The theme of the last Mobiography Photo Challenge was ‘Nature’. From an amazing collection of images that were submitted to this photo challenge, the photos in this weeks showcase were pain-stakingly selected. These photos illustrate how the photographers have approached the subject of nature. Whether it is capturing a wide landscape vista or a close cropped or macro photo of autumn leaves or flowers.

Featured photographers this week include: Nicoloas Xanthos, Kathleen Weber, Joseph Cyr, Arturo Lopez, Amo Passicos, Ana Carolina Silva, @di.monheit19, @eikihosomi, @heidiloevdal, Jason Bloom, Jill Lian, Paule Briere, Debbie Rawson, Rosie Karel, Maciek Pakosh, Elaine Taylor, Joel Worthington, @vollygda, Maria Rebelo, and Mike Christoff.

Take part in the next Mobiography photo challenge

This week I have noticed that the colours are changing and autumn is starting to set in, so for that reason, the theme for the next challenge will be ‘Autumn’. For this challenge think about sharing your best mobile photos that capture the theme of autumn, it’s vibrant colours and the changing of the season. Think landscapes, leaves, wrapping up warm and the colours.

To enter the challenge simply start sharing your best images on the theme of ‘Autumn’ that were taken and edited with a smartphone by using the hashtag #mobiography_challenge_44 on Instagram.

The best ones will be featured in the next photo challenge showcase, so get sharing now.

Join the Mobiography Facebook Group

Mobiography has just setup a Facebook Group as a place where the Mobiography community can chat and interact, share your photos, ideas, tips and news. Head over to Facebook and join the group, introduce yourself, share some of your images, and leave some comments on other people’s photos.

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Mobiography Photo Challenge: 20 Beautiful Nature Inspired Smartphone Photos 1

Untitled‘ by Nicoloas Xanthos – “With many peaks and trails, the region of Charlevoix, Quebec, is a paradise for hiking. For a year, I greatly enjoy discovering, and of course taking pictures. This photo was taken at the famous “Acropole des Draveurs”, which overlooks the Malbaie River. The landscape is absolutely amazing, with the river below and the surrounding mountains. Moreover, the day was a bit cloudy, so the light was constantly changing.

It’s not always easy to make an interesting picture of this kind of landscape, which is almost more an experience than a spectacle. The composition is important in this photo, because it divides the space and makes perceptible its size: the rocks in the foreground, the river below, the mountains in the distance. And the colors mark this space: the dark red of the foreground, the green / yellow around the river, the bluish tones of the background. I finally get the impression that the force of the natural elements is also noticeable in the rocks in the foreground.

I edited the light and the tones in Lightroom and VSCO. A final touch of Snapseed made visible some details of the photo.”

I knew I loved you before I met you…

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I knew I loved you before I met you…‘ by Kathleen Weber – “I took this photo during our vacation in Oregon this year. The first place we went after landing in Portland was to the coast. I had only ever seen pictures, and I was already half in love from those alone, even though I’m not a “beach person” by nature. But, as soon as I stood on that beach and looked out at that quiet and still, solitary giant surrounded by the constant movement of the ocean, I was completely enthralled. The magical beauty of the Oregon Coast is hard to truly capture in words or even photographs. The beauty of it is really an emotion, and you have to be there to feel it in order to really understand it. The photo was taken with the iPhoneX native app and edited in Snapseed. ”

The humble desert thistle

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The humble desert thistle‘ by Joseph Cyr – “I took this photo while on a hike in the late spring. The humble desert thistle is a common enough wildflower, but all wildflowers in the desert are always a treat. Scenes like this always make me think of those words by poet William Blake: “To see a world in a grain of sand, and a heaven in a wild flower hold infinity, in the palm of your hand, and eternity in an hour…”

I took this with my iPhoneX, using the snapseed app to isolate the bloom from its background. Studio close-ups of flowers are always striking, but for wildflowers, that’s almost impossible. With the snapseed app, using the ‘select’ tool to gradually desaturate and darken the surroundings, you can achieve almost the same effect as isolating flowers against a black background indoors.”

