CAMERA SELECTIONS

BEST CAMERAS FOR SAFARI UNDER $300

1. Panasonic Lumix ZS50: This camera is a great choice for safari travel because of its 30x optical zoom lens and built-in Wi-Fi connectivity. It can shoot Full HD 1080p videos at 60fps and has a built-in viewfinder for better composition.

2. Canon PowerShot SX620 HS: This camera has a 25x optical zoom lens and built-in Wi-Fi connectivity. It can shoot Full HD 1080p videos at 30fps and has a 3-inch LCD screen for easy framing.

3. Nikon COOLPIX B500: This camera has a 40x optical zoom lens and built-in Wi-Fi connectivity. It can shoot Full HD 1080p videos at 30fps and has a 3-inch tilting LCD screen for easy framing.

4. Sony Cyber-shot DSC-HX80: This camera has a 30x optical zoom lens and built-in Wi-Fi connectivity. It can shoot Full HD 1080p videos at 60fps and has a 3-inch tilting LCD screen for easy framing.

Taking the best Camera Photos

1. Focus on one subject. Many of the best photos include just one, interesting subject. So when taking a picture of one, spend some extra time setting up the shot. Some professional photographers say that the subject shouldn’t fill the entire frame, and that two-thirds of the photo should be negative space — that helps the subject stand out even more. to ensure that it’s focused and the lighting is optimized.

Pro Tip: Once you’ve taken your photo, you can use filters and apps to make the subject even more vivid, or to crop it to frame the subject correctly. The brightness, contrast, and saturation of the photo can also be adjusted accordingly — all from your phone.

2. Embrace negative space. “Negative space” simply refers to the areas around and between the subjects of an image — and it can take a photo from “good” to “great.”
When you include a lot of empty space in a photo, your subject will stand out more and evoke a stronger reaction from your viewer. And what does negative space looks like? It’s often a large expanse of open sky, an empty field, a large wall, or water.

3.Play with reflections. There’s something so idyllic about seeing the sky reflected in a body of water. There’s a reason why we love seeing that — our eyes are drawn to reflections. So look for opportunities to play with them in photos.
There are plenty of out-of-the-box places to find reflections — puddles, larger bodies of water, mirrors, sunglasses, drinking glasses, and metallic surfaces are just a few.

4. Use leading lines. In some photos, there’s a line that draws the viewer’s eye toward a certain part of the frame. Those are called leading lines. They can be straight or circulinear — think staircases, building facades, train tracks, roads, or even a path through the woods.
Leading lines are great for creating a sense of depth in an image, and can make your photo look purposefully designed — even if you just happened to come upon a really cool shape by accident.

5. Use natural light. It’s hard to find a great smartphone photo that was taken with a flash. Most of the time, they make a photo look overexposed, negatively altering colors and making human subjects look washed out. In fact, even the iPhone 7’s flash is rumored to have some flaws.
Take advantage of the sources of natural light you can find, even after dark. This gives you a chance to play with shadows, like in the second image below, or create a silhouette with other ambient sources of light, like traffic and surrounding buildings.
Once you’ve taken the photo, play with the “Exposure” tool in your favorite photo editing app to see if you can make the image slightly brighter, without making it too grainy.

6. Set your camera app’s exposure manually. Another mobile camera feature you’ll want to set manually is your exposure. Tapping your screen when your phone’s camera is on doesn’t just refocus the lens on a new subject — it also automatically adjusts how much light the camera lets in. This, too, won’t always look just right. It’s best to adjust it by hand.
To change your mobile camera’s exposure by hand, open your camera app and tap the screen. When you see the lens refocus, you’ll see a very small sun icon and a vertical scale. Slowly swipe your finger up and down this scale to adjust the light level.

7.Avoid zooming in. When you take a photo from a distance, it’s tempting to zoom in on something specific you’re trying to capture. But it’s actually better not to zoom in — doing so can make the photo appear grainy, blurry, or pixelated.
Instead, try to get closer to your subject — unless it’s a wild animal, in which case we would advise keeping your distance — or take the photo from a default distance, and crop it later on. That way, you won’t compromise quality, and it’s easier to play around or optimize a larger image.