iPhone photography - accuracy and expression

[Ukiyo Evenings]

No, but OP admits that he prefers raw images, even from his phone. Of course learning composition and fundamentals is the first step, but he (and others on this forum) want to go to the next step, regardless of the camera used. You say that learning manual is important, but what about photographers who only shoot in Ap mode?

Anyway, despite what it seems, I am not trying to argue with you, but to further the discussion. As OP is interested in raw images coming from his phone, then my point is that raw images do actually contain more detail, and as that is what he wants, shooting raw on his phone makes sense.

To the OP, here are some iPhoneography articles for you (don't let the "moms" in the title scare you away -- these are some seriously talented professionals and artists).

Molly, thank you so much for these I love reading about photography and will spend time next week going through the articles. I've got to crack on with my GMAT prep for now and will return to this thread later. Moms are amazing btw ??

Okay, time to head home instead of sitting in parking haha. Love how the sky is a more accurate blue in the LR shot.

 

[Fishrrman]

<--- Does not own a smartphone...

 

[Darmok N Jalad]

I don’t really use a smartphone for many photos anymore, but it’s not to say I won’t turn to one when I need to. There are more and more applications where a smartphone will produce a pretty good result now, so you can certainly use one for most of your needs, and there’s something to be said about limiting your medium in order to encourage creativity. While there is this notion that smartphone cameras will someday take over photography, let’s just say that I’m curious how many couples would be excited to see their pro photographer show up with just an iPhone in their hand!

I could certainly use my phone camera more, but here’s an example of the best my XR could do, versus my E-M5 with a nice telephoto lens on it. With the XR, I was 4” away from the subject and still had to crop the photo. With my 40-150 lens, I was over 3 feet away. I guess the iPhone Pro has a tele lens on it, which would help, but I doubt I could get as good of results on a faster moving subject, or a more distant subject.

 

[Ukiyo Evenings]

... there’s something to be said about limiting your medium in order to encourage creativity.

... With the XR, I was 4” away from the subject and still had to crop the photo. With my 40-150 lens, I was over 3 feet away. I guess the iPhone Pro has a tele lens on it, which would help, but I doubt I could get as good of results on a faster moving subject, or a more distant subject.

Hello again and thank you for sharing. This is the kind of comparison that enhances the discussion. Shooting experience on the Olympus v the XR notwithstanding, the result is beautiful. I'm a fan of the creamy (is that the term?) look and the lens allowed that perfectly. The XR's is still a nice composition; would it be safe to say that the DOF would have benefited from a manual focus? I'm not completely aware of how things are in iPhones and think a standard wide + telephoto is a better combination than wide + ultra wide that Apple provides on their base 11.

I do subscribe to the limiting your medium approach. I've shot portraits with my GR and enjoyed doing so. Here's one straight from cam with the in-camera Positive Film effect turned on.

 

[mollyc]

Hello again and thank you for sharing. This is the kind of comparison that enhances the discussion. Shooting experience on the Olympus v the XR notwithstanding, the result is beautiful. I'm a fan of the creamy (is that the term?) look and the lens allowed that perfectly. The XR's is still a nice composition; would it be safe to say that the DOF would have benefited from a manual focus? I'm not completely aware of how things are in iPhones and think a standard wide + telephoto is a better combination than wide + ultra wide that Apple provides on their base 11.

I do subscribe to the limiting your medium approach. I've shot portraits with my GR and enjoyed doing so. Here's one straight from cam with the in-camera Positive Film effect turned on.
View attachment 959402

I have an 8+ with the regular and telephoto lens and my daughter has an 11 with the regular and ultrawide and I prefer my lens arrangement. Even though I rarely use my phone for a camera I'd probably make sure to have my next phone with the telephoto lens as one of the options. My daughter takes photos of our 8mo old puppy a lot and her snout is always super long looking in them because of the wider view.

 

[Darmok N Jalad]

Hello again and thank you for sharing. This is the kind of comparison that enhances the discussion. Shooting experience on the Olympus v the XR notwithstanding, the result is beautiful. I'm a fan of the creamy (is that the term?) look and the lens allowed that perfectly. The XR's is still a nice composition; would it be safe to say that the DOF would have benefited from a manual focus? I'm not completely aware of how things are in iPhones and think a standard wide + telephoto is a better combination than wide + ultra wide that Apple provides on their base 11.

