I’ve been talking lately about adding the Fujifilm X100VI to my camera bag for international trips. One of the big reasons for this is to have a camera that is easily accessible to me, even when the main kit is all packed up. On days when I’m actively traveling — flying to or from a destination, train trips between locations, etc. — I prefer to keep my kit packed up and ready for security inspections. Especially in international airports, there are plenty of places were you are not supposed to take photos, so I don’t even want one hanging off my shoulder to raise eyebrows. Getting through security cleanly and efficiently is also important to me and I pack my kit to facilitate this while limiting the opportunity for anything to go missing.
All of that said, I do like to take photos during the travel process. While not always for stock or client work, I like to document the trip and have photos to jog my memory years later of what the experience was really like.
Right now, that’s where my iPhone comes in.
iPhones make pretty good cameras, especially as the sensors have gotten higher in resolution. But they don’t replace a true camera experience. At least not for me. I’m hoping that the X100VI can become the “real” camera that lives in my jacket pocket to take the same kinds of images that I’m taking with the iPhone now.
So what kinds of things do I shoot with the iPhone? Here are a few examples from a 2019 trip to Japan (the data shows I was shooting with an iPhone XR at that time). While I have actually licensed some phone images, for the most part these are just images that I make for myself.
Above: The photo at the top of this post is an example of things I might shoot at the airport. All the big gear is packed up in my backpack but I see that the plane I’ll be flying on is a crazy Star Wars robot graphic-covered beast. Not really worth getting into the backpack and assembling my Nikon, but fun to have as a reminder and easily captured on my iPhone.
Below: Panos. I love shooting panos with my iPhone, even when I have my Nikon hanging from my neck. They’re just so fun for getting weird, super wide perspectives. This one is shot from my hotel window probably immediately after check-in in Sendai, Japan.
This second pano below shows a lot of strange distortion and warping of perspective that you’d never get just shooting with an ultra wide lens, but that’s what makes it interesting.
Hotel Documentation
I like to document my hotel rooms, especially if they are unique in some way. This was (I believe) the Ydanaka Onsen Yoroduya in Yamanouchi, Shimotakai District, Nagano where I stayed after trekking up to see the snow monkeys. I didn’t have much time to enjoy this room, but wanted to remember the truly Japanese fashion of the furnishing.
I’m not always good about this, but I try to photograph the hotel floorplan that is often found on the inside of your room’s door for fire escape purposes. I’m fascinated by the layout of some of these hotels, and especially those that are fit into historic buildings. This one was modern, but I mostly shot it to show that I seemed to have been given one of the very smallest rooms available.
I enjoyed the color of the sink at the Ydanaka Onsen Yoroduya as well. One reason I tend to take a lot of these kinds of photos on my phone is that A) they’re throw away shots where I don’t need super high quality and B) I’ve often just stumbled in from the airport or train station and haven’t unpacked my gear yet. I try and take hotel room shots before I have messed them up with all of my stuff.
This to document that the mirrors were perhaps not hung for a person of my height.
And, especially when in Japan, it’s fun to document the controls for the toilet. I have a lot of these kinds of photos for Chinese hotels panels of light switches as well. “Learning the room” can be a real challenge sometimes when you’re moving hotels every night.
Being someone who speaks barely one language and struggles to try and learn any other, I will never make fun of a non-English speakers translation. Major points for trying. But I do enjoy the process of trying to decipher things in the breakfast buffet and elsewhere. “Not Hot Water” is helpful, sure, but still makes you wonder what is in the pot.
Back in Nagano where I’d gone to see the Snow Monkeys, the room had a helpful sheet telling you how to behave around the animals. All good info and I enjoyed the presentation.
And of course I will always document my hotel’s carpet. I’ve been doing this as long as I’ve had a phone with a camera and have a Tumblr blog on that theme. I don’t post to it much anymore and really need to migrate it to some kind of WordPress site or something. Maybe that’s a good winter project.
Signage, train stations, and things in transit.
Again, not to belittle someone’s attempt at English — I couldn’t even make an attempt at Japanese — but I can still enjoy this version of Fire Hydrant.
Japan has amazing manhole covers. I would have loved to have had the time to seek them out and photograph them properly, but it seemed the best examples I ran across were when I was rushing down the street toward a train station with all of my luggage in tow. Another time I’m glad to have a handy phone camera in my pocket.
Inside a train station, waiting to board. Everything is packed up to have made it through security efficiently but I still like having a pocket camera to grab interesting scenes I spot while waiting in line.
I like to use the iPhone for shooting out the car or bus window as well. The compact size lets me get right up close to the glass to help eliminate reflections from inside the vehicle and sometimes the window has a bit of tinting that works like a warming filter. I shoot a lot of videos this way as well, just to remind myself of the journey.
Food
Lastly, probably one of my most frequent times that I’ll use my iPhone camera, is for food. Especially in restaurants with no natural light and plenty of mixed color temperatures, I find the phone to be excellent for grabbing quick food shots. It handles the mixed lighting extremely well and can easily be tweaked afterward to clean up any remaining color shifts.
To be honest, this may be one place that I’ll continue to use the iPhone even now that I’ll have the Fujifilm X100VI in my pocket. Just because the phone is so good at mixed light. If I can get a good table by a window during daylight hours, I’d gladly shoot with a “real” camera, but the iPhone is great for balancing those more challenging situations.
These are just a few examples from one trip to Japan, back in 2019. It’s a pretty good representation of the kinds of things I shoot “just for myself” when traveling — the kinds of things I hope to shoot on the X100VI in the future. Not that there’s anything wrong with the iPhone, I have actually licensed phone photos like these that I’ve taken in the past. It’s more about the photography experience. I still like having a viewfinder and shooting camera-style, rather than at arms length trying to see a screen in sometimes bright conditions. A viewfinder is just a more pleasant and familiar experience for me. Of course, your mileage may vary.