C a t a r a t a s

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C a t a r a t a s‘ by Arturo Lopez – “This waterfall is located in Triberg, in the Black Forest region in Germany. To get the sense of movement of the water I had activated the live photo option in my iPhone and tried to keep hands frozen during the shot. Little editing in Snapseed and voilà.”

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Untitled‘ by Amo Passicos – “This picture is part of a floral series, using cut flowers or flowers from garbage, mainly from cemetaries. Given them a second life.”

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Untitled‘ by Ana Carolina Silva – “The Huayhuash Mountain Range is located in the south of Huaraz, in Peru, and I got to know it for sheltering the Siula Grande (6.344m), which is the scene of an almost tragedy narrated in Joe Simpson’s book, as well as in the film “Touching the Void”.

On the first day we had a long trip to the Cuartelwain camp (4.100m). The night was sleepless and under heavy rain, which made our first day trekking harder. At dawn, in that Andean cold, we faced mud, rocks and a trail with slopes greater than 40° to reach the highest point, the Paso Qaqanan (4.750m), just to be in awe with this image.
The majesty of nature around us is breathtaking. It is worth facing any difficulty for such landscapes!””

Moody skies

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Moody skies‘ by @di.monheit19

One way to go

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one way to go‘ by @eikihosomi – “With this photograph, I felt it had a story with characteristics on a big scale so I felt the need to photograph it. I wanted to express the leadership of the woman.

I took this photograph with my iPhoneX and Moment wide lens and Procam app. The editing app was Lightroom and VSCO app.”

Things you come across in Norway

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Things you come across in Norway‘ by @heidiloevdal – “I came across this amazing “treehouse” while I was on Christmas vacation in the mountains of Hemsedal in Norway. In the car, on our way to go cross-country skiing we passed this spectacular house and I could barely believe my own eyes and luck and shouted “stop”! Making sure we had no cars behind us on this small country road, we made a short stop so that I could snap a shot from my car window. A small adjustment in Snapseed and this was ready to go in Instagram, becoming one if my absolute favourite pics. I recently saw a fall shot of the house so it still stands. It has apparently become a very popular sight for photographers. No wonder!”

In bloom

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In bloom‘ by Jason Bloom – “I don’t have a very exciting story about the inspiration for the photo. I took it as I was walking past while at my job as I do most of my photos. I have only been seriously putting work into developing my photography skills since the beginning of this year, I think this was part of one of those steps. I suspect everyone goes through an evolution of their style. I started capturing close up shots of flowers, realizing that it isn’t always important to include the entirety of the subject as the whole can be inferred from a part. I’m sure I captured dozens of images of the type of flower, but this one stands out to me because of the details and the 3D effect caused by the shadows and perspective. It was taken with my iPhone SE, and I did the post-processing in Snapseed. ”

Spiderweb decorations

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Spiderweb decorations‘ by Jill Lian – “I was sad that my Zinnia flowers were being taken over by this spiderweb. I then noticed the reflection in the dewdrops and was quite pleased! I think the fading Zinnias gave just the right mood and reflection.

I used my iPhone 7 Plus with an olloclip macro lens attachment. This shot was taken through the Hipstamatic app. I then used Mextures to soften the look. ”

Fallen angel

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Fallen angel‘ by Paule Briere – “Bird bones are part of the natural life cycle, but on a metaphorical level, I see those as a symbol of how the dreams of the last century (aka Jonathan Livingstone) are now being drag down by ecological concerns.

I often move my finds onto a better background but this one would have been destroyed so I only cleaned around. Then I took some shots with my iPhone 6 then did some basic Instagram editing to sharpen the definition. ”

Autumn reflections

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Autumn reflections‘ by Debbie Rawson – “This photo was taken on an iPhone 7+ and edited in Snapseed. I was with my family kayaking on a beautiful autumn day in New Hampshire and was drawn to this tree and the reflections shown in the water. I thought it would be a good illustration of nature in New Hampshire.”