I do subscribe to the limiting your medium approach. I've shot portraits with my GR and enjoyed doing so. Here's one straight from cam with the in-camera Positive Film effect turned on.
View attachment 959402

The soft background/blurred background is called “bokeh.” Where that name came from, I don’t know. With traditional photography, this is achieved with a shallow DOF though the optics. I’ve not taken any classes, but from years of experience and reading in forums, my crude explanation is this: you can get that result with greater distance between the background and the subject in focus, with a really wide-aperture lens, or with a longer lens. I get my best results on M43 with longer lenses (150-300mm) where the subject is in a very narrow focal plane, but it can still be reached with shorter, wide lenses and thoughtful technique.

All that mostly gets thrown out with smartphones, as they use fixed aperture, fixed focal length lenses. You can employ some of the standard techniques above, but the hardware is a considerable limitation. With such a tiny lens and sensor, it’s basically impossible to accomplish the mantis result above natively with my XR. Maybe I could with the telephoto lens that many phones now have. In my case, my XR produces a “panicky” bokeh, where it’s very busy and more distracting. Maybe nothing one might notice until you get a side-by-side comparison and one image “looks better” for less obvious reasons....but that‘s not all. With smartphones, companies (like Apple) have incorporated a lot of machine learning and built-in/automatic post-processing techniques to artificially create this shallow depth of field. On iPhone, you can do that with Portrait Mode. It works to some degree, but I can tell you it has a long way to go when it comes to photos of my curly-haired daughters.

Still, someday the same results might be achievable, but one tool will use traditional optics, the other AI/Machine Learning. It’s much like automatic versus manual transmission—one requires the driver to be more connected to the machine and know what to do in each situation. Automatics have come a long way, and in many cases they are faster than manual transmissions. I see smartphones approaching that same situation, though it requires a far more diverse set of conditions than sending power to the drive wheels of a car.

 

[Ukiyo Evenings]

I have an 8+ with the regular and telephoto lens and my daughter has an 11 with the regular and ultrawide and I prefer my lens arrangement. Even though I rarely use my phone for a camera I'd probably make sure to have my next phone with the telephoto lens as one of the options. My daughter takes photos of our 8mo old puppy a lot and her snout is always super long looking in them because of the wider view.

Must see photos of this puppy sometime

I'm interested in the 5.4" iPhone but don't think it'll get a telephoto. I too would like to have a telephoto included in my next phone for the same reasons as you so let's see what Apple announces next month ?

The soft background/blurred background is called “bokeh.”

All that mostly gets thrown out with smartphones, as they use fixed aperture, fixed focal length lenses. You can employ some of the standard techniques above, but the hardware is a considerable limitation. With such a tiny lens and sensor, it’s basically impossible to accomplish the mantis result above natively with my XR. Maybe I could with the telephoto lens that many phones now have. In my case, my XR produces a “panicky” bokeh, where it’s very busy and more distracting.

Still, someday the same results might be achievable, but one tool will use traditional optics, the other AI/Machine Learning. It’s much like automatic versus manual transmission—one requires the driver to be more connected to the machine and know what to do in each situation. Automatics have come a long way, and in many cases they are faster than manual transmissions. I see smartphones approaching that same situation, though it requires a far more diverse set of conditions than sending power to the drive wheels of a car.

Thank you for explaining bokeh. I've seen creaminess used as a term to describe attributes of pleasing bokeh and tones as illustrated in this post on reddit, so wasn't sure what to call the overall lovely quality of your E-M5 image. I do agree that it takes a bit more ingenuity to squeeze out oodles of bokeh from shorter focal lengths with thoughtful technique. I was however alluding to the ISP in the XR possibly going for more items in focus/a broader focal plane as a result of image stacking, rather than what the lens and sensor combination would create with a single, less processed exposure. Anyway, moot point as this is finicky detail from my side

Funny how the auto v manual transmission metaphor has been brought up twice in this thread. I like automatic transmission for daily driving, and perhaps manual when it comes to my phone photography haha! I don't care for portrait mode for the very reason you mentioned how it has a long way to go when it comes to photos of your daughters. I just wanted to know if the iPhone has the capabilities to be used as a pleasing photography tool that delivers great results when used smartly, or conversely, if the computationally focused "AI" heavy + "wide and bonkers wider" approach has robbed it of its photographic charm. @mollyc raised a good point about the lens combinations and I do think that it will be a crucial factor in my purchasing decision.

