Here's a man we photographed whose political career was not without controversy.

I say "photographed" - but my time with him also involved getting my butt whipped at a quick game of pool. Always enjoyed the game - never been any good at it...

After the shoot we discovered our photos were to be used for his (then) upcoming show on the Russian channel RT, which was later suspended when Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.

We had signed away the licence to the photographs before the shoot even took place, although in such cases there's almost always a last-minute question or wrangle about who owns the copyright. That's something we never compromise on. We tend to keep our prices as low as possible for our "two hour shoot" and rather than increasing them to allow the client to fully own the rights to photos, we will always insist on keeping our costs the same for everyone - and the copyright under our own belt. If you want to pay to "own" the photos (rather than to have a "licence") then we aren't the photographers for you.

I hope, dear reader, you take these photos for what they are: innocent portraits captured over a drink or two with Alex Salmond. On a personal level I found his charisma really engaging, and he was a far better pool player than me. It was a privilege to photograph him.

Alex Salmond died on 12 October 2024, aged 69. Whatever you made of his politics, few people have worked the political stage quite like him: quick-witted, combative, mischievous, and never happier than in front of an audience. He sang opera as a boy soprano long before politics, and sold out the Edinburgh Fringe after it. I'll leave you with my favourite frame from that afternoon: a showman to the end, and never one to miss a curtain call.

A treat to hear Gavin play the Steinway at Air Studios whilst we captured some shots for his upcoming album.

Nell is one of the five all-female finalist authors shortlisted for the prestigious BBC 2018 short story awards.

We'll be sure to tune in to BBC Radio 4’s Front Row on October 2nd to hear whether she is crowned winner. Either way, a great achievement to be a finalist, her work selected from 800 stories entered this year.

Meeting interesting, talented people like Nell is one of the more enjoyable aspects of our work. It makes the admin side of things bearable! Congratulations Nell, and best of luck from us at Mat Smith Photography x

After some time away from the music scene for the birth of Annabelle's beautiful son Marty, these photos are to welcome Francesca Barritt as new violinist to the Lawson Trio.

Fran has been busy this year leading English Touring Opera, and recently performing recitals as part of the fascinating Multi Story Orchestra series, as well as playing at Opera Holland Park season with the trio's cellist Rebecca.

You can catch the Lawson Trio for their latest CD launch concert next month at the Sound Laboratory, University of Sheffield, and events starting in 2019, with recitals in Bromsgrove on 22nd February and Sheffield on 10th March.

Not so for Marianne Power, who set herself the task to read a new self help book each month for an entire year, following their advice to the letter, in a quest to change her life, hopefully, for the better.

Picador are set to publish Help Me in Hard back, e-book and audio in September 2018, and we were invited to take some publicity shots of Marianne in East London.

We had fun wandering around Marianne's neighbourhood of Homerton, popping into some of the local cafes that were favorite haunts of hers whilst penning her journey of self help.

As Help Me is out after the hols, forgive me if I stick to grizzly fiction whilst enjoying the unusually glorious English summer - I promise to break from my usual genre to dive into a year of self help with Marianne once her book is out this September.

Congratulations to potter and author Elizabeth MacNeal, whose first novel The Doll Factory, a gripping 19th century tale of love, curiosity and possession set in London (published by Picador next year), is now also set to be adapted for TV by the team behind Netflix and ITV hit Marcella.

Mat Smith Photography had the pleasure of spending a few hours with Elizabeth in her home to take publicity shots a couple of weeks ago.

It was a bright hot day and we dodged both sun's glare and garden sprinklers in Elizabeth’s secluded East London garden to shoot portraits for The Doll Factory book sleeve.

At the bottom of the garden lies Elizabeth's potting studio, and to our delight we explored Elizabeth's latest ceramic wares, packed and stacked in boxes, and lined on wooden shelves, dragging ourselves away only to make time for some more shots.

We walked away from the shoot with a TV "must watch" tip from Elizabeth (Happy Valley, in case you wondered - we binge watched and can highly recommend), two beautiful handmade MacNeal cups (from which I drink coffee as I type today) plus the future anticipation of a thrilling novel to read and another TV series suggestion. Can’t wait.

Congratulations again, Elizabeth. We wish you every success with the television adaptation and future work!

Clients of Mat Smith Photography - if you prefer us to crop your images then we can always do this, but don't forget when we crop the photo to required specs, this always reduces the flexibility you have for future use of the photo. That's why we usually only crop for personal clients and not for business or commercial. Read on for the how-to.

Anyone can crop a photo, you don't need to be an expert. But it's one of those things that may benefit from an expert doing it, for the following two reasons:

1. There are basic visual rules when cropping photos of people: avoid cutting off limbs, don't crop too close to a head, maintain aspect ratio, etc. There's no doubt you'll follow these rules. But a really good crop can lend an image a sense of power. Professional photographers are - hopefully - able to do this as second nature. And it's a subtle thing. If you have a good eye, then go right ahead.
2. When you load an image, edit it, then re-save, you are potentially degrading the quality of that image. I'm guessing most readers of this post don't know how to completely mitigate against this, but again if you do, then go ahead.

Of course, as with all things in life, the more experienced you become, the more you can bend or break the rules.

Q: How do I crop a photo?

Firstly, do you mean crop, which means to remove unwanted outer areas of the image? Or do you mean resize, which means to reduce the file size of a photo?

• Cropping is useful for "zooming in" on something or removing part of the photo you don't want to see.
• Resizing is useful for uploading to certain websites that place a restriction on the file size of the photo. Note: clients of Mat Smith Photography are provided with different resolution versions, so this should not be necessary.

Quickest way to crop (Windows)

Here we'll use Paint; this is the quickest option as it doesn't need you to install new software.

Don't forget: re-saving a JPG file will degrade its quality. You should always attempt to re-crop from an uncompressed file, such as TIFF.

• Check you know where the file you want to crop is stored on your computer. Please make sure you have unzipped the image file, if applicable.
• Open Microsoft Paint (click the Start button and type paint, then click on the icon you see)
• Open your image (click File, top left of window, then Open, now find the file and open it)
• Drag the Zoom bar (bottom right of window) to zoom out until you can see the whole photo on your screen
• Find the Home tab (top of the window, next to File) then press the button above the word Select. (Note, if you see something other than a rectangle on this button, use the pull-down menu by clicking on the word Select to change it back)

• Now drag a rectangle around the area you wish to crop
• (Ideally you'd get the exact same ratio of rectangle as you had before. If you're good with numbers, keep an eye on the dimensions in the bottom bar whilst you drag the mouse to create the crop rectangle, and ensure you achieve the same ratio. Generally I need a calculator to do that, unless it's a square crop. For everyone else, you'll need to use something more advanced to achieve this properly. But if you don't care about the final aspect ratio, don't worry about this.)
• Now press the Crop button on the same menu, then File > Save As > now give the new file a different name to the original.

There's your newly cropped file. Now if you want to completely avoid loss of quality, you can save as a BMP file. However most websites won't allow you to upload this kind of file. It's still useful though, e.g. if you want to do further edits later, without even more loss of quality.

More advanced way to crop (Windows)

If you don't own professional image editing software, but wish to maintain the aspect ratio of your crop without needing a degree in maths (okay, maybe a good GCSE...), then you'll need to download and install some software.

