A tip for those of you for whom this is new: about the iPhone.

I use my iPhone camera rather more than I was expecting I would.

Even though I would not want to publish the pictures I take with it, I do take pictures, and then edit them with Chase Jarvis’s Best Camera app.

Why?

• To remember things. Like printed directions, or a bill, or a product I want to buy, or a URL I want to remember. Snap snap: and I have it forever. Easier than writing.
• To remember student comments like the following from last week (OK, I apologize profusely for blowing my own trumpet but I think since this blog is a free resource, at least I am allowed to do this every now and then. Right?):

Michael Willems Reference

• Importantly, to geotag. Whenever you take an iPhone picture, the iPhone embeds the location it was taken at. So for each shoot, I do a quick pic like that to remember exactly where I was.
• To recall where a client wants me to take a shot. To recall a great shoot location for an upcoming portrait. One snap and the exact location is forever memorised.
• To track a trip. A snap every hour during a road trip, and like Hansel and Gretel, I memorise a trail for later recollection or blogging.
• To recall a vendor location.
• To store a portrait snap to go with address book records.

Like many of these tools the real use only becomes apparent later, when bright people start to think of even better uses. Use your iPhone camera and tell me why and how you use it.

POSTSCRIPT: Can you geotag even when you have no data plan? Yes! You do not see a map, but that does not matter. Your iPhone knows where it is because of the built-in GPS. That needs no data plan.