Expert tips on taking professional looking photos using your phone

17 July 2023

By Fashion Quarterly

With a high-tech phone and some pro tips, you’ll capture top-notch shots in a snap.

You don’t need to be a professional photographer to take advantage of the technology in the new Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra smartphone, but it can’t hurt to have one guide you. Guy Coombes has been shooting fashion, beauty, portraits and advertising commercially for more than 12 years in New Zealand, Australia and the UK, including for the pages of FQ, so we hit him up about how he uses his Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra to capture unforgettable moments. Unlocking his expert-level hacks to make each snap sing, he offers his top five ways to boost your confidence behind the camera and get epic results.

1 / Explore raw

The Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra camera uses AI technology to autoenhance your images, so it’s already helping you straight away. My best tip is to experiment with the Expert RAW functions, which allow you to adjust the ISO, exposure, speed and white balance to take your pictures to a new level. My favourite mode to shoot in is Expert RAW at 50 megapixels, to make the most of the image-quality capabilities. You can also shoot at 200 megapixels, which creates amazing photographs with incredible detail — great for landscape shots.

2 / Go low

I often see people holding their phones up high when they’re taking pictures, but particularly when you’re shooting people, you should try shooting from a lower angle — waist height or even lower — to create a more flattering frame.

3 / Find your light

Lighting is key when photographing anything. If you’re outdoors shooting people or portraits, the best time of day is in the morning or evening when the sun is low in the sky; you want to avoid harsh sunlight from above, which causes bad shadows over faces. If that’s not possible, get creative with angles to make the lighting situation work.

4 / Edit like an expert

I like shooting RAW at 50 megapixels, then once I upload my images to a computer, I can edit with all the RAW capabilities in Photoshop, just like an image out of my professional camera. You can adjust things like contrast, sharpness and colour, and even zoom right in to retouch the skin.

5 / Take a step back

With the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra, you don’t need to take selfies by awkwardly pushing a side button — you can use the S Pen as a remote trigger. This is also really handy if you’re setting up using a tripod because you don’t have to touch the phone to take a shot. Getting yourself a mini tripod will help you take advantage of this phone’s modes, including Astro Hyperlapse and Astrophoto [which allow you to shoot a time-lapse video and the night sky respectively], as the camera needs to be steady to nail them. Make sure your lenses are clean, given they can get smudgy with fingerprints or from being in your pocket or bag, then just get out there and experiment!