I highly recommend the free software IrfanView, which I've used for many years for really quick / basic edits. This is "no frills" but excellent quality. Download it directly from here. Install the software, load up your image file, then you can immediately crop as follows.

• In IrfanView, no need to select a tool. Just drag the mouse to draw a rectangle. Whilst dragging the mouse, hold down the Alt key on your keyboard. This will constrain the aspect ratio to match the original. You can try a few times until you are happy.
• Once ready to crop, press Ctrl-Y, and the image will immediately crop.
• Now you can save the image from the File menu. If it's a portrait photo, I recommend the following:
  • Check file type is JPG
  • Ensure you don't overwrite the original - give it a new name
  • Before you hit save, you should see a window with a Save Quality slider bar. Slide this bar to about 90.
  • Hit save

As this is the "Advanced" version of my instructions, a quick word about save quality. The higher the number, the larger the file, but the lower the loss in image quality. I'd always recommend 100% unless you are saving thousands of files and are getting low in disk space, OR unless you need to ensure the file size isn't too big (e.g. you are uploading to a website).

The ultimate way to crop

Speak to your photographer or purchase Lightroom / Photoshop!

Back then we had great fun treading the streets of East London, photographing as he stunned people into silence on the street with impressive tricks whilst maintaining that unmistakable Maddox smile and unassuming vibe. Read more and see photos from our 2016 shoot here.

For this shoot our brief was to capture more of Sam's personality, with the addition of a studio setting for May's front cover of international magic magazine "Vanish".

Once finished in our Chiswick High Road studios we took a stroll around the block. We're always a fan of our local railway arches. To others a dingy uninspiring narrow alleyway, to us it provides eye-catching texture, interesting backdrops and therefore photo opportunities galore.

A theme to many a Mat Smith Photography shoot is the coffee stop; this shoot was no exception. Artisan Coffee have become particularly special to us - as well as neighbours they also roast their beans in the workshop at the bottom of our garden.

Talking about the roasters, this was our next shooting location. The mix of rope lighting, London stock, ply and render allows for a great range of scenes all in one venue.

Just before sunset we strolled around our local square before heading back to the studio, and as we packed down for the night, we were lucky enough to be treated to a trick.

The magic of Maddox as well as, of course, the magic, comes from who he is. Relaxed, personable, engaging. He drew us in and astounded us with a card trick that has left our brains all a-jumble. Afterwards he graciously heard our rookie theories as we scratched our heads attempting to work out what we had just both witnessed.

Mat Smith is a London-based portrait photographer. To see more of his work or to get in touch, visit www.matsmithphotography.com

And here's Mat's photo on the front cover of Vanish Magazine, May 2018.

Our surprise battle with that wicked wind-chill began early one Sunday morning, close to Shoredich High Street Station. We love to start early; to capture the pre-dawn light, the empty streets and, from a more practical pragmatic perspective, before traffic wardens have started their shift.

It takes a combination of factors to make a memorable, fun, and successful shoot. Some of it is in the preparation, the honed brief, the planning, and of course the photographer's skill, but once these boxes are ticked, much of the day is down to serendipity and the sheer amount of effort put in by the client. Graham put in effort by the bucket load - both before, and throughout the shoot. Many would have shirked the cold; Graham's costume changes in the chill and his bare arms (see the portrait on yellow) are testament to his fortitude!

Heating set to full blast, it was time for the car to give some warm relief. The plan was to stop off for a coffee near Bank, but due to a rally and road closures we found ourselves diverted nearer to the Barbican. It's a running joke here at Mat Smith Photography that the Brutalist Barbican is Mat's Bermuda Triangle. Once he enters, he and his camera are never to be seen again, at least for a very, very long time. We played it safe today, and used instead for backdrop the high-rise glassy buildings around the danger-zone:

Next, a quick stop for a much needed brew & brunch at caravan coffee. Mine was an enjoyable Ethiopian Wote Konga V60 followed by a ludicrouly laden sourdough grilled cheese sandwich, quince jam, with a fried egg for good measure. Graham followed in the same suit, whilst Mat plumped for the smashed avocado, pickled red onion, soy pumpkin seeds, sprouts, manouri - not forgetting a poached egg on top. No food photos, but back to the blog in hand,  here is a portrait of Graham, whilst waiting for his chow:

Back to business, Graham donned his work attire and we wandered up to Bank. Our brief was to capture Graham both for personal portraits and for business use. The stone archtecture of Bank offered us a good contrast to the glassy walls near the Barbican and street art of Shoreditch. Too corporate, however, would certainly not do for Graham's brief. The choice of orange tie nicely took care of this!

Being Sunday morning, we quickly stopped off at church (albeit not making it past the front door):

And onwards though backstreets and alleyways photographing as we went, happy in the knowledge, for today's shoot at least, the Beast from the East didn't defeat.

I say "re-visited", for Mat, it was a first.

I hadn't seen the film for decades, and as well as wincing at the ludicrous "London" accent of Dick Van Dyke, I couldn't help cringe at the portrayal of Jane and Michael's ditsy, apparently inept, and often absent, suffragette mother. Many have wrangled over both the positive and negative impact of Mrs Banks and her help or hindrance to the ensuing attitude shift toward women and the roles we fulfil in society. She was, nevertheless, my first introduction to the ever-present plight of women to reach equal standing with men. As I was not, sadly, a "daughter's daughter" of a feminist, its impact was meaningful.

Today I have been looking back to some of the inspirational women Mat Smith Photography has recently had the pleasure to meet and photograph.

Lady Hale - Portraits for Bristol University

We were commissioned to photograph Brenda Marjorie Hale, Lady Hale of Richmond back in 2016, before she took up appointment as the President of The Supreme Court in 2017. Her role as President follows her appointment as Deputy President from June 2013. In October 2009 she became the first woman Justice of The Supreme Court.

Lady Hale - Now President of the Supreme Court

Lady Hale talked of hoping to use her position to inspire other women and show that they can reach the pinnacle of any profession. She hopes to further improve the gender balance in the Supreme Court moving forward. We wait with eager anticipation to see whether women fill either the position of the new Deputy President or any of the three currently vacant Justices positions later this year.

We ended our shoot in her private chambers:

Lady Hale in her Chambers

Toto James - Portraits for Women's Institute

"Woman of the Year" nominee in celebration of her work as a Marketing Consultant with leading law firms, and her voluntary work with the Women’s Institute.  Mat Smith Photography was invited to her home for an editorial shoot for the WI Magazine, WI Life.

You can read all about Toto in this month's WI Life edition, "The Inspiration Issue", where our photograph of Toto James is featured on the cover, with a double page spread celebrating Toto, who in her life has blazed a trail in both the business and voluntary sectors.

Mary Kerr - Portraits for Lincoln's Inn

Mary is currently the Under Treasurer of the Honourable Society of Lincoln’s Inn.

During our shoot with Mary we loved hearing about a project she, with a wry smile, coined "her baby"; a major £20m conservation and extension project on the Grade II* listed Great Hall and Library, situated within the Bloomsbury Conservation Area in High Holborn - the biggest single project since its original construction in 1845.