 

[Darmok N Jalad]

Yeah, car analogies seem to get used a lot in technology. It’s often not the best comparison, but we can all relate to cars more than we can the gnomes and goblins that switch all the knobs and levers inside our smartphones.

 

[r.harris1]

Aren’t we incredibly lucky to have such a wide array of image making tools available to us! I’m pretty process focused and love quality glass lenses and the character of light on a large image sensor through them. I love film as a creative medium as much as a digital sensor. Speaking of “Gen Now”, I saw some work by a young artist at an art museum (The Baltic) in Newcastle, UK all devoted to film. She did some amazing and creative work with prints from pin-hole cameras and large format negatives. It reignited my love for that story-telling medium, and me a “Gen Not-so-Now”.

Back to cameras. I love the decisions that I need to make on exposure and choosing settings. I love raw processing and the creative control that comes with it, including raw images from an iPhone if that’s my camera at hand. I’m no pro, but I’m too much of a control freak to shoot JPEG-only. The pros I know are raw all the way. I suppose if I were a sports shooter or photojournalist with a tight deadline, perhaps.

I also love to print large-ish - and that’s a whole other process thing and world to be involved in.

iPhones can produce stellar images, and I do use them in certain situations, though not much. When I do, I will use apps that allow raw capture such as LR, etc. It depends on the story I’m trying to tell and what I want to do with it. I love watching the stories people tell with photography, regardless of the image capture device! But for me, mostly it is my larger cameras, larger sensors and nicer glass.

 

[deep diver]

“bokeh.”

It comes from Japanese and refers to both a blurred background or foreground (even though we generally think of it as background).

 

[Ukiyo Evenings]

Aren’t we incredibly lucky to have such a wide array of image making tools available to us! I’m pretty process focused and love quality glass lenses and the character of light on a large image sensor through them. I love film as a creative medium as much as a digital sensor. Speaking of “Gen Now”, I saw some work by a young artist at an art museum (The Baltic) in Newcastle, UK all devoted to film. She did some amazing and creative work with prints from pin-hole cameras and large format negatives. It reignited my love for that story-telling medium, and me a “Gen Not-so-Now”.

Back to cameras. I love the decisions that I need to make on exposure and choosing settings. I love raw processing and the creative control that comes with it, including raw images from an iPhone if that’s my camera at hand. I’m no pro, but I’m too much of a control freak to shoot JPEG-only. The pros I know are raw all the way. I suppose if I were a sports shooter or photojournalist with a tight deadline, perhaps.

I also love to print large-ish - and that’s a whole other process thing and world to be involved in.

iPhones can produce stellar images, and I do use them in certain situations, though not much. When I do, I will use apps that allow raw capture such as LR, etc. It depends on the story I’m trying to tell and what I want to do with it. I love watching the stories people tell with photography, regardless of the image capture device! But for me, mostly it is my larger cameras, larger sensors and nicer glass.

Thank you for sharing your experiences and opinions. This is the context within which I was looking for opinions about iPhones. It's great to hear that a "Gen Now" artist has reignited an old love of a "Gen Not-so-Now" one - that term gave me a good chuckle. As a member of the former group ?, posting here and the responses I've received have reignited my enthusiasm for using my phone as a storytelling medium. Earlier in this thread we had spoken about how creating within a constraint can encourage one's ingenuity, plus, there's that element of showcasing what this wonderful image making tool is capable of: more than simply taking selfies and disappearing pictures of food.

