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selfie-stick makes this worse, creating blurry photos, especially in dim light. To minimize this hold
your phone with both hands and release the shutter with a dedicated button (often one that con-
trols the volume) rather than jabbing at the screen. Bend your arms so that your elbows are
pressed against your waist or are resting on a table if you are sitting. In dim light, rest the phone
against a solid object if possible. If your near vision is limited, hold the camera at arm’s length to
make adjustments, but pull it closer to take the picture.

Tap the screen on the point where you want the camera to set its focus and exposure, otherwise
it will make a choice. The result could be a sharply focused, well exposed shrub in the fore-
ground and an overexposed blur in the background barely recognizable as the Leaning Tower of
Pisa. If your subject is moving, set the camera to take a sequence of pictures; you’ll throw most
of them away, but you may capture the moment you want. Also consider a sequence when pho-
tographing a group; you’ll have a better chance to catch everybody’s eyes open. Always squeeze
the shutter button rather than jab at it; the latter jerks the camera. Taking a photo sequence
means the timing is not important, so even here you can be gentle with the shutter.

The best compensation for a small sensor is to have plenty of light when you take the picture.
You can sometimes achieve this my moving so the light source is behind you; certainly try to
avoid back-lit subjects. Another approach is to limit the exposure sensitivity, which the camera
sets by adjusting its ISO, although not all photo apps and phones allow this,. For my phone, ISO
values above a few hundred produce very noisy images, which even capable photo processing
software can’t correct. Once you limit the ISO, you will find you have long exposure times, which
means you now must place the camera on a solid support to reduce the shake. You probably al-
so want to delay the exposure, so that it takes place a few seconds after you press the button,
giving you time to ensure the camera is steady. Again, not all camera apps have this feature.

Carry a clean, soft cloth or a packet of lens cleaning paper and use it often to clean the lens. Al-
so, keep in mind that the lens is right at the surface of the case and has no shade. You may have
to use your hand to keep sunlight from striking it directly. Let’s see now, you are holding the
phone with one hand, operating the controls with another, and shading the lens with a third, while
all the time trying to hold it steady. A shutter delay may help, but some thinking may be better.
Perhaps you can stand in the shade or ask someone to cast a shadow on your camera.

The simple lens is always set for wide-angle pictures; it achieves a telephoto effect by throwing
away the outer portions of the image. As a result, you should avoid using the camera’s zoom fea-
ture, instead move closer to your subject. If you can’t, then take the picture at wide angle and
throw away the unwanted portion of the image with processing software after you move it to your
PC. This gives you more flexibility on what you choose in include the finished photo. Figure 1
shows a picture taken in normal (wide-angle) mode.

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