Those who follow Mat’s various personal social media feeds, will be all too aware of the somewhat smaller basement project that fills much of our spare time, and so we were particularly inspired by the 1,247 sq. m, two-storey extension being constructed below ground under the East Terrace of the Great Hall. A day-lit basement providing state-of-the-art teaching facilities comprising a large, multi-purpose lecture theatre and mooting space, 10 flexible advocacy training rooms, quiet study and break-out areas, and additional social meeting spaces.

We look forward to taking up Mary's offer of revisiting her awe-inspiring project, once it is complete later this year.

Dr. Sabrina Cohen-Hatton - Portraits for American Psychological Association

Commissioned by the American Psychological Association, Mat Smith Photography had the pleasure of photographing one of the most inspiring women we have ever met: Deputy Assistant Commissioner at London Fire Brigade, Dr Sabrina Cohen-Hatton.

The double studio session held at our High Road Studios, in Chiswick, has been one of Mat Smith Photography's recent highlights. The brief was to somehow capture Sabrina's warm, approachable personality whilst dressed in full Brigade uniform, on a stark white studio background, which will be used as a cover shot and feature article in the APA's May magazine edition later this year.

One of the best parts of any shoot is hearing about the lives of those we photograph. This shoot was certainly no exception. Having left home at 15 and school at 16, Sabrina's firefighting journey began at her local fire brigade in a small, South Wales mining community. Since then, as well as rising the ranks to become one of the most senior fire fighters in Britain, having served at a number of major incidents, including the Westminster terrorist attack in March this year, Grenfell Tower in June, and the Holborn fire in 2015, Dr Sabrina Cohen-Hatton also has a PhD in Behavioural Neuroscience, having undertaken a series of night classes.

She has won two prestigious international academic awards for her research into incident command in the emergency services. It is the first time in history that psychological theory has been used to improve the way officers make risk-critical decisions and her work fundamentally changed the national approach to how fires are fought, to make both firefighters and the public safer.

Sabrina's book, a firefighter's memoirs, "Through the Fire" is to be published by Transworld in Spring 2019, which I, for one, can't wait to read.  And if TV is more your thing, Broadchurch producer Kudos is also adapting her memoirs into a new TV drama series.

My portrait of Lady Hale below was taken almost exactly a year ago. Commissioned by University of Bristol.

Back in Autumn of last year I had the opportunity to shoot the portrait of an entertainer and magician supreme: Maddox.

Check out his video (not by me) and photos from our shoot (by me) below:

Maddox approached me with a brief I immediately warmed to. A range of different crops, everything from a cinematic full length shots to tighter-cropped head and shoulders shot. A range of styles from cinematic to street photography. All with a fresh, engaging, approachable, and cool vibe.

Check out his site here: http://www.maddoxmagic.com/

As with the majority of our shoots, we spent 2 hours together in London to get 5 outstanding portraits. (And as with many of our portrait sessions, the client wants a few more than just 5 from the shoot!)

We made use of the structures found at Barbican to create dramatic shadow and light photos:

Barbican is one of the finest examples of brutalist architecture in the world, a sprawling mass of thoughtfully designed shapes with large open spaces for the public and hundreds of interesting hidden corners, curved walls, enormous concrete pillars.

It's an urban portrait photographer's dream place to work, on the right day with the right light. There are so many opportunities for interesting compositions, implied vanishing points, squares of light, dark structures. I love to experiment with depth of field in shots like this one below, I think we nailed it on the final take:

Brick Lane makes a fantastic backdrop for photos. The atmosphere brings out the best in people, and there's always a flash of colour:

Well, not quite.

My client was Rainbow Productions, one of the world’s leading manufacturers of mascot and character costumes. The nice chap roped into being the anti-hero was the anti-actor and newest member of the sales team, Matt.

Rainbow Productions brief: to make identically sized Deadpool costumes to be shipped worldwide for Red Carpet productions who were in charge of the cinema launch for 20th Century Fox.

It was a great pleasure coming face-to-face with the sarcastic superhero himself. I didn't realise a superhero such as Deadpool could be such a sensitive conversationalist. He asked about my career as a London portrait photographer, and even suggested I make friends with his new friends, whose skins hung all around us in the costume warehouse; Pepper Pig, Tinky Winky, Postman Pat, and my personal favorite, Pingu, to name drop just a few...

On the rug with ... Deadpool.

DISCLAIMER: I've labelled mushrooms on this blog. I'm new to foraging and my labels may be wrong. Refer to a professional. We had the knowledgeable Lisa of Edulis and Matt of Eden Wild Food by our sides to show us the ropes.

Showering at the end of today reveals little pin-pricks on my skin from brambles, itchy raised bumps of stinging nettles unnoticed until now, and "foraging fingers" of yellow, brown, and slime. This all gives way to an overwhelming sense of a thrill which, until recently, I'd have reserved for discovering a new piece of music from my favourite artist or experiencing some new culture or cuisine.

Rewind the clock back 2 weekends, and I was camping in the New Forest. Camping is not a pastime I had ever relished. I had taken every opportunity over the last 15 years since my teens to scald the stupid types who trade warmth, civilisation, slated pitched roofs and other first world comforts for a night in an undersized, cold, damp figleaf of canvas that barely covers enough floor space to lie in the foetal position. I'm not an outdoorsy type.

But after 16 years of refusing to camp (I last camped in my teens), I gave in, on the proviso that there would be a minimum of 18 inches of air between me and the ground at night - oh - and on the proviso we would find a room with a view.

The reason for all of this camping nonsense? Mushrooms. I've long held a great deal of respect for fungi, although I've not until now known the first thing about the subject.

We booked onto a mushroom course, and within a day of meeting the wide-eyed Lisa Cutcliffe of Edulis Wild Food, I was bitten by more than one type of bug.

The common reaction to "I'm going to pick some mushrooms to eat" is "goodness, isn't that dangerous?". Well it only took a day with Lisa to realise how much I have to learn in the coming years about the enchanting world of fungi, but this one day certainly set me on the right path. Now I'm able to confidently identify 20+ mushrooms from 10 paces. Since the course I have become somewhat obsessed with how to determine the right environment for different types of mushrooms, and this seems to me harder than making sure you don't poison yourself.

It's hard to work out where mushrooms grow.

But if all else fails, you could do worse than starting with a wood that looks like something out of a fairy-tale:

Lisa taught us about the trees that fungi seem to latch on to most, I won't spill the beans here but these are two of the main four:

An early success: some beautiful Chanterelles.

One of the memorable pieces of advice given to us by Lisa was this:

Start off by learning the 50 tastiest edible mushrooms, and the 50 most poisonous ones, and don't bother with everything in between.

To my mind, the safest place to start is to look for the Boletes. These are mushrooms with tubes underneath the cap, as opposed to the more common gills. Apart from one or two of the more rare Boletes, they are all pretty harmless, and the best Boletes can be some of the most valuable and delicious mushrooms. The Cep (aka Porcini or Penny Bun) is one of the superstars of the mushroom world, as such they can be a great find.

