How to take great snowboarding pics with the Nokia Lumia 920

Snowboarding legend Seth Wescott once said, “In snowboarding, there’s a huge focus on style. It’s the aesthetic that draws us in. It’s this which also makes it so appealing  to photographers. But how do you go about capturing all that awesomeness on a Nokia Lumia 920? One person who knows better than most is Stefanie Suchy, a photographer who recently won the Noka x Burton competition. Part of her prize was to jet off to Vail, Colorado, to photograph the Burton US Open Snowboarding Championship on her Nokia Lumia 920. Now she shares her tips on how to take snowboarding photos that rock.

Trust the automatic settings

“Don’t worry if you’re used to controlling everything on your DSLR. The automatics on the Nokia Lumia 920 camera are super fast and trustworthy. Even though I shot in some terrible conditions for automatic cameras, white snow and black jackets, concerts, dark parties, I didn’t have one picture that was under or overexposed. And I took eight hundred.”

Shoot from the hip and the head

“Once you learn to rely on the camera, it actually becomes an advantage that it has automatic settings. You stop wasting time looking for technical stuff and instead you just shoot! I was shooting from my hips or with the camera above my head. And even if though there were times when the photos missed a part, or the flash wasn’t strong enough to freeze the movement at a party, I still managed to catch the great moments I’d have missed setting up my DSLR camera.”

Experiment with low light and apps

“It has such an impressive camera that it’s easy to forget it’s a phone. Especially in low light moments it really captures the atmosphere, and it’s great for sports because it’s fast and shake-free. Plus it has some fun apps like the Burton Sequencer, which is a great tool for board sports of all kinds. Experiment with all these.”

Go wide and close

“I love wide-angle pictures, and luckily the Nokia Lumia 920 has a great wide-angle format that allows you to showcase the atmosphere and the surroundings. However, you can still get really, really close. Try to get as close as possible and then tip on the screen on the area you want to focus on. The closer you are the more blurry the background, which makes the shot look really pro. Yet because of the wide angle you don’t need to sacrifice the atmosphere, which is great.”

Keep in the fast lane

“When you’re trying to capture moments when riders are shooting past, make sure you already have the camera button pressed half way down. The camera’s even faster then as it’s already focused. This gives you the chance to capture the exact moment and perfect image of a rider flying by.”

You only have to look at Stef’s stunning shots to see she knows what’s she talking about. But what tips do you have for extreme Lumia 920 photography? As ever we’d love hear them in the comments below.