Railfan Technology > Using an iPhone 4 camera through train window?

Has anyone had any success using an iPhone camera to take photos through a moving train's window?

I just completed a lengthy Amtrak trip (ALB-CHI-SAC-LAX-CHI-NYP-ALB)carrying both an Iphone and a "real" digital SLR. I used both--in particular, I wanted the ability to quickly email photos home so my autistic son had a feel for where dad was and what the countryside (and trains) looked like along the way.

I continue to be drop-dear amazed at the quality of photo you can get out of an Iphone 4. (And yes, I understand the 4S is even better, but after this trip I can't afford one right now).

Some tips:

Try to shoot at right angles to the glass if possible. This minimizes glare, and more importantly minimizes distortion from the windows. They're not perfectly flat, and if you shoot through them at a low angle, you get a lot of ripples and other distortion.

Try to hold the camera close to the window, but not in contact with it. Again this helps minimize glare. Sometimes if you notice glare as you're composing the photo you can eliminate it by holding something up that blocks the source of the glare (an interior light, for example).

If you're in a leeping car room, turn off the lights and draw the curtains. This almost totally eliminates glare.

The biggest single problem is the slight lag between when you touch the button and when the camera fires. This can be infuriating if you're on track that has bushes growing alongside, and you're trying to shoot at just the right time when there's a gap in the bushes. The only solution is to shoot a bunch of pix and delete the ones with clutter in the foreground. TURN OFF the HDR feature if you're doing this--it greatly slows down the reload time between one shot and the next.

Obviously, shooting from the shady side of the train (that is, shooting with the sun over your shoulder) is generally the best way to get nicely sunlit photos. But that's not always possible.

You will be amazed at how good a photo you can get from an Iphone at night. I routinely shot scenes on the station platforms after dark, with no tripod, and produced better results with the phone than with my fancy SLR. By all means try this--you'll be amazed at the results. This is one place where you should keep the HDR feature turned on--it does a great job of compensating for the very high contrast in scenes like this.

Hope this helps. Enjoy the ride...

Thanks so much for the hints. I have been able to get some photos with my iPhone 4S that are very good quality. I have also found camera app that I love! It is "Camera Awesome" from SmugMug. It lets you improve your photos in several ways before you export/ upload them.
What is the HDR feature? I'm basically a point and shoot person!

The HDR feature extends the dynamic range of the photo you are taking. It does the by taking a standard photograph followed quickly by one emphasizing the darker portion of the subject, and the merging the two images. It saves the normally exposed image and the HDR image. Because of the interval between exposures it is not recommended for photography of moving objects.

You can access the feature by touching "options" on the camera screen, turn HDR on and then touching "done."

REMEMBER to turn it off when you are through using it.

OCV

A quick shot through an Amfleet window on the Northern California Explorer special on the WP near Keddie, no special apps or editing....

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