Why your camera does not matter (to some point)

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You most likely heard the adage that your camera does not matter, and that you can take beautiful photos with any device. Though when you see somebody with a big camera and a thousand dollar lens you think, "Of course every photo he takes is going to look amazing". And this is understandable. There are far more awesome photos taken with incredibly expensive cameras than remarkable photos taken with smartphones. But what matters the most is skill. When you are skilled, you are more likely to buy an expensive camera because you know your needs.

In our case, photographing nudes, you will do just fine with a very basic camera and in some cases even with your cell phone. The photos above illustrate that point. One is taken with a $2000 professional camera, one with $400 advanced compact camera, and one with a Galaxy Nexus smartphone. All of the photos are straight out of the camera without editing. I’ve posted them in reverse order. That means that the first photo was taken with a cellphone! And here it looks better: the skin tones appear more alive. This teaches us several things. First, if you have a beautiful model properly posed and well lit, the photo will look good even if you do snap it with your phone. Second, you have to understand the settings of your camera in order to get better results. Third, you must know the limitations of the camera you are using. Let's talk about those limitations.

Cellphone/smartphone
1. It takes terrible photos when there's not enough light. Dusk or indoors with poor lighting - forget it. The image will be covered with excessive digital noise and you have to stay incredibly steady to take a photo that is not blurry. If you have a flash, use it only if you have to capture something you absolutely have to: don't try to shoot portraits or nudes with flash.
2. The resolution isn’t very good, even if it is 8 megapixels or more. If you want to print it in a large format or crop it, you will be disappointed - cellphone lenses are terrible.
3. Usually you have just one option: wide angle shooting, and it's bad when shooting people. Wide angle lenses that are used in cellphones are good for shooting landscapes or interiors. Essentially, they allow you to capture a wider view without moving back. But when you shoot people close up, you will see how some parts of their bodies or faces are comically exaggerated. You can see that on the cellphone photo above: one buttock looks larger than  the other because of the distortion. We will cover this later but for now, just keep it in mind.
4. Everything is in focus. It makes shooting easier but takes away some artistic control.



Point and shoot camera
1. Still not very good in low light situations
2. Lenses are not always high quality
3. Has troubles focusing, especially in low light situations.
4. Usually has very limited settings


SLR camera
1. Big
2. Heavy
3. Expensive
4. Requires quite a bit of knowledge to operate properly

The bottom line here is that if you want to shoot professional quality photos and are willing to learn, get an SLR. Otherwise you are making a good start with a point and shoot camera or in extreme cases even with a cellphone.