(English Text) Most of the time I observe rather than photograph George Koutsouvelis is a photographer and at the same time teaches Computer Science in Athens. His first contact with photography took place in the first grades of the Primary School, through his father's Lubitel camera. He had so magnetized by that magical machine, which managed to spoil it to see how it worked. He is a self-taught photographer. He learned photographic theory by reading countless photographic books. Photographic techniques learned in the street, constantly photographing, "usually without good results," he says self-effacingly.
In his university years he decided to make a rudimentary dark room, so the adventure of film printing began. When digital cameras began to dominate the market, he stopped for a long time to photograph. That’ s because the film became more expensive and scarce, and he did not like the aesthetics of the digital images
produced that period . In 2009 he bought his first digital camera and began to get acquainted with the processing of digital files. In 2014, he made an Instagram account and totally accidentally discovered the Tiny Collective, a group of talented and in his opinion pioneers photographers taking pictures exclusively on their mobile phone's camera. "I felt like I found the wheel! Until then, I believed that only "serious" camera can create high quality photos, forgetting that photography is created by the eye of the photographer and not by the camera. Since then and after countless experiments, I have entered the world of mobile photography using almost exclusively my mobile phone in my personal photographic projects, "he says. What really means digital photography by mobile, and how much it changes the photography industry or not, explains it below.
What does mobile photography mean? The term mobile photography was originally used by the photographic community to describe photos taken with "mobile media", especially "smart" phones and tablets. Just as it happened with the lomography, very soon ceased to be mentioned in the medium of reception and now describes a photographic “movement� that has the slogan "the best camera is what you have always with you". If we wanted to stand on some milestones in the evolution of mobile photography, then we would definitely refer to the first picture ever taken by mobile phone by Philippe Khan (June 11, 1997), the launching of the iphone and the creating of instagram. The first comprehensive editing application that gained the attention of the "mobile" photo audience was the Camera Bag. Shortly afterwards, Hipstamatic was born, an app which became famous when the New York Times photojournalist, Demon Wind, used it to cover the Afghan war in 2010, so his photos won the third place in the international photojournalism contest "Photos of the Year�.
What are the features that differentiate mobile photography, beyond of course the media, which is the mobile phone? First, the photo is captured and edited on the same device. As many people say, you have in your pocket both your camera and your darkroom. Secondly, editing applications (filters) are an integral part of the final image and often shape its aesthetics. Many times the app stacking process is used. That means processing a photo in an application and re entering the result to another for further processing. On the other hand, there are those who do not use any kind of filter and they use the #nofilter tag, to make clear that fact. Thirdly, the overwhelming majority of photographs produced are almost instantly communicated to social media, mainly in instagram and EyeEm, and are not printed. In recent years, of course, there are few photographic collectives, such as Hikari Creative and others, hosting "natural" photographic exhibitions.
On the other hand, mobile photography has been accused of overworked, unrealistic photos and excessive use of filters. Digital photographs are by nature unnatural. Thus, many photographers began to look for ways to make digital files more "analog". Several software companies today provide editing tools that mimic digital popular films, such as Kodak portra 400, tri X 400 etc. If I'm not mistaken, the first application that transformed a cell phone shot into "analogue" was the InstaCRT project: you had to upload your image to a server and then an employ projected it on an old CRT screen, took a photo again with a modern DSLR (!) and sent it back to your phone. InstaCRT has paved the way for many such mobile applications. It is worth mentioning the case of VSCO, which started as a complete mobile camera application (camera and processing) provided filters that realistically mimic many classic films (originated from digital film digitization) and recently started selling these filters as add ons for programs like photoshop. In my opinion, a bad photo will not be better with editing and adding filters. I personally use filters only when they add something, especially to the atmosphere of the image, and not to improve the quality. When we chose a particular film in the analogue era, did we actually choose a filter through which we mapped reality? Did we spend hours in the darkroom to process the negatives? In mobile photography we do the same but with the tip of our finger.
What do you think mobile photography has to offer to the photographic community? When I was a kid, we had one camera in our family, and many family of friends had none. Now almost every member of a typical family has a cell phone, a potential camera. How everyone uses it is another conversation. The fact, however, is that there has never been such a direct and massive access to the taking of images in History and I find this quite positive. Many people of course claim that this poses a threat to any professional photographer who makes his living by photography. In my opinion, that is not the case. Although many professionals use mobile photography (recently Nick Knight, one of the most important fashion photographers, photographed and edited the Diesel brand advertising campaign entirely with his mobile phone), no one would choose his phone to photograph a wedding or to print in large dimensions. But we do not all have the same goals. Why someone who simply wants to share their street photographs electronically and print them from time to time in a book, even to expose them in small dimensions, needs to buy a "serious" camera, computer, processing programs e.t.c, as the evolution of technology in cell phones offer all these in pocket packaging, cheaper and almost in the same quality?
Will you give us some tips for better photos with a cell phone? Never use the digital zoom of the camera. Zooming actually magnifies the image, but significantly reduces the resolution, resulting in poor picture quality, which is even worse when edited. The best zoom is getting closer to our theme. Lock the focus (and exposure) on your subject. This is done on most mobiles, by holding down the screen, where we want to focus. If we do not lock the focus, our cell phone usually continues to re-focus (especially if someone passes in front of our lens), "looking for" the best focus point. So we end up in blurry pictures even in good lighting conditions. The principles of composition, framing and lighting do not change. Spend time to familiarize yourself with using your screen as a viewfinder as well as the behavior of your mobile in different lighting conditions. All cameras have their limitations. The better you know them, the more effectively you use them.
What does photography mean to you? Photography is the medium I use to express my impression of reality. When I photograph, I am more interested in capturing the "feel" and the atmosphere of the subject, and not simply recording a fact. I like to walk in the streets of Athens and observe around me. In fact, most of the time I observe rather than photograph. Photography enforces me to see. Whenever I walk the same road, I always see something different. That's what makes me particularly charmed. I prefer to express myself with pictures. They “talk” more than words do and they can get as many interpretations as the viewers who see them.
►You can see George Koutsouvelis's work through his account at Instagram: @yiorgoskouts (George Koutsouvelis)