Often when I've been asked by peers about the camera I use for my shots, the answer has been my phone or the GR, which in turn generates exclamations of surprise and "you should take up photography!" and "I thought it was some big professional camera" comments. I find it all quite amusing. We are incredibly lucky indeed to have had the tech progress so far and become much more accessible, yet individual creativity seems to not have kept pace with this democratization. Not a worry though, as I'm sure there will always be plenty of us who do enjoy photography and the stories we can tell with it. Thanks once again for a good read.

 

[Clix Pix]

As someone who by a year or so precedes the "Baby Boomer" generation, and who has been shooting since my first Brownie Hawkeye and later Kodak Instamatic before I got into SLRs followed years later by DSLRs, I can certainly agree that photography technology has come a long, long way! Back in the days when we did everything manually, including metering, because we had to, there was no choice, who could've imagined what is done these days with cameras of all types?!

A few years ago I went through a period of not shooting all that much and my camera bodies and lenses sat patiently awaiting my return, but during that time I did occasionally pull out my iPhone when I wanted to capture something, and was pleasantly surprised by the results I could get..... The iPhone, even my current iPhone 11 Pro, has limitations. I could go out on our boardwalk here and fire off a few shots of something interesting on a neighbor's deck with my iPhone and that would be fine, but shooting a sparrow standing on one of the posts that are all along the boardwalk? Not a chance of that! This is when my "real" camera and long lens come into play. Bokeh and backgrounds are very important to me and I always try to pay close attention to what's behind my subject and on each side of it before ever pressing the shutter button. Sometimes if it's a static subject I move myself and the camera to see what happens from different angles, different perspectives.....

As for subjects I prefer to shoot, well, browsing through the POTD thread here will give you a good idea of that! I can tell you that two things I do NOT shoot are "selfies" (YUCK!!) or food. (I'm not all that interested in what I eat, so why on earth would anyone else be?!).

Yes, photography can be a wonderful medium for telling interesting stories...... OP, I hope you do participate in the POTD thread and share some of the stories you capture!

 

[Ukiyo Evenings]

As someone who by a year or so precedes the "Baby Boomer" generation, and who has been shooting since my first Brownie Hawkeye and later Kodak Instamatic before I got into SLRs followed years later by DSLRs, I can certainly agree that photography technology has come a long, long way! Back in the days when we did everything manually, including metering, because we had to, there was no choice, who could've imagined what is done these days with cameras of all types?!

A few years ago I went through a period of not shooting all that much and my camera bodies and lenses sat patiently awaiting my return, but during that time I did occasionally pull out my iPhone when I wanted to capture something, and was pleasantly surprised by the results I could get..... The iPhone, even my current iPhone 11 Pro, has limitations. I could go out on our boardwalk here and fire off a few shots of something interesting on a neighbor's deck with my iPhone and that would be fine, but shooting a sparrow standing on one of the posts that are all along the boardwalk? Not a chance of that! This is when my "real" camera and long lens come into play. Bokeh and backgrounds are very important to me and I always try to pay close attention to what's behind my subject and on each side of it before ever pressing the shutter button. Sometimes if it's a static subject I move myself and the camera to see what happens from different angles, different perspectives.....

As for subjects I prefer to shoot, well, browsing through the POTD thread here will give you a good idea of that! I can tell you that two things I do NOT shoot are "selfies" (YUCK!!) or food. (I'm not all that interested in what I eat, so why on earth would anyone else be?!).

Yes, photography can be a wonderful medium for telling interesting stories...... OP, I hope you do participate in the POTD thread and share some of the stories you capture!

Thanks for dropping by to share your experience too! As I'm hearing positive responses about the iPhone photography experience, I'm beginning to wonder how much of it is due to Apple's approach to camera tech and image processing, and how much is due to phones just being pretty good nowadays when their limitations are taken into consideration. I suppose that would be a nuanced and highly subjective discussion, but a point to ponder or opine on nonetheless

I just saw your latest share in the POTD thread; loved that you were able to capture such a subtly beautiful scene. I will participate soon and share my thoughts/stories behind the photos. This is the first photography forum I've ever ventured to be a part of and it appears to be much more genteel than the ones I've come across before (DPReview acrimony being an example). Thank you for the warm welcome!