Dressed in POWerful pollen

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Dressed in POWerful pollen‘ by Rosie Karel – “I live in a beach town in North County San Diego. The change of seasons are subtle here as contrasted to the midwest where I grew up. Finally our weather had started to shift slightly and it was getting a bit cooler. As the saying goes, “Fall was in the air”. I was out looking to capture some images of autumn and I walked past this small house with a front yard full of all types of sunflowers. Sunflowers always reminded me of autumn. Some were just budding, some had already faded and then this amazing welcoming fully opened sunflower caught my attention. As I studied this flower contemplating angles and perspectives to shoot, the honey bee flew over and landing right on it. Of course I knew then, the shot had to be a macro so that I could capture him too. The bee had been very busy gathering pollen and was laden with the golden dust so he was quite cooperative as I moved in closer, focused and snapped away.

Shot with an iPhone 6s using Camera+ macro. Slight crop and tuning done in Snapseed.”

Sheepfighter

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Sheepfighter‘ by Maciek Pakosh

A little bit of Autumn

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A little bit of Autumn‘ by Elaine Taylor – “I took this shot on day 263 of my 365 Hipstamatic project. I’d been walking with a friend and found myself looking down at the fallen leaves. I picked up a few that caught my eye up and carried them home. I lay them out on a piece of white paper on the table to decide what to do with them, then realised I quite liked how they looked just as they were. After a little adjustment to fit them in to a square frame, I stood above on the table and took a the shot with my iPhoneX through Hipstamatic, settling on an Anne-Marie/Irom 2000 combo. I absolutely love Autumn and it’s wonderful colours.”

Destiny

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Destiny‘ by Joel Worthington – “This image is from a famous spot near Point Reyes, California just north of the San Francisco Bay Area. It’s a shipwreck that I had seen many times on Instagram and knew I had to check out since we were going to be on vacation nearby. I actually took this picture at dusk on a scouting trip to the site right as we were arriving to our destination (I spent more time there the next morning at dawn). There was a photographer just off to the right of this crop who was creating long exposure images, and I didn’t want to interfere by getting too close. So, I settled for this more distant yet dream-like shot with some long exposure of my own on my iPhone. I edited in VSCO and Lightroom to emphasize the dream-like atmosphere.”

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Untitled‘ by @vollygda

Beauty in Aging

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Beauty in Aging‘ by Maria Rebelo – “The second law of thermodynamics says that entropy grows over time, that disorder is ever increasing. I see this law at work in living beings. Time replaces evenness with irregularity, vibrancy with grayness, ease with tension. While the results are unappealing to some, I see in the old the clay of youth shaped by the chaotic marks of time. And in that disorder, I find beauty.”

The image was shot with my iPhoneX. I only did a few adjustments on Instagram; used the Clarendon filter, increased structure and shadows and decreased highlights.

Quakies in Autumn

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Quakies in Autumn‘ by Mike Christoff – “Hiking in the Wasatch Mountains of Northern Utah is my place to recharge and in breathe in all things nature. Fall at this elevation is short lived, so I get out when I can. I am always in awe with the Quaking aspens. So, I am always looking up. I got up close and low with this shot, looking up as their brilliant yellows danced agains the deep September blue skies. I used Snapseed to as my post editing tool and added a splash of Mextures to add an emulsion effect of an old polaroid.

(Fun factoid: A grove of quaking aspens in Utah is the largest known living thing on Earth. Nearly 50,000 stems protrude from a single root system. The entire organism covers over 100 acres and weighs 6,000 tons.) ”

Don’t forget…

The theme for the next challenge is ‘Autumn’. For this challenge think about sharing your best mobile photos that capture the theme of autumn, it’s vibrant colours and the changing of the season.

To enter the challenge simply start sharing your best images on the theme of ‘Autumn’ that were taken and edited with a smartphone by using the hashtag #mobiography_challenge_44 on Instagram.

The best ones will be featured in the next photo challenge showcase, so get sharing now.

Join the Mobiography Facebook Group

If you haven’t already done so, follow Mobiography on Instagram and hashtag your photos with #mobiography. Don’t forget to sign up to the Mobiography email list to get the latest news and updates direct to your inbox.

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