Here are some Boletes. Had I seen the bruised underside before, I would have thought "ugh, that's a rubbish mushroom". Now I have a great fondness for seeing the tubes under a Bolete bruising blue. Combine this with brown flecking on the stem and this means you've found a Bay Bolete:

These slimy looking mushrooms are called Porcelains, and they are edible. They are very fond of Beech and they grow in this tufted manner. I've found quite a few since our day with Lisa but I'm yet to take the plunge and cook them up! They are exquisite to look at and touch.

We met quite a few weird fungi on our travels, including this little coral:

The Tawny Grisette with its strongly grooved cap edges and tall elegant stem:

Lisa opened our eyes to so many wonders of the natural world, including this Beefsteak mushroom found by one of the course attendees. You can pull these straight from the tree and eat them raw. Surely this is the closest thing in the natural world to eating cured meats?

Although this was a fungi foraging course, we also took some time to get to know a number of other special things in the New Forest, including edible flowers, mosses, hawthorns, sloes. Here is a plant known as Butcher's Broom, said to have been used by butchers to clean their block as the leaves are very tough and scratchy.

We did concentrate on edible mushrooms, but a lot of time was given to the inedibles which can be equally (if not more) alluring. Here's Lisa and her Fly Agaric, with its own mini-me:

Our group of 20 stopped for lunch. Lisa had dreamt-up an amazing 4 course meal, starting with the mushrooms we had picked that morning fried up in butter and garlic and served with bread, followed by a feast of venison, ale, and wild mushroom stew, then a selection of cakes made with foraged goods, and finishing up with lots of impressive home made tipples (birch sap syrup, raspberry vodka, and many more!)

In the afternoon we were set free to practice what we had just learnt. This is what we found:

It's no over-statement to say that Lisa's course has re-invigourated my love of the outdoors. As a city dweller I'm seeing more and more the benefits of taking a 1-2 hour drive and spending hours just wandering and looking at things.

Excuse the Instagram-styled photo here (edited on the iphone in situ - never a good idea!), but isn't this spread just gorgeous?

We weren't exactly "glamping", after all how can sleeping a mere 18 inches off the ground in a tent as long as my own body ever be considered glamourous? But I must say waking up to the stunning view of the New Forest sunrise the next day, pulling out the travel coffee kit, and cooking up a mushroom breakfast in front of a couple of wild ponies was experience never to be forgotten.

And the dinners have started to look a lot more like this ever since:

That was, until one day, after a particularly busy wedding photography season. I was staying away from home on a futon for just one night, and I awoke to severe pain in my left shoulder.

By midday after a few hours of agony I resolved to book my first ever private medical treatment (the NHS had done me well until that point, but this was pretty urgent).

I'm sure, dear reader, you must think I'm silly. How obvious the cause!

In my defence, and fellow wedding photographers will totally understand this, one's mind during a shoot - not to mention the night before in preparation - is applied in its entirety to the job at hand. During the day one can easily forget to eat, drink water, and one certainly isn't thinking about how one holds one's camera. No wonder you need a full day to recover after a 16 hour day!

Long story short, I needed a way to get the weight off my shoulders and down to the hips. The legs still ache after a long shoot, but legs tend to deal with weight better than the delicate muscles in the shoulder cuff.

So the product I fell immediately in love with was the Think Tank Pro Speed Belt v2.0.

Let me tell you about it.

Think Tank is the name of the company that make it. This US company has a fabulous range of wearables and luggage for cameras, each item designed to perfection by people who understand the challenges photographers face (unlike some other very well-known camera luggage brands whose products are mediocre in comparison).

The Pro Speed Belt v2.0 is one of three belts they make. It's essentially the mid-weight one with padded edges and buckle stops. There's a "skinny", which is definitely not enough to hold 2 full frame cameras plus lenses and a third lens, and a "steroid" which is enough to carry quite a bit more.

Think Tank also sell a wonderful range of things you can put on this belt, called their modular component system (see the range here). They twist and rotate, you can get different types and sizes of lens pouch, covered adjustable size holsters for camera plus lens (the "digital holster") - these also have a load of little pockets for mobile phone, tiny pad, rain covers, etc., and full-on camera bags that can be carried on the waist. Brilliant!

Problem is they don't do a gun-holster style attachment, like the Spider Camera Holster (a different manufacturer). The latter is a great product, which includes the belt, but I'm addicted to my Pro Speed Belt. and they also do an adapter version for the Think Tank Pro Speed Belt, problem is in the UK at least it costs £140, essentially for a piece of metal that securely clips on to your belt.

Enter the Eggsnow. This little puppy costs £23 on Amazon. It comes with its own belt, but with some careful modification I discovered today it can be used with the Think Tank. Hurrah!

Here's how I did it.

What you'll need:

• Eggsnow Pro Waist Holster Camera Belt Plate Single Camera System (Amazon, £23)
• Think Tank Pro Speed Small/Medium V2.0 Belt (£32.50). Belt comes in two sizes, small/medium or large/extra large
• Screwdriver
• 2x M3 machine screws. I used 22mm long screws but slightly shorter or longer should work
• Pair of scissors
• Some decent accurate tweezers

Firstly I removed the retaining screws and plastic washers on the Eggsnow. The screws are not "structural", they don't take the weight, they just prevent the holster from sliding upwards. The plastic washers are next to useless, but you can replace them if you like. I didn't bother as my solution below didn't require it.

When you remove the screws, slide the holster away from the Eggsnow belt. Measure the screw locations carefully, I used a Vernier gauge and made the screws 25mm apart and 36mm down from the top edge of the belt.

Now use a bradawl or something very sharp to mark holes in the Think Tank belt in the right place. I'm right-handed, so I marked it at 90 degrees to the right of the belt clips which I keep at the front. A bradawl won't make it through the Pro Speed Belt - it's very tough! So I used a 3mm drill to get all the way through. I used a proper drill press because I have one, but careful use of a hand-drill would work. It does of course break the webbing, but not catastrophically so.

I needed to replace the screws provided with the Eggsnow, as they aren't long enough to go all the way through the Pro Speed Belt. Luckily I had some M3 machine screws (3mm diameter). 22mm long worked for me. I bought mine on ebay, a couple of quid for 50.

If you were to push the screws the Speed Belt and attach them to the holster, the heads would get lost in the rubbery insides of the Speed Belt. So I cut out a section of the Eggsnow (yes, it's good for nothing now!) as follows:

Actually I didn't need this shape, I just needed the rectangle around the screws. You'll see what I mean below.

When cutting the Eggsnow belt, you'll see there are 4 layers. I discarded all but the toughest layer and put that layer around the back of the Pro Speed Belt like so:

Getting the screws through the belt took a bit of work. The material inside the Think Tank Pro Speed Belt v2.0 is rubbery and the holes drilled seem to close up, so I used some needle-nosed tweezers to open the holes up a few seconds before getting the screws in. I shoved the tweezers in so far that the handle of the tweezers opened the hole up.

After a little shoving, we have a very secure holster attached permanently to the Think Tank Pro Speed Belt v2.0:

Right - add to this the digital holster and a lens drop, and we have ourselves a mean camera carrying machine! The holster makes for super-fast shooting, that extra 2 seconds it saves compared with pulling a camera out of the belt case makes all the difference!

