What Are Cameras Even For Anymore? + How Do You Use a Camera?
Being a photographer that uses a dedicated photo camera, I often get asked a lot of questions about photography. In the modern day, almost everyone has a phone in their pocket that can take pretty stunning photos in the right conditions.
This shot was taken on my iphone 16 Pro and then lightly retouched. Pretty good for not being a "dedicated" camera
With phones that can take pictures of this quality, I don't blame the average person for not even thinking about buying a true photo camera. However, there are definitely applications in which a dedicated camera is very much worth having. That begs the question: what are these applications, and how do you use a dedicated camera to get the most out of it, as opposed to a phone?
It is my opinion that in good lighting and without considerable zoom, a phone camera can be just about as good or straight up on par with a dedicated camera. Phone cameras have gotten so much better over the last 10+ years, and with that situation being what they are most often used for, it makes sense that that would be their bread and butter. However, I think that it is when you get into unique lighting situations, when you need large amounts of zoom or an extremely wide angle, or when you need to caputre fast action, that dedicated cameras really come into their own.
indycar racecars can reach speeds over 240 miles per hour on ovals! hard to capture that well with a phone (taken with a nikon z6 & nikon 70-200 mm f/2.8 @ 200 mm, 1/200 sec, f/16)
Another subject that's hard to capture with a phone: fireworks! Doing long exposrues to get the light trails on a phone is often difficult, if not impossible (taken with a nikon z6 & sigma 12-24 mm f/4.5-5.6 @ 12 mm, 6 sec, f/20)
One more for good measure: macrophotography. Most phones have nowhere near the zoom required for a shot like this (taken with a nikon z6 & nikon 200-500 mm f/5.6 @ 500 mm, 1/500 sec, f/5.6)
In these situations (sports photography, long exposure photography, macrophotography, etc.), phones simply cannot capture images of the same quality as dedicated cameras with the appropriate lens. Now that I've (hopefully) shown the merit of dedicated cameras, even in the modern world, people are always confused by how they actually work.
Phone cameras are completely digital. They have a lens that focuses light straight onto a camera sensor. This sensor takes this input and digitially transfers it into the image you see. While this makes for a very simple user experience, it limits the capabilities of a phone camera. Some newer phones have multiple lenses to add options. For example, my iPhone 16 Pro has three lenses: a wide angle lens, a standard lens, and a zoom lens. However, the small form factor of phones limits these lenses, and there is still a simply digital sensor.
In contrast, a dedicated photo camera (whether mirorless or a DSLR (which is a whole topic for another day)) has a shutter which controls the time of exposure and a (typically interchangable) lens to control field of view and depth of field, in addition to a sensor much larger than that of any phone. These tools are all put together in a concept known as the exposure triangle. The exposure (for simplicity sake, think of this as the brightness of the image) is controlled by three things: the shutter speed (how long the sensor is exposed to light), the aperature (how wide the lens is allowed to open to let in light), and ISO (the digital gain or sensitivity of the sensor). This is where the creativity of photography comes in. By mixing these three elements in different ways, you can caputre an endless number of images in an endless number of ways. Furthermore, each of these elements has its own unique nuances. The longer the sensor is exposed (ie. longer shutter speeds), the more motion blur there will be in an image (see the fireworks or racecar above). The wider the aperture of a lens, the smaller the depth of field (this is how you get a blurred background like in the butterfly picture, or , on the opposite end, much of the picture in focus as in the fireworks picture). Thirdly, the higher the ISO of an image, the more grain there will be (I don't have a great example of this, but if you look up high ISO grain, you will find many examples).
In addition, there are countless lenses out there. Some have absurdly wide fields of view, while some have extreme zoom. Even still, some give photos strange distortion effects. There is a lens out there for pretty much any application. That's not even mentioning filters that you can put on lenses.
As you can probably tell, there is a lot more that I could go in to here. But, for the purpose of brevity (and for the sake of your time), I will wrap this post up. Photography is a field of art and technology that is a somewhat recent development. The world's first picture wasn't taken until the 19th century. However, it has seen massive strides in both artistry and technology since then. What once was a device that few had access to is now in almost everyone's pocket. However, while phones and their cameras can do many things, I believe that there is most definitely still a place in this world for the dedicated photo camera and the photographers who know how to use them (not that I'm biased). While it takes great skill to be a good photographer, it also takes an in depth understanding of the equipment and how to use it well. It is these two attributes that truly make a photographer. As always, let me know if you would like to hear about a specific topic. Until next week!
