The Guardian - UK (2022-04-30)

Saturday 30 April 2022 The Guardian •

Passports 55

Thousands face losing

holidays amid delays

Page 56

Motoring

Could it be time to

give up owning a car?

Page 57

edit, share or clear them from your
phone’s storage. Shared photo
albums can be made with anyone
with a Google account making
collecting snaps from group
holidays or events a doddle.
You can back up photos and
videos in “storage saver”, which
compresses them to save space,
reducing quality slightly in
the process, or save the larger
original quality. Photos will even
back up the digital equivalent of
negatives, called raw fi les, from
some cameras.
You can use a diff erent Google
account from your main one to
have the free 15GB only for photos.
Google One plans add more space
starting at £15.99 a year for 100GB,
which will be plenty for most
people. You can manually upload
photos from a camera using the
web, too.
Google lets you print off photo
books costing from £15.99 plus
delivery – you can choose pictures
and layouts and add captions
before you do.
It also integrates with Assistant
smart displays such as the Nest
Hub , turning them into excellent
digital photo frames.

• Microsoft OneDrive
  5GB free; 1TB with Microsoft 365
  £5.99 a month
  Microsoft’s OneDrive is a general
  cloud storage drive that can also
  automatically backup photos
  and videos on Android, iPhone,
  Mac or PC. You can manually
  upload photos from a camera via a
  computer or the web.
  It lacks some of the more
  advanced features of Apple or
  Google’s tools but you get 5GB of
  space for free. The most appealing
  part of OneDrive is that you get
  a huge 1TB of storage if you have
  a Microsoft 365 account, which
  is the subscription service for
  Microsoft Offi ce that costs from
  £5.99 a month.


• Amazon Prime Photos
  Unlimited photos, 5GB of videos
  £7.99 a month
  Amazon off ers unlimited automatic
  photo backups from Android
  and iPhone, plus PC or Mac via a
  browser or desktop apps, as part
  of its Prime subscription, which
  starts at £7.99 a month. The phone
  apps allow you to organise, search,
  edit and share photos. Up to 5GB
  of videos are also backed up, with
  extra storage available for a fee.
  Prime Photos integrates with
  Alexa smart displays such as the
  Amazon’s Echo Show line , turning
  them into good-looking digital
  photo frames.

Local backups

If you want to back up your

photos for free without using the

cloud, manually storing them on

a computer or external drive is

another option. You can transfer

photos to your computer from your

phone by plugging it in via USB , as

you would a storage drive. From

there you can transfer them to an

external drive for safekeeping. We

recommend storing them in at least

two locations in case of theft or fi re.

For enthusiasts and pros

If you are looking for a place to

show off your photos, there are

cloud photo services geared more

towards enthusiasts or professional

photographers that off er hosting

with a portal to show them publicly

or license them for use.

Adobe’s Creative Cloud off ers the

Lightroom photo development app

and 1TB of cloud storage for £9.98 a

month. SmugMug off ers unlimited

photo storage, a personalised photo

site and desktop and mobile apps

for $11 (£8.79) a month. SmugMug-

owned Flickr off ers storage for

1,000 photos for free, with 50 kept

private and the rest made public,

or unlimited photo storage from

£6.99 a month. 500px is another

alternative that promotes licensing

of photos for money, with free

accounts limited to seven uploads

a week and unlimited accounts

starting at $6.49 a month.

 Photos can take us back to

memorable moments, so it’s worth

making sure they are stored securely

PHOTOGRAPH: PANTHER MEDIA/ALAMY

What about videos?

Most cloud photo backup services

support videos, too, but the size of

video fi les quickly eats into your

storage limits. Videos shot in 4K at

60 frames a second on an iPhone,

for instance, require about 400MB

a minute or about 90MB if reduced

to 1080p resolution.

Some backup services have

restrictions on the size or quality of

the video, or options to compress

it to save space. Local backup

or large general-purpose cloud

storage drives can off er cheaper

alternatives for manual backing up

of lots of videos.

Printing options

It can be nice to have cherished

photos in a physical form. The

most popular options include

6x4in (10x15cm) single prints

and  photobooks.

Some of the photo backup fi rms

have printing services but for those

that do not there are many online

or in-store alternatives. You can

print from your computer, phone,

camera or memory card with most.

