I am someone who absolutely, unequivocally hates using a smartphone for travel photography.

I think smartphone photos usually come out over saturated, blurry or pixelly (if you dare try and enlarge them) and they also have a kind of ‘unreal’ quality to them.

I’m also wrong about a lot of stuff.

Smartphone photography is getting better all the time.

The lenses they can now squeeze onto the back of these little telephonic computer bricks are impressive. The algorithms they use to airbrush our photos are often better than what I can produce in Lightroom.

So this is a begrudging celebration of the smartphone.

While I will always prefer a dedicated camera setup, for many people (possibly most people) smartphones are the way to go. They are small, lightweight and always on you.

When we went on a recent trip to Sicily I thought I would run and experiment to see if I could get any passable photos using my smartphone. These were the results.

This is a famous view from an archway in Cefalu. Approximately 4.7 billion tourists take a photograph of this archway every 3 milliseconds.

You have to wait patiently in a queue to take the picture postcard shot (where it looks as though you have the place to yourself).

I increased the brightness before posting using the edit feature in Google photos. Before that it was a little too dark and moody.

This is another Cefalu shot, taken from our hike up the nearby hill.

I was quite happy with the way this one turned out, although the version I took on my ‘proper’ camera came out a lot better. There was minimal editing for this other than clicking the ‘Vivid’ button in Google photos.

A simple shot of some pots up a little alleyway.

There was no editing on this one but I did have to take it several times to get the angles the way I wanted them.

Last shot from Cefalu. This one was taken from the other side of the arch featured earlier.

If you look carefully to the middle right of the photo you can see the arch.

Cefalu really was a truly magical place. Shortly after this shot was taken a street vendor tried to sell me a gold plastic microphone. It wasn’t something I needed but I appreciated the effort and the nicheness of his products.

Now we moved on to Palermo.

When we walked into this beautiful piazza it literally took our breath away. No tourists and a stunning array of art and architecture. I made some small adjustments to brightness and contrast for this one.

Some of the tiles you’ll find in Palermo are exquisite.

These ones, at the ancient convent bakery, just outside and in the courtyard are almost as special as my toes, which I failed to crop out.

Here’s another picture of the courtyard, this time without my feet.

The only editing I did to either of these was to increase brightness slightly.

We are still in Palermo, this time celebrating the stunning apartment balconies.

There is something so intoxicating about the beautiful stained brick and old shutters. Often you’d see a grandmother out on one of these balconies chuffing on a cigarette.

Another view of Palermo, this time with the backdrop of the mountains.

No editing done to this one.

Obligatory food shot. This a disappointingly average meal from a taverna type place which good fantastic reviews online.

No editing other than cropping in, maybe about 10%.

Now we move to the beautiful medieval village of Tusa. This is a place we stumbled upon and hadn’t planned to visit.

It was one of the unexpected highlights of our trip. Lovely food and people. No editing done for this photo.

We are still in Tusa, this time admiring a popular local rock formation.

No editing here, just a very small crop. We really enjoyed wiling away a few hours in this village.

The locals had turned this boat into a set of planters for flowers.

Not much editing here, just a boost in contrast in Google photos.

Time for some seafood in a local restaurant.

I’m not going to give the name because I think I may have had my wallet stolen here (but I’m not sure). However, the food was excellent and very reasonably priced. Raw prawns are a speciality in Sicily.

Last one of Tusa! A minimalist appreciation of some colourful chairs.

I didn’t do any editing to this one.

Another minimal shot taken from my phone. This time we’re in the Scopello beach.

There was no editing done to this but it few goes to get the angle as I wanted it.

This is my favourite shot from Scopello. A really stunning place. You have to pay to get in, and it feels a little bit wanky, but it was worth the entrance fee and we spent a very enjoyable afternoon here.

You spend your whole time here feeling like you’re in a movie set.

This was the view from near where we stayed in St Ambrogio.

The colours of the flowers and the foliage here were phenomenal. I tried a different saturation setting on the phone with this one because the one it shot with was so vivid it felt a little brash.

Lemons everywhere.

The freshest garnish on a gin and tonic I think we’ve ever had.

This was a shot from the outskirts of St Ambrogio. We had just accidentally wandered up the steps to someone’s house (thinking it was the steps to the village) and a slightly awkward but very friendly conversation in pigeon Italian ensued.

I took this shot just after. I don’t like the saturation and none of the editing settings on my phone improved the shot. This is definitely one where my dedicated camera did a better job.

The beach just outside St Ambrogio was a hidden gem. There was no editing done to this one as I don’t think it was needed.

Sicily has incredible light and shadows and is a great place to shoot, even with a smartphone.

This was an ‘English’ breakfast (it was called ‘London Breakfast’ on the menu which I tweaked and substituted out the bread with avocado to suit my finicky autoimmune diet.

It felt polite to include another food shot.

We’ll finish with this one.

I stood on a concrete bollard near a police offer to get this shot. One of the things I love about photography is how utterly absurd it is. There is rarely any real context.

This photo suggests a kind of infinite horizon of azure serenity. Behind me was a car park with a police officer in it checking cars. Beauty is so often juxtaposed with the mundane.

That’s the end of my Sicily smartphone showcase.

I hope it gives you an idea of the kinds of results you can get from smartphone photography.