I feel like this might be a controversial opinion. And that’s okay. You can do whatever you’d like while traveling. But I’ve got an argument for why I think you should ditch taking photos or videos on your phone while traveling.

If you didn’t know, 1) I visited Paris a few weeks ago for the first time, and 2) I’m a wedding and tourism photographer here in New York City, so I am familiar with that itching desire to take photos of everything you see when visiting a new City for the first time.

And I’m not arguing that you shouldn’t take photos, I’m arguing that you should consider WHY you’re taking photos and videos and consider WHAT you’re going to do with them after your trip.

With camera phones, we’ve become what I like to call “Snappy Happies”. We just want to snap all the time. And because we can snap all the time, we take too many okay-ish photos and rarely take the time to look back at them.

I want to argue that you keep your photo taking intentional and artistic by taking both a nice camera and a disposable-like camera with you:

1. We used a digital Canon camera. If you’re like, “Stacie I’m not a photographer, I don’t have one of these laying around”. I hear you! I recommend renting one for your trip (with a nice 35mm or 50mm lens) and getting it out when you really feel like you want those romantic city photos. You can take my approach and take photos that don’t look touristy, but rather look like they should be included in an editorial magazine. Everyone can have a photo of them standing in front of the eiffel tower, but approach it from a different perspective than everyone else for a fun creative approach that will make you feel like your vacation photos are fresh and different.

2. For old school looking imperfect disposable photos, we used my papershoot camera. You really have no idea what photo you’re going to get when you use a papershoot camera because there is no screen. You simply point, shoot, and see what you got later. I love how homemade these photos look and after looking back through them, I wish I had kept my papershoot on strictly the black and white mode for all of Paris. I even don’t mind the amount of tourists that get into the background of these photos because the photos themselves are sort of vintage-y looking. For sure they remind me of disposable camera photos, but the quality is a bit better. I used this minimally, but it gives a really good homemade vacation vibe to our Paris photo album.

The Big Question I want you to ask yourself is: What will we be doing with our photos afterward?

I want you to look back at trips you’ve taken…. How many photos from your trips do you usually post on social media? I’ve noticed the average post is about 10-15. Not much more. And you know you took a million photos.

And beyond social media sharing, what’s your plan with your photos? Will you print an album? For me, I put together a quick chat book album so we have something printed to look at as we get older.

What’s your plan with your video? Maybe you’re going to put together one long home video to show to friends and family? Or, a slide show of some sort?

I think it’s important to have a plan for your photos and a really good WHY behind snapping them. Be intentional. Spend time taking great photos you’ll really savor later.

So, Why should you put down your camera phone on vacation?

When we were in museums, I wanted to throw some people’s phones against the wall. We’d be contemplating a piece of art and SO many people would walk right in front of us with their phone to get photos or videos of the art. They wouldn’t even look at the art (or see us looking at it) unless it was through their phone. The art experience felt so cheapened when the Snappy Happies weren’t even aware of how incredibly annoying they were being. I might not mind it if it happened once, but it happened more times than I could count. Something I’ve slowly had to come to terms with over the past few years of living near wonderful museums or iconic locations, is that for the average tourist, museums and locations are not for observing anymore. They are for documenting and content creating (and as a content creator, I totally get it, but also feel like there has to be some decorum or etiquette).

So for the sake of other tourists and the sake of intentionality, consider why you want that photo you want. And if it’s because you want to look back later and remember the joy of the trip you took, go ahead and take it— it’s amazing that you can document so many moments. But consider whether or not you’re overdocumenting your trip. And consider if your documenting it is actually getting in the way of someone else enjoying it or yourself being present.