How to use HDR to take better photos with your phone camera
HDR is a great feature that enables you to take much better photos with your phone camera than photos taken in normal mode. Smartphone cameras have recently witnessed a remarkable development, which made them compete and sometimes surpass traditional digital cameras in terms of image quality and high speed to take great photos with simple steps. Thanks to this development, phone cameras have become professional in performance that enables ordinary users to take amazing photos that are very close to what the human eye sees.
What is the function of HDR mode?
It may happen that you have an excellent phone camera with great capabilities, but when you use the camera to take photos or videos, you get unsatisfactory photos or videos. The reason is often that you are not using the correct camera mode that suits the conditions of the place where you are shooting. There are different modes that can be adjusted based on the environment and surrounding place, including the HDR mode, which works to significantly improve the quality of images over the usual shooting mode. What is this mode and how and when can it be used to take great photos easily? In the following lines, we will learn about all of this in detail.
What is the difference between jpg and jpeg in images?
HDR stands for High Dynamic Range. This mode allows you to capture images that are closer to reality as seen by the human eye, providing a good balance between lighting and shadows, which enhances the clarity of details better. In automatic or normal mode, some details may be lost due to the uneven lighting in the image, as the light appears with varying strength across different parts of the image, leaving some parts without clear details. Also, shadow areas may appear as if they are too dark. This is where HDR technology comes in to distribute lighting evenly throughout the entire image, revealing more details.
When HDR mode is activated in the camera, the phone takes three photos of the same scene but with different levels of contrast between light and shadow. A photo is taken with high contrast, then another with medium contrast, and finally a photo with low contrast. These three photos are then combined together to create a single photo that features dynamic colors and clear details better than taking the photo in normal mode. The attached photos above clearly show the difference as you will not find dark areas in the photo, which makes the process of saving the photo take a few seconds longer than other modes in the camera.
However, this does not mean that you should always use HDR mode when taking photos with your phone's camera. There are certain situations where using this mode is appropriate to get better photos. For example, when shooting landscapes where the contrast between the sky and the ground is high, HDR mode is ideal for getting a clear and detailed image. Also, when shooting in direct sunlight, where foreground elements may appear dark due to the intensity of the lighting, HDR can help improve the balance between shadows and highlights. Also, in low-light scenes, HDR works to show more detail in dark areas, as shown in the photos.
However, there are instances where using the feature can lead to unsatisfactory results, such as photographing moving elements in a scene. Since this mode takes three consecutive photos at different contrast levels, it can result in blurred images if there is movement in the scene, as the moving element appears in different locations in each photo. This can result in an unclear and blurry image. Additionally, if you are taking a photo of a scene with balanced lighting where all elements appear clearly, using HDR may result in some loss of detail due to over-adjustment of the lighting.
How to activate HDR
To activate and use HDR mode on your phone's camera, you usually won't need any additional tools, as this mode is built into the default camera app. After opening the camera app, look for the (Mode) button or a similar option and you will find HDR mode there. Once activated, you can take pictures in the situations we mentioned to get amazing results. If you don't find this mode in your camera app, you can resort to using apps like "HDR Camera" as an alternative to achieve the same effects. You can also download the HDR Camera app if the feature is not available on your phone.