Abstract Photography

How to do it with a smartphone: 

1. Find a cool staircase, a brick wall, or the corner of a building. 

2. Open your phone camera and tap the 2x or 3x zoom button (or pinch to zoom slightly) so you only see the lines and shapes, not the whole building. 

3. Look up! Pointing your camera straight up the side of a building or into a curved ceiling creates awesome, confusing angles. 

4. Tap the screen on a bright area to adjust the exposure (brightness) so the shadows look deep and dramatic. 

The Idea: If you get close enough to a flower or a leaf, it stops looking like a plant and starts looking like a strange new world. You begin to notice the weird textures, tiny veins, and smooth curves instead of just the flower itself.

• How to do it with a smartphone:

  1. Find a colorful flower or a large leaf.

  2. Move your phone very close to the plant. If your phone has a Macro Mode (usually a little flower icon that pops up automatically on newer phones), let it activate.

  3. If it gets blurry, you are too close! Back up just an inch and tap your screen on the petal or leaf vein to lock the focus.

  4. Fill the entire screen with just one part of the plant so no background grass or dirt is visible.

(Remember you can crop the image to find that perfect abstract image)

The Idea: Patterns are everywhere! You probably have dozens of them around your house—like a radiator grill, a stack of books, a wire fence, or fabric texture. Repeating shapes make for incredibly eye-catching abstract art.

• How to do it with a smartphone:

  1. Go on a "pattern hunt" around your house or school. Look for things that repeat (like rows of tiles, keyboard keys, or the texture of a woven basket).

  2. Hold your phone completely flat and parallel to the pattern to keep the lines straight.

  3. Turn on your camera’s Grid Lines in the settings. Use the lines on your screen to make sure the pattern is perfectly lined up and square.

  4. Crop tightly so the pattern fills all four corners of the photo, making it look like it goes on forever.

The Idea: Water is one of the best tools for abstract photography. Instead of taking a picture of a lake or a puddle, you focus only on the squiggly, distorted reflection of things inside the water.

• How to do it with a smartphone:

  1. Find a puddle on a rainy day, a swimming pool, or even a shiny car hood.

  2. Look for a colorful reflection in the water (like a neon sign, trees, or a building).

  3. Crouch down low and get your smartphone camera lens close to the surface of the water.

  4. Tap your phone screen directly on the reflection to focus on it, rather than the bottom of the puddle. Take the shot when a breeze creates ripples in the water to make it look like an oil painting.

5. Intentional Camera Movement (ICM)

The Idea: Usually, we try to keep our phones completely still when taking a photo. With ICM, you do the exact opposite! You purposely move your phone while taking the picture to turn lights and colors into beautiful, blurry streaks.

• How to do it with a smartphone:

  1. Find a place with bright colors or lights, like a tree line at sunset or city lights at night.

  2. If your phone has a "Pro" or "Manual" mode, switch to it and set the shutter speed to something slow (like 1/4 or 1/2 a second). If you don't have this, you can use iPhone's Live Photo mode or download a free long-exposure app.

  3. Press the shutter button and immediately jiggle, twist, or pan your phone in a straight line.

  4. Experiment with different movements—smooth upward sweeps create cool vertical light trails, while spinning the phone creates a neat whirlpool effect!