IPhoneographer Brendan Ó Sé has won the 2015 Mira Mobile Prize. The award honors the best images taken and edited with mobile devices.  In 2014 Ó Sé was profiled in a video by Glen Mulcahy and featured in a MobileMovieMaking magazine post.

The theme of this year’s Mira Mobile Prize  competition was “Streets of the World.” Irish-based  Ó Sé won with a shot taken in Copenhagen.

 

The Mira Mobile Prize is sponsored by the MIRA Forum Gallery in Portugal. You can see all the short list entries from this year and from 2014 here.

MobileMovieMaking magazine focuses on motion pictures, so why cover the Mira competition”? The answer is simple. There is plenty of evidence that one of the best ways to become a creative cinematographer is to study—and shoot—still photographs. Owners of mobile devices, who generally carry a high quality camera with them, have the opportunity to sharpen their photographic eyes every day.

Thanks to the Internet, you can easily find first-rate instruction whether you’re a novice or an advanced still photographer. For example, the iPhone Photography School, offers beautifully illustrated tutorials on general subjects such as lighting and color, and specific subjects such as capturing dramatic skies and taking self-portraits. In a piece titled “Six Ways to Improve your iPhone Street Photography” mobile photographer Mark Hemmings covers scale, shadows, reflections, humor, juxtaposition, panning (yes—while taking a still photo), and converting color images to black and white. All of these techniques can be used by a cinematographer looking to add sizzle to a shot, scene, or movie.