So far this means:

• Full window blackout, of course
• Full digital control of ambient light levels in the studio. (I can control exact dimmer settings for uplight and downlight - either independently or in tandem - from both the iPhone and the command line. How cool is that?)
• Light bulbs with 6500k colour temperature and pure white walls
• Brand spanking new IPS display, custom calibrated to my chosen ambient light level and temperature in the room (re-calibrated every 5 minutes, not that it needs it)
• Wacom Intuos, of course
• Little fake electric candles for ambiance (calibrated into the ambient light reading as well!)
• Dedicated remote controls for light and music database, speakers mounted nicely for desk position

It's like looking at my photos with new eyes!

To set the scene: an ecstatic Carly who woke up to the sound of dad starting the rustic engine of Carly's wedding surprise - her wedding carriage - a resplendent baby-blue VW Camper Van. A seriously talented mum who made not one but three impressive wedding cakes.

I'm such a sucker for the sunset portrait, I cannot resist...

I was apparently born within the sound of the Bow Bells which technically makes me cockney. I've done my best to lose the accent... #homecountiesupbringing

We shot in a home in South London, simple mobile lighting setup, 2 hours of shooting, and lots of backdrop and clothing options to get the best five images. Check out Paul's website.

Nat is wearing a beautiful wedding dress combination which she designed herself with the help of the talented Pascale at Stag and Bow. (Twitter: @stagandbow)

A funny feeling, but a good one. (That is, if the photo was from a commission. I dread doing this one day to find a pilfered image on display; I guess this is quite uncommon given the nature of this kind of photo. It happens all the time online, but - one hopes - less in the world of print.)

I worked with the Lawson Trio last year, before Clara joined the ensemble. It's always that photo right at the end of the session, when everyone is freezing, windswept, and tired of lugging bags around, and you probably went on for two hours longer than you planned to - it's then you finally get the shot:

Anyway not so this year. Like gold-dust, we found a lovely secluded little space outside a property management company right next to Tate Modern that gave us impromptu permission to shoot on their land. So lovely finding "Real Human Beings" from time to time, when London seems so full of officious security guards and companies who are so obsessed with faux health and safety, insurance, PR, and frankly any other reason to not let you shoot anywhere near them.

(Thanks, Neo Bankside - nice people.)

It wasn't quite without interruption, but mercifully we were left alone after name-dropping the "real human being" who said we could shoot there. Anyway, the result of a little bit of planning, a lot of improvisation, and 2 hours of shooting:

Next up, we made use of the fact that photography inside the Tate corridors is permitted, with this great little scene shot across the escalator:

Finally, onto a favourite location of mine. Millennium Bridge is a footway across the Thames which connects the Tate Modern to St Paul's Cathedral. Actually many photographers love shooting here, and you often have to fight for the specific spot as we did! This is because it's such a great place to capture people, movement, old architecture and new.

The really exciting thing for me is that I managed to get my hands on a Microsoft Surface Pro for the best part of a day (colleague of a colleague), so naturally the first thing I did was to install my copy of Lightroom 5 on it, and give it a spin.

It's very exciting indeed to edit photos directly on a tablet, without the usual restrictions you expect from an iPad. The Microsoft Surface Pro is absolutely superb for Lightroom because it uses a 128GB SSD which makes the process really snappy. Sure, it's not quite capacious enough for your average working catalog size, but it's wonderful for throwing into your bag and carrying out some edits over a coffee.

The Microsoft Surface Pro comes with a Wacom digitizer which I didn't have time to test out fully, but there's something a little unreal and wonderful about using a pen directly on your photographs in Lightroom without being tethered to a desk and a Wacom off to the side.

Actually I fell head-over-heels with this little computing device, and was surprised that it was even possible to use for serious editing work.

Perhaps I will get my hands on a Surface Pro again to give it a full review here on the blog, but I'll leave you for now with that edited shot. I brought it back onto my primary editing setup to check contrast and colour, which were both good. I may have gone a little overboard with the blue backdrop masking but it's quite a fun effect.

So here's the finished product, an hour of backdrop masking in Lightroom on the Surface Pro!

Overheard myself at dinner at Italian resto: "if I wanted a bloody PINOT GRIGIO I would get myself a fake tan and head to Carluccio's"

— matsmithphotog (@matsmithphotog) July 30, 2013 Anyway wine prejudices aside, I am a huge fan of this man. The first time I tasted his amazing Penne Giardiniera in Ealing I was bowled over, then so glad many years later when the recipe was published and I could make it in my own home. What a recipe.

Anyway, I took a portrait of the great chef in his deli restaurant in Chiswick last year, and realised I never blogged the photo.

I rarely shoot just with natural light, so this was a bit of a stylistic departure for me, but I hope you like it. The shot is lit from the front of the shop, hence the striking (unbalanced?) white balance of the subject vs. the backdrop.

There was a time I lugged my primary DSLR around with me everywhere I went. Out for dinner with friends, out and about in town, everywhere. The camera lived on my shoulder constantly but, the more time I spent shooting professionally, the less I was inclined to take my DSLR, opting instead to take various other smaller cameras for everyday photography; Canon G6, my beautiful old Nikkormat with 50mm 1.4 lens and a roll of Fuji BW film, even a twin lens reflex was smaller and easier to carry around!

Now I've been a professional photographer full-time for 4 years, and the only camera I ever take out with me when I'm not shooting for a client is my iPhone 4S.

The iPhone 4S camera is nothing to write home about, photographically speaking - of course. Without a large piece of glass in front of that sensor, it never will be.

But the point is: it's good enough. Good enough that shooting portraits can be an enjoyable affair - quick, instant, and good results. The lens and the quality of the sensor are no more than adequate, which is precisely what you need from a tiny take-everywhere camera. The barriers to taking good portraits have mostly been removed; the process of shooting is no longer cumbersome as it was in previous generations of the phone, and I'm always able to predict the optical and digital quality of the images will be good, unlike many other camera phones I've used.

Here's a shot I made yesterday on an unexpected visit to a coffee house in Amersham, where I unexpectedly met Claire and friends:

4 Steps to great iPhone portrait photography

1. As with all natural-light photography: find the light. Most of the time I don't go out looking for it, but instead I see it and think "this is gorgeous light for a photo". This usually happens when you aren't expecting it: hence keep the iPhone to hand!
2. Get an iPhone 4S or iPhone 5. The camera is far superior in the 4S to previous models. Also ensure you update your iPhone's operating system. The latest version of iOS brought in some killer changes when it comes to shooting quickly. Read up here for more info.
3. Adopt the mindset of a portrait photographer. Take fewer photos, delete all photos except the best version, start to think in terms of editing every shot as part of the process.
4. Get the right apps. Process every photo you keep. This takes time, thought, and invention. The iPhone camera is not magic, it's an automatic camera that makes assumptions about exposure. Every shot you take will require intervention with some kind of processing or photo editing.

Some apps I use

iPhonography is a fast-moving thing, so make sure to keep-up with the latest apps. I'm an incessant reader of reviews in the app store, and I research apps online a lot.  Over the years I've purchased, downloaded, and tested tens of photo editing apps, but here's a quick summary of the ones I always come back to.

Snapseed

I've used this app every day over the last year.

