the monitor brightness can be dimmed!

Cheers!

This is an example of what you can do.

Military by Colin Dempsey, on Flickr

Or this
1/72 B17 G Memphis Belle by Colin Dempsey, on Flickr

Outstanding!