TOP PHONE SETTINGS FOR GREAT REELS!
If like me, you use your phone to capture your food content for social media, you might have wondered how to capture the best possible footage for optimal results.
From ensuring the colours on your Reels are perfect and vibrant, to knowing which FPS setting to use, there are many technical aspects to consider when filming and creating Reels with your phone.
After capturing and sharing countless food Reels, I’m here to share the best possible phone settings with you, so that you can creating the most stunning, best looking Reels ever!
Should you film in 4K or 1080HD?
I recommend you film in 4k as it will give you crisper, higher quality footage than if you were to film at 1080p. That’s because the increased resolution will result in overall better video quality. Now it is true that Instagram does compress videos, but despite that, I’ve still found that filming in 4K produces superior colours and a more pleasant feel than filming in 1080p, even after compression.
Which is better, 30FPS or 60FPS for reels?
FPS, or Frames Per Second, indicates the number of frames captured per second of video. In other words, 30FPS means 30 frames are captured per second of film footage, while 60FPS means 60 frames per second of video. Although the difference is near impossible to notice with the naked eye, each setting does have its pros and cons.
Filming at 30FPS uses less storage space, making it ideal for everyday use and conserving your phone memory. However, filming in 30FPS means you can’t introduce slow motion effects into your Reel. Despite this drawback, I always film in 30FPS.
In turn, filming at 60FPS allows for smooth slow-motion footage but consumes A LOT more storage space on your phone, which over time may mean you have to either purchase external storage or frequently delete your footage after using it in your Reels.
here are some more phone settings you need to be aware of when sharing your reels!
If, like me, you use an external app to edit your Reels, it's crucial to check your export settings and ensure they match the resolution you used when filming, whether it's 4K or 1080p. Then, when uploading your Reel to Instagram, select 'allow high quality uploads' to ensure Instagram compresses your footage as little as possible. This step helps maintain the quality and clarity of your Reels and allows for your food to continue to look super drool worthy!
Finally, there's the option of filming in HDR on your phone camera, which I decided against for my food content. While HDR can enhance your phone video quality, it has several drawbacks:
It consumes way too much storage space on your phone.
The footage appears darker compared to content filmed in 4K.
The large video files often get compressed by Instagram, negating the benefits of HDR.
For these reasons, I prefer sticking with 4K for capturing my food Reels, but now the question is, what settings will you choose?
Before you go…
I’m a food photographer and educator first and Reels content creator who shares food content primarily on Instagram, second. I’m not nor do I claim to be a cinematographer or videographer and hence am sharing the settings that yield the best results for the type of content I share. So if you’re looking to create the next blockbuster movie, please take my advice in this blog post with a pinch of salt!
It’s also important I note that I primarily create my videos on iPhone, though a variation of these settings can be applied to any smart phone camera.
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