Business owner looking to justify the cost of a new iPhone 7 Plus to your partner (business, or domestic) or yourself? Apple’s new Portrait Mode, now in public beta via iOS 10.1, might be the feature that makes the 7 Plus worth the upgrade. Yes, even if you currently own a perfectly-respectable iPhone 6.
Portrait Mode mimics the look of a DSLR portrait shot with a telephoto lens, utilizing sophisticated software and two-camera configuration of the 7 Plus to create a pleasing background blur, while the subject of your shot is isolated in sharp focus. Simply put, this gives your images a more polished, professional look (and unlike a DSLR, the 7 Plus saves both a Portrait mode and standard version of your shot, should you wish to compare the two).
Why does this make the iPhone 7 Plus a business expense? Social media, of course. Portrait Mode isn’t only for shooting people. It’s equally good at adding a little professional polish to product shots and other set-ups with a foreground object worth focusing in on. If you’re doing social media in-house, the iPhone 7 makes a lot of sense.
Photo Credit: 9to5Mac.com
For considerably less than the $769 price tag of the 7 Plus you can, of course, pick up a perfectly decent used DSLR and a few lenses (Canon’s consumer-level Rebel line is currently in its T5s incarnation. A used T2i or T3i can be had for as little as $200-300 on Amazon. Pair it with the 50mm F/1.8 lens, for less than $100 and you’ve got a decent set-up for true shallow depth-of-field shots).
What a DSLR won’t do is fit inside your pocket, or provide you with the same speed, convenience and flexibility in terms of uploading directly to your social accounts, though current camera models increasingly feature wifi capabilities.
Portrait Mode should make for better social posts, whether you’re a restaurateur uploading a shot of the day’s special to Facebook, a start-up posting behind-the-scenes pics on Instagram, or a craftsperson showing your latest jewelry creations on Instagram or Pinterest. And if your staff are your businesses USP, here’s one way to make them look good, while they make you look good.
It’s hard to overstate the importance of utilizing good visuals on social media. Twitter, for example, claim that posts with images or video are three times more likely to draw engagement than posts without (source). Half of teens are on photo-centric Instagram (source). 44% of women online spend time on Pinterest (source).
We live in a show-don’t-tell world, and these kind of statistics will be important when justifying that iPhone 7 Plus purchase, whether you’re doing so to your business partner, or twisting your own arm at the Apple store.
Looking to take your social media content to the next level? Give Kiosk a call.