This has been my favoured go-to app for almost every photo I've shot on the iPhone. Made by Nik Software, who have a good pedigree in professional photo editing software, the app combines some of the toy-like features of Instagram with some really decent manual editing functions. The Instagram-like photo filters are actually fully manual functions with presets and a randomize feature, which does provide some 'playability' if you aren't sure what look and feel you are going for.

On the whole I avoid using Snapseed's "vintage" or "grunge" filters as they are way too 'Instagrammy' - they detract from the purity of the image. My style is to accentuate and to make the image pop. I use "drama", "crop", "selective adjust", and "tilt shift" a lot, though. I also use the "straighten" function to rotate images although I do find that a bit fiddly. More on how I use this app later.

Big lens

Whereas Snapseed is about bringing out the best qualities of your photos, Big Lens is basically a naughty app for cheats. Don't get me wrong - you have to put a lot of work in, and the results are very good, but it essentially emulates the look and feel of a big lens where you might stop-down the shot to reduce depth-of-field. Put simply it blurs out the background of your image. (Plus it does a whole load of other things.)

Every great portrait has a good separation of subject and surrounding.

By blurring out the background of your image, you are accentuating the subject and drawing the eye in to the photo. You are removing distractions from behind the subject which is something you can only usually do with a big piece of glass on the front of your camera. The app actually has "aperture" settings to emulate f stops (f3.5, f3.2, f2.8 etc.) although clearly these are to be ignored as, technically speaking, they are nonsense. Add to this the fact that it's technically not a great idea to mask out a subject using a pen tool, and you'll see why this app isn't for photography purists - but I like it because it does give 95% great results a lot of the time, at least for portraiture.

What about camera apps?

The above are great for post-processing, but what about replacement apps for the iPhone's camera?

Personally I don't use one. I have a number of theories on this one, not least the fact that there's a good chance you will inadvertently begin using an app that doesn't support the resolution of the latest iPhone. It's a huge flaw, but I've seen it before. App developers tend not to make a big thing of such flaws.

If you do prefer to use a special app for taking photos, instead of iPhone's built-in app, then make sure you do your research. Find an app that definitely supports your iPhone camera's resolution, and one that doesn't attempt to make your images brighter. Apps that claim to make the image brighter are actually pre-processing apps; all they do is remove the options to fine-tune your photographs in post-processing afterwards.

How I  process photos

The greatest thing about instant mobile photography is taking your image from start to finish without getting your desktop editing software out! You can do it all on the bus.

I've settled on a process I like, which gives my images a certain look and feel. I'd encourage you to find your own process to make images that suit your own eye - this is the key to becoming a great photographer.

That aside, here's my process:

Settle on my image

I settle on my favourite image version by doing quick mock-up edits of a few different versions, cropping accordingly. I delete extra versions of the same shot and set about editing the chosen image.

Edit in Snapseed

I load the image up in Snapseed and straight away use the "drama" filter:

I'll get the filter strength as high as possible without it looking to hyper-real (it gives a surreal bad-HDR effect if over-used).

I bring the saturation UP as it's usually too low by default. Here I've used +54.

I make a note of the numbers and then try out different combinations of the two settings for this filter. I press-and-hold the top compare button a few times to decide whether I went over-the-top:

Then I apply the filter:

Sometimes the image isn't nearly bright enough. To fix this I tend to prefer using the "Tilt Shift" filter (instead of the "tune image" filter), as this has a really nice brightness algorithm. Although the image is exposed nicely here, I still use it to slightly push-up the brightness:

I use two fingers to pull-apart the Tilt Shift area, so that the diagonally opposite corners get a tiny amount of blur, and I tend to leave the other settings as they are. Perhaps I will tweak the saturation a little.

Next up, crop:

I usually double-check my edits using the compare feature from the main screen (this time, press-and-hold the image. The compare button shown above is only when you are in one of the filter views).

All done! Now I save the image out to the camera roll.

Edit in Big Lens

Next I load the image into Big Lens. Always use "advanced" to mask the image:

Now draw the brush around the subject. Then click Auto to tighten up the edges:

Zoom in to erase the mask where it shouldn't be, and use the brush tool to re-apply if you removed too much:

To pan around, use two fingers.

Be patient, this process takes a long time. If you mess up, it won't look good. There's an undo button you can use for brush strokes. You really need to be a little bit anal about this process. Don't worry though, you can try it out and go back and edit the mask if you like.

Use the arrow top-right to move to the next stage. Now apply your aperture size.

You can see here, I've gone too far. This makes it look unnatural, and you can also see masking artefacts more, if you look around the edge of the subject:

I went for f3.2 in the end. I also used the 'pop cold' filter, which only applies to the backdrop, to further draw the eye in. I turned the filter strength down to about half:

Again, use press and hold the compare function. Play around with the other options.

But there you have it: a great looking portrait from a tiny camera in your phone.

Before and After

Here's a quick before and after comparison:

Personally I think the concept is quite unique. It's not the same as an animated GIF, the somewhat tacky pre-cursor of video on the web, where the whole image moves - usually as 3-5 second sequences in loops. Nor is it the same as video. It is a kind of moving still, where the photographer / artist (we can't call him the film-maker) decides which parts of the image will move and which parts will be static.

This creates an interesting tension between objects whose movements are shown, and objects which were clearly moving but whose movement is frozen in time.

Testing Image #1: The Tiniest Movement Throws It Off

You can find some great examples of the power of Cinegraphs if you look anywhere online, but for now here is my first evening of work on the concept.

It's a steep learning curve that combines frame-based image masking and editing, stills extraction, and a good degree of artistic direction when done well.

Don't believe the multitude of tutorials online that tell you it's really easy and super quick to do. Well it may be - but not to do one well! Try it yourself...

The artistic direction of the two photos below is next to none, but these were just testing images.

Have you seen Cinegraphs on the web? What do you think? Powerful, quirky, or gimmicky?

Testing Image #2

I've been pretty excited about the opening of Jamie Oliver's new restaurant Union Jacks for a while, and as an avid local tweeter for Chiswick / accidental restaurant advisor / general photo and food blogger (usually on other sites), I took my camera along to the soft opening today.

Some background: I don't have a TV and I'm only familiar with Jamie through his books, website, and other restaurants which I love (Jamie's Italian in Cambridge and London W12, where I've dined more times that I can remember).

Sadly I just missed chatting to Jamie, but caught Jamie's partner in the Union Jacks venture, Chris Bianco, who is a passionate foodie and restaurant entrepreneur from the US:

Back home his restaurant Pizzeria Bianco in Phoenix, Arizona is reputedly a great success with food critics, not to mention the fact he's opened up other restaurants from Italian to Mexican, he grows and packages a range of varietals of tomatoes in California (sadly he won't be exporting them for use in this restaurant) and he obviously cares dearly about his ingredients. I'm hoping the Union Jacks venture will attract similar critical praise. Certainly his amazing positivity comes across within just a few minutes of meeting him. I love how he has done-out the restaurant with little bits of local life - some framed prints from a much-loved nearby bookshop Fosters of Chiswick, to mention just one.

The interior itself is a nod to 50s/60s café dining with formica-style tabletops or roughly-painted wooden tables, funky lighting, traditional unfussy menus, and lovely tiling work on the walls - the same tiles as you are likely to see on the London Underground.

