Get creative with smartphones

You can produce great photos even with your phones, writes Izwan Ismail

ONE of the most important things in producing photos with a ‘wow” factor are the ideas that you have and the way you compose them. Instagram artist Yafiq Yusman is known for his creative photos taken with just his iPhones. The 24-year-old creative artist and iphonegrapher runs a creative platform for like-minded people called Plexxie.

Looking at his photos collection on his IG _yafiqyusman_, one would never have thought that he only uses smartphones to take them.

Yafiq, who likes to venture around Singapore’s geometrically aligned “landscape” taking photos while getting creative with building shapes and patterns, says creativity is key in getting great photos.

He also travels to some parts of the world to get creative shots. For the past four years, his tools are just his iPhones, from the iPhone 4 to the current iPhone X.

“A person standing under glittering light may be normal but if you lower your angle to the ground on a reflective surface, you get reflection that will give better impact,” he says. He also shows how he plays with distance between subjects to give eyecatching perspective impact like a giant person almost step on a group of screaming people.

However, new technologies in iPhones like the low-light capability, portrait features, dual lens and more detailed images play a part in making photos great. Here are some of the eye-catching photos that Yafiq produced.

3. ROTATE IT: This looks like an illusion of a person going against gravity by arranging the subjects in such a way. Then Yafiq just rotates the photo to get this cool perspective.

5. FRAMING: If you see something that can be a frame to your photos use it. This photos was taken by Yafiq at the Future of Us Exhibition in Singapore. He was interested in the shadows and used the structure to frame the subject.

4. HAND GESTURE: This photo was taken by Yafiq at one of the popular spots in New York, the Fulton Station. He took a shot with his hands just to make the photo look different from others.

2. PERSPECTIVE PLAY: Our eyes can be tricked if we can be creative with perspective composition. In this photo, Yafiq positions some of his friends close to the wall, one friend has just his shoes visible really close to his phone. This results in an...

1 1. REFLECTION: Be creative when taking photos, try to lower your angle of shots and wait for certain moments. In this photo, Yafiq was taking a shot of his friend with the reflection effect, but suddenly a stranger walked by in front of him. The...