I first came across the work of Tania Konnerth in the Mobiography Flickr Group. There was something unique and different about her style of iPhone photography which strikes a balance between macro photography, painterly styled abstract imagery. I was keen to find out more about Tania’s work and her approach to the macro photography images she takes with her iPhone.
Tania is an author. When she isn’t writing books, creating self teaching courses or running different websites she is indulging her passion for photography.
“I am not a professional photographer, my photography background is simply passion, but I am taking photos for over 25 years now. I started 1989 with my first reflex camera (a Ricoh), continued with several Nikons (currently I am still shooting with my D90) and since 2011 with the iPhone.
For quite a long time I was taking pics just for myself, presenting them only on my private website. This year I took my first steps into showing them to more people. In June I created a Flickr-account for my iphoneography and since then I was featured several times on The App Whisperer, iPhoneography Central, Art of MOB and on your wonderful site! Every time this happens I am giddy with excitement, because it makes me so happy that others like what I do. And so I am over the moon that you invited me to this interview.”
How were you first introduced to iPhone photography?
In summer 2011 I took over a used iPhone 3 and it was love at first sight. I immediately started taking pics with Hipstamatic and was totally fascinated with all the possibilities of it and other apps, too. I searched the internet for websites, mags and tutorials about mobile photography (there weren’t that many 2011) and built up a pretty big app-collection over the years. Today, there is almost no day without me shooting at least some pics with my iPhone.
What inspires you to take photos with your iPhone?
Honestly everything. For me that’s the best thing about iPhoneography, that I literally can take pics everywhere from everything I see.
How would you describe your style and approach to your photography?
I am a free spirit and I love variety. So I do not want to restrict myself to just taking a special kind of photos or restrict myself on motives or genres. Therefore I would say, that I do not have a special style.
But I do have themes, which are more prominent than others.
One is nature. I am a passionate lover of nature and I am always blown away by the beauty of it. My goal is to detect things, many people might never see, revealing small and precious objects, discover hidden beauty and treasures. There is so much to find!
Another big part of my iPhoneography is a much more experimental one and it concerns feelings. From my very first steps into iPhoneography I was drawn into experimenting with photos of myself in order to explore, understand an express my moods and feelings and finding out who I really am. I don’t like the word “selfies” very much, because it suggests something light and shallow, and that is not what I am experiencing and intending with my self-portraits. They are a way of seriously and deeply confronting and exploring myself and this seems to touch and move people who see these photos and let them feel, too.
Your work makes good use of macro photography and features flowers as a strong theme. What draws you to these subjects?
I love beautiful things, colors and liveliness and as I said before I love to find beauty in things you normally don’t really see. Macro photography leads us into a often unknown world and this is what I want to show with my photos.
Do you use any lenses or other equipment to capture your macro images?
Yes, for my macros I am using the olloclip-lense, a fabulous possibility to explore the small and tiny worlds around us, like plants, insects or structures.
What apps do you use and what is the post production process you follow to create the images you capture?
All my iphoneography photo I exclusively create on my iPhone. I enjoy taking and editing the pics on the same device.
Almost all my photos I am taking with Hipstamatic. Sometimes I force myself to use the native cam of the iPhone, but this doesn’t really work for me.
Half of the time I do not edit the Hipstamatic prints because I like them the way they are.
But just as much I do use several apps in order to create more artistic pictures. My favorite apps are Distressed FX, Snapseed, Laminar (former IrisFotoSuite), Repix, Blender, Diana, Decim8, LoMob, Glaze, BlendTextures and Mextures. I just love to play with all the possibilities and I am always amazed where I do get with them. They make pics possible which I always wanted to create.
Are the any other iPhone photographers that have influenced or inspired you?
I am inspired by so many photos, because there is so much creativity out there in the world of mobile photography! So it’s hard to pick only some inspiring photographers, but I love the self portraits made by Susan Tuttle, the mysterious scenes made by Eloïse Capet or the expressive portraits taken by Paula Gardner and many, many more.
What advice would you give to those who are new to iPhone photography?
Take in as many inspirations you can get, have no fear to experiment and take photos of what you really love, even the theme might not be popular, your love will make your pics special.
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