As with all of Jamie's restaurants, staff are superb; their enthusiasm is palpable and even though Chiswick Union Jacks was not fully open, they were really on the ball, chatty, excited...

Whilst Union Jacks probably won't compete with the excellent Gelato Mio across the road for serious ice, are not putting out cocktails like Sam's or Charlotte's, and probably don't put pizza to the core of the menu as much as the nearby Franco Manca - which will always hold a special place in my heart - nevertheless the restaurant's main strength is that it serves up an impressive range of food styles.

The Woodman Pizza (they call it a "Flat"): a topping with mixed field mushroom base and an aftertaste of aniseed:

Although in many ways Italian - at least the style of the interior - Union Jacks isn't a traditional pizzeria by any means. It's more like an "Italian-inspired English tapas restaurant"; the palate catered-for is very much the English one.

How so? Think mini Yorkshire puddings, Indian spiced chicken with Bombay potatoes, Bubble and Squeak, Treacle Tart, selection of great cheeses.

Below, Indian spiced chicken. What an amazing gravy it came with. Typical of Jamie: bursting with surprising flavours. And a delightful marinade.

The other thing I love: you can stop-by for a quick Builder's Tea on the seats outside, or bring a group of friends for a whole evening out.

Below, the "Damson Gin Fizz":

Below, "Roobarb & Custard" and "Union Mule":

What they do, they do very well. "Earl Grey and biscuit" and "bitter chocolate" ice cream scoops:

The dough is made right in front of diners, so you can see the action! Smells amazing.

The restaurant is apparently not taking bookings until May, however I believe it will be possible to walk-in and dine at any time.

Can't wait to spend some more time there!

There are myriad features on the new iPhone that I love; after 24 hours of testing Siri to its limits, playing with notifications, the integrated Twitter features, the location-based reminders, and more, I'm in no doubt the 'phone will enrich my life albeit in some small way.

Rather than focusing on these features, however, here I'm reviewing the iPhone 4S camera from the perspective of a professional photographer.

Summary of improvements

Here's a list of improvements you'll see in the iPhone 4S camera, whether they are down to the iOS5 upgrade (which can be installed on older models) or to the iPhone 4S itself.

This review expands upon all of these improvements.

• Ease of access
  • Quick access from the lock screen (iOS5)
    • No access to existing photos if iPhone was locked with passcode
• Ease of control
  • Quicker camera-ready time (especially compared with iPhone 3GS and older)
  • Vastly reduced shutter lag (un-noticeable delay in taking shot after pressing button)
  • Increased ergonomics: use side button to shoot (applies to iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S under iOS5)
  • Optional grid for rule of thirds
  • Flash (improved on 4S) - photographers: keep that flash off at all times!
  • Quick Edit after taking photo
    • Crop / free-form rotate
    • Separate 90 degree rotate function
    • Manual red-eye removal
    • "Auto Enhance" - photographers: avoid!
  • Vastly improved focus and exposure seek time
  • Pinch to zoom - photographers: avoid!
  • Photo Stream (iCloud)
• Redesigned sensor
  • Increased resolution (7.99MP: 3264 x 2448)
  • Lower noise despite increased resolution
  • Increased sensitivity: especially great for low-light photography
• Redesigned lens system
  • 5 elements: sharper images
  • Wider aperture: f/2.4 - brighter and more impressive images. Reduced DoF for more 'artsy' photos

Some background - a personal disclaimer

As a professional photographer, there is a small part of me that despises the concept of a cameraphone. This ubiquitous device has landed in the hands of The Many, which has led to an explosion in the number of photographs taken across the world in any given second (which should be good), yet a proportionally huge reduction in the average quality of a photograph.

If this sounds a bit abstract, just consider what you see on Facebook. Every minute detail of our lives is now captured on our mobile phones in poor light, at low definition, and with little thought. Every moment, including the seminal moments - a child's fifth birthday party, a graduation, the first dance at a wedding. These seminal moments are being lost in the sea of photos that we take, their significance diminished in our memories.

However this problem is not because of the technology itself; we can't blame technology. It's how we have adopted the technology. But then, neither can we blame lack of expertise; it's not only the average Joe who doesn't realise that 'less is more' when it comes to curating our lives' photos, I have seen professional photographers who take the easy line and offer clients quantity over quality.

No, let's not focus on the effect that ubiquity is having on the social function of photography. Let's focus instead on the camera itself.

I wish I could attribute the following quotation to someone like Henri Cartier-Bresson, alas it's a modern idea;

"The best camera is the one that's with you"

The History

As a cameraphone, the iPhone has long been behind the competition. Users of the original iPhone, the 3G, and to a lesser extent the 3GS, have bemoaned the poor camera.

The iPhone 4 brought the 'phone's camera up to modern expectations.

The iPhone 4S, released yesterday, greatly exceeds expectations of a camera phone, and many are saying it's the best camera on a 'phone to date.

What makes a good cameraphone?

From the perspective of a photographer, here's what I believe makes a good cameraphone.

Ease of access: capturing 'the moment' is difficult if you have to navigate through menus and buttons before the shutter is even ready

With iOS5, it is now possible to access the camera from the lock screen. This may be done by double-clicking the home button, either when the lock screen is already showing, or when the phone display is off altogether.

And for those who protect their iPhone with a passcode, there's no need to worry that this could be used to circumvent entering the passcode to view existing photos:

Controllability: how responsive is the shutter release? To what extent can focus and exposure be controlled? Is it quick to change the settings? What about other tools like composition guides or in-app post-processing?

One of the main issues with the iPhone 3GS was a delay when entering the camera app. The shutter animation would hang for a second or more, which really affects your ability to point and shoot. The iPhone 4S has an upgraded processor, and there's no more waiting.

Another major gripe was that you had to use the software button on the screen to take a photo. The iPhone 4S now has a physical button for shutter release: the up-volume button on the side. This is a lovely button which provides a good level of physical feedback without jogging the 'phone in the slightest when pressed. Great for macro shots, where the tiniest movement can throw the focus off.

Most importantly, something that angers most photographers about cameraphones - and indeed small point-and-shoot cameras - is the shutter release delay. These inferior cameras usually use autofocus; even if you have pressed the button, that shot isn't taken until the camera thinks the image is in focus. This can lead to a delay of a second or sometimes more, and we professionals (or anyone with an SLR camera!) absolutely hate that!

The iPhone 4S has an instantaneous shutter release - like an SLR.

The result is that inexperienced users may end up with photos that are out of focus - but let's face it, in many cases if you leave the camera to choose your focus point then you won't be getting the best results anyway. At least this gives power back to the real photographer.

Combine this with the new face recognition feature, and the new super-fast focusing, and it's actually very difficult to end up with photos that are out of focus.

The new iPhone 4S sports a grid for composing a shot according to the rule of thirds. Of course, this grid may be turned off, but it's great for shooting landscapes. Here it is with the options screen:

Naturally, of course, we have the ability to turn the flash on or off, or set to auto. For a professional photographer, this switch is set to the 'off' position 95% of the time. If there isn't enough light, the last thing we want is a horrible harsh flash lighting the scene. There are some occasions it is nice to switch the  flash on, such as ... wait for it ... when the sun is shining. Why? This is called fill flash, and if the subject is close enough to the iPhone, the bright LED light is just enough to take the harsh edges off the shadows that are cast on the subject's face. Similarly the flash is useful for more 'functional' photographs, e.g. if you are trying to read a number from the rear of a box and you can't quite reach it otherwise.

