Enhancing Phone Photos With Snapseed App

Original iPhone 7 photograph

Taking photos with a smartphone while driving a car is not the smartest thing to do. I just want to get that out of the way.

But shutterbug that I am, I often cannot resist when presented with a pretty landscape or skyscape (and the setting is safe, traffic wise). Case in point, this iPhone photo I took yesterday while driving home from work.

I do like the quality of my iPhone 7's camera. The clouds had such nice coloring as sunset approached.

Version enhanced with Snapseed's HDR tool

Now here's the same image after some quick processing using the free Snapseed photo editor application.

The HDR (high dynamic range) tool really adds a dramatic touch wouldn't you agree?  As defined by Wikipedia, HDR is "used in imaging and photography to reproduce a greater dynamic range of luminosity than is possible with standard digital imaging or photographic techniques."

Threatening weather looking even more so!

I took this photograph with my phone in December, going in the opposite direction of the ones above, in the morning.

The processing just takes a minute or two. Once in the HDR mode, you can adjust the level of "luminosity" with a scrollbar.

South of the Border along I-95 

When driving up to Virginia during the holidays I snapped this image of the iconic South of the Border site in South Carolina just before the border with North Carolina.

Marion Square in Charleston, S.C.  

One final picture is this photo I took a couple weeks ago.  I was sitting in the Starbucks at the Francis Marion Hotel in Charleston. It has a really nice view of Marion Square, so I took a few shots with my iPhone when noticing the chance to showcase three things that I feel represent Charleston:  church steeples (Charleston is the "Holy City"), historic statues and monuments (in this case John C. Calhoun) and Palmetto trees, which are represented on the flag of South Carolina.

It's fun to post my Snapseed photos on Facebook and Instagram as well as my blog.  One Facebook friend liked this Marion Square photo so much she asked me if she could use it as a background to her profile photo. I said yes, of course. Very flattered really!