Snapfi sh off ers individual prints

costing from 10p or photobooks

Award-winning Guardian

photographer David Levene off ers

tips on how to get a good picture:

• Get closer: Be bold and get
  close to your subject, rather than
  shooting from afar – that may
  either make your subject too
  insignifi cant in the frame, or mean
  that unwanted elements creep in to
  your composition. If you’re super
  close, then try using wide angle
  lenses, which might make your
  images feel more dynamic. Get
  creative with shooting angles: see
  how your subject looks from down
  low or fi nd a high vantage point
  to shoot down from. Check out
  alternative points of view rather
  than just accepting what you see
  before you.


• See the light: As obvious as it
  sounds it’s worth remembering
  that photography is dependent
  on light and, in general, good-
  quality light will help you to
  produce more impactful imagery.
  Sure, golden hour (the period
  just after sunrise or just before
  sunset) can be beautiful, but
  you might fi nd more interesting
  conditions just before sunrise
  or after sunset, as the blue
  evening shade mixes with the
  orange and yellow of glows of
  urban night-lighting.


• Shoot on manual: If you are
  using a standalone camera see
  if you can operate it on fully
  manual, or semi-automatic
  modes, and experiment with
  diff erent apertures and shutter
  speeds. Soften the background
  (if you are relatively close to
  your subject) by shooting with
  a wide aperture, such as f2.8.
  Experiment with long shutter

speeds, perhaps even moving

the camera while exposing your

photograph, to see what kind of

results you can get. If you are using

a phone camera, you should be able

to switch off the automatic fl ash,

and may be able to override other

settings, too.

• Get good glass: Invest
  in better lenses to see an
  immediate improvement in
  your photographs. Beyond the
  “kit” lenses that might come as
  standard with your camera, you’ll
  fi nd better contrast and sharpness
  with fi xed focal length or better-
  quality zoom lenses. “Fast”
  lenses (those that achieve a wider
  aperture) will also allow you to
  shoot more eff ectively in lower
  light conditions.


• Shoot in raw: All modern
  DSLR and mirrorless cameras
  (and even some smartphones)
  will allow you to shoot raw fi les

How to take photos worth keeping

An expert’s advice

▲ Cewe’s photobooks are one way to

get your favourite pictures into print

▲ David Levene advises people to get

closer when taking photos, as he did

for this shot of Bono at Glastonbury

PHOTOGRAPH: DAVID LEVENE/THE GUARDIAN

get a book with a photo, or photos,

on each page, and no bells and

whistles.

The customised options mean

putting in more time to choose and

arrange your photos. Many services

off er diff erent themes or framing

options, from simple white borders

to fancy designs based on the

season or events such as holidays.

You upload your photos, crop and

move them between boxes on the

page, and add captions and titles.

Framing your work

Digital photo frames display a

rotating slideshow of your photos.

They come in various sizes and

capabilities, with the cheapest

models starting at about £55.

However, be warned, even more

expensive ones are hamstrung by

poor interfaces and diffi culties in

making photos fi t properly.

If you use either Google or

Amazon’s photo backup solutions,

their smart displays, which start

at as little as £50, make better

digital photo frames that can show

curated or automated selections of

your snaps and provide many more

features for the price.

from £10 plus delivery. Cewe

specialises in photobooks from

£5.99 plus shipping and also runs

Boots’s photo-printing services.

Snappy Snaps off ers in-store and

online photo printing from 65p for

a single photo. Max Spielmann runs

Tesco’s photo services and off ers

similar, from 35p for singles or from

£15 for photobooks. Many larger

supermarkets have photo-printing

kiosks, too, for instant prints. Most

services off er bulk rates, if you are

printing hundreds of photos.

The best photobook services give

you the option to create one with

only a few clicks or spend hours

customising one. If you go for the

simplest version, you will typically

(such as CR2, NEF or DNG). These

retain far more information than

Jpegs, which compress fi les by

discarding information and detail.

You’ll need more memory card

space and hard drive storage,

but your images will have far

more scope when it comes to

processing them.

• Give your pics a pep: Experiment
  with some of the basic adjustment
  tools in programmes such as
  Photoshop, Lightroom or Capture
  One to fi nd ways to enhance your
  images. Tools such as exposure,
  shadow detail (HDR), clarity and
  vignetting can do wonders for
  your photographs (particularly
  if you’re shooting in raw). Don’t
  overdo it, though.