Other than that: turn that horrid flash off, and leave it off!

From the above screencap, you can also see the switch camera icon (top right). This allows you to use the front-facing camera on the iPhone instead. Whilst this might be great for that narcissistic shot of yourself, it most certainly won't do your photography any good. The front-facing camera on the iPhone 4S is still pretty horrid, and should be avoided for anything except its primary intended use which is video.

Another brilliant boon to iPhone photographers in the release of the iPhone 4S is the quick edit function. This is where, after taking a shot, you can quickly crop, rotate, or fix red-eye. There is also an option to 'Auto Enhance', however this should be avoided if you are serious about the photo. Apple have mercifully avoided any other 'artistic' editing functions, as well as manual post-processing control over exposure or contrast, and stuck to the basics: crop, free-form rotate, and red-eye. This is a good thing.

The focus and exposure control offer a similar interface to previous generations - tap anywhere on the screen to focus on that point - however they are noticeably faster and more accurate. iPhone 4S now also has a face recognition feature which assists when focusing on a single subject or taking a group shot. The focus can of course be overridden by tapping the screen to focus on another point.

Unfortunately, there is no separation of exposure and focus control, which means the point you focus is also the point which you choose for correct exposure level. Personally I think that separating these two controls would indeed have been one step too far for the average user. If you require this kind of functionality... there's an app for that.

The zoom control now uses multi-touch pinch rather than the slightly fiddlesome zoom scroll-bar on previous generations. However, as this is digital zoom as opposed to optical zoom, the result is that you are cropping the image rather than actually zooming-in. Therefore, never use digital zoom; it's a bad idea because it reduces your options. If you need to see something close-up, you should crop the image afterwards using the new iOS5 in-app editing (mentioned above) or using other software e.g. on your computer. (The same applies for any camera with digital zoom!)

One final point of interest about the improvements to photo handling in iOS5 worth noting is the integration of photos into iCloud. A new folder appears within the pictures app when you upgrade to iOS5 (or by default on the iPhone 4S) called photo stream:

If you have upgraded to iOS5 (whether you restored a backup of your older phone to a new iPhone 4S, or just upgraded your non-4s to iOS5), you have the option of using the photo stream function. If you switch this on, all photos you take from that point onwards will be uploaded / backed-up to iCloud, and will appear in both the camera roll and the photo stream folders.

This is a real boon for those who use desktop or laptop computers (Mac or PC) as your iCloud photo stream can be synchronised with your computer. No more emailing yourself files, or uploading them to Dropbox! Windows users will need to download the iCloud control panel application (download link here) for Windows, and Mac users will need to upgrade to OS X Lion and switch on iCloud. The windows client allows you to set the location of your photo stream, if you choose to have this downloaded to your computer.

The Lens and Sensor: more important than megapixels

Everyone knows how futile the 'megapixel race' is; this is where camera manufacturers play on the general public's lack of knowledge and get them to focus on meaningless specifications such as the megapixel count. Of course, it's not an entirely meaningless specification, but in many cases over the last decade, cameras have been released with dog-awful lenses and a high megapixel count; all this does is to show you in even higher resolution how terrible the photograph is!

It's like matching hi-fi speakers with an amp. No use spending a tonne on lovely speakers if the amplifier doesn't do them justice.

As long as the megapixel count does justice to the lens and the quality of the sensor, that's all the matters.

Apple upgraded the iPhone 4S camera's megapixel count (this is a function of the new sensor itself, of course) to 8MP. This resolution definitely does justice to the upgraded lens and sensor. It's worth noting at this point that the video function does not use the full resolution of the sensor, and as such the image is cropped. Therefore, it's no longer possible to take such wide angle images in video mode. This is a great shame, and it would surely have been possible to use the full sensor frame but reduce the resolution on-the-fly.

So - onto the good stuff: the lens and the sensor.

Apple stated that, despite having a higher resolution,the new sensor is 73% more sensitive. This essentially means the lens performs better in low light, which means that there is less blur and less noise. Let's take a look. This is actually a comparison of images from iPhone 3GS rather than the iPhone 4.

The image from the iPhone 4GS had its resolution reduced in Photoshop to match that of the 3GS, for comparison's sake. The images were taken in the same light.

The brighter image is from the iPhone 4GS.

As well as poor response to light and higher noise, below we can also see the increased JPG artefacts from the iPhone 3GS, however this may be due to the fact the image was not reduced in size, whereas the 4GS image was reduced in size, for this comparison.

If you can look past the noise and the JPG artefacts, it's also possible to see that the image has a greater clarity of edges and increased detail in the blacks. Compare the cat's eyes and nose; on the 3GS version they are blacker and with less detail.

As well as this revised sensor, the iPhone 4S has a completely redesigned lens setup, with a wider aperture (f/2.4, as opposed to the iPhone 4's lens aperture of f/2.8). This wider aperture allows more light in, and as you can see from the below test images, it reduces the depth of field; this is something many photographers will enjoy about the new lens, as it can slightly improve the feel of portraits.

Note that the aperture of f/2.4 is not equivalent to that of the photographer's standard measurement based on the 35mm film. The equivalent aperture would be much higher, in the order of f/18-22, as is appropriate for a fixed-aperture and fixed-focal-length lens.

Of course, the focal length of the iPhone 4S has also changed, and it's now 4.3mm as opposed to the iPhone 4 focal length of 3.85. Whilst it may seem at first the image should appear zoomed-in in comparison to the iPhone 4, remember that the crop factor may be slightly different if the sensor has been redesigned. Very little detail has been released on the dimensions of the sensor itself.

The below two images show the effect of DoF (depth of field) of the iPhone 4S as compared with the iPhone 3GS. The images are shown here uncropped; the iPhone 3GS image is taken at a slightly higher elevation to compensate for the different focal length. These images are not intended as technically accurate comparisons of DoF.

Observe the bottom horizontal stick (a thin bamboo skewer) in both photographs. The focal point of both images was the middle stick. The iPhone 4S version shows the bottom stick to be much more out of focus.

The reduction in DoF is not severe, however it will have a noticeable effect on portrait shots, where backgrounds will appear that little bit more blurry and out of focus, thus accentuating the subject. A lesser proportion of the iPhone 4S image is in focus, which results in a more artsy photo. Great in most cases.

For example, here's a picture of an avocado in the foreground, with me in the background...

And Apple has proven the DoF point with a slightly less attractive model, and a pretty flower...

The new lens consists of 5 elements, one of which Apple has stated is a 'hybrid infrared filter'. This is presumably due to the increased sensitivity of the sensor to incident infrared light.

Summary

Please do see the summary of improvements listed near the top of this review.

Hopefully I have covered the main improvements to the iPhone 4S camera. As always, I'd love to hear your comments. Thanks for reading!

Click here to see the original review (this might make your mouth water!)

Click here (see pages 18-19) to see the online copy of the magazine to read the publication in full.