 

[mollyc]

Here is a quick read on why editing your images in Photoshop is as normal as developing film in the darkroom. Shooting raw to edit later isn't really any different than shooting film. JPEG is the equivalent to sending your film off to the one hour photo, and PS is the equivalent to developing yourself.

Purists vs Photoshop - Scott Kelby's Photoshop Insider

scottkelby.com

 

[Darmok N Jalad]

Here is a quick read on why editing your images in Photoshop is as normal as developing film in the darkroom. Shooting raw to edit later isn't really any different than shooting film. JPEG is the equivalent to sending your film off to the one hour photo, and PS is the equivalent to developing yourself.

Purists vs Photoshop - Scott Kelby's Photoshop Insider

scottkelby.com

Just to add a bit more here, some cameras allow you to adjust how the camera post-processes your images when it creates the JPG, and you can apply these to different scene settings depending on the situation. So if you find yourself applying the same contrast, sharpness, saturation, etc to your images in post, then you can just make the camera do this for you at the time of shooting. This only works in jpg mode, of course.

I just shoot to JPG, and I adjusted a few settings on my EM5 over the default to improve the results for my style. I get that some won’t like this limitation, but I just wanted to point out that there is another layer to letting the camera do PP. Also, shooting in the highest quality JPG format will give you a lot of data to work with should you want to do more advanced edits. Not as much as RAW, but there is still a lot of dynamic range there to work with.

 

[mollyc]

Just to add a bit more here, some cameras allow you to adjust how the camera post-processes your images when it creates the JPG, and you can apply these to different scene settings depending on the situation. So if you find yourself applying the same contrast, sharpness, saturation, etc to your images in post, then you can just make the camera do this for you at the time of shooting. This only works in jpg mode, of course.

I just shoot to JPG, and I adjusted a few settings on my EM5 over the default to improve the results for my style. I get that some won’t like this limitation, but I just wanted to point out that there is another layer to letting the camera do PP. Also, shooting in the highest quality JPG format will give you a lot of data to work with should you want to do more advanced edits. Not as much as RAW, but there is still a lot of dynamic range there to work with.

I always set camera profiles when I get a new camera so the camera back looks (sort of) close to how I will edit it later (at least closer than a default camera profile). The bonus to this is that with my current camera (Nikon Z6) those profiles actually carry over upon import to the raw file with initial edits done. Of course you can zero them out and ignore them like previous, but I like having a decent starting point with import.

 

[Clix Pix]

For me, shooting RAW is a more flexible and more in-control approach than shooting in JPG, as it offers opportunities to experiment within the dynamic range and to tailor the image to my liking, editing it "to taste," as the saying goes, while in the post-processing stage. Some people like to batch-process their images from a given shoot, which makes sense when using the same exposure and general settings throughout. I tend to edit each image individually, making decisions as I go along: shall I convert this one to B&W? Would the image benefit from cropping? What happens when I crop it this way? That way? Do I need to give the color a little more "pop," or, oops, does it look a little "over-cooked?" A gentle kiss of additional sharpening or is it fine as-is? Hey, how about going all-out and playing with some filter effects to create something beyond than what we see in the basic image as it was shot? That can turn a potentially boring image into an intriguing, interesting and fun one.

In the old days, while working in the darkroom with the enlarger was fun, it also could be frustrating at times, occasionally somewhat limiting and definitely when one got to the point of developing the print if doing B&W, smelly and potentially messy. I miss the darkroom days in some ways but for the most part I much prefer being able to manage my images on the computer -- no smelly chemicals, I'm in normal light, I can experiment to my heart's content and try things out without wasting loads of expensive photo paper, and the results can be produced in however much time I need and choose to spend: a few minutes, a couple of hours.....

In addition to the kind of camera profile Molly talks about above, most editing programs these days have modules for establishing specific profiles for camera bodies and lenses. This is available only in RAW, though. It can be very useful, as then the software program is dialed right into the camera and lens used in shooting a given image. If someone uses several different cameras each one and its accompanying lenses has its own profile. DXO PhotoLab 3, the editing software I use most of the time, does a nice job with this.

Technology has changed how we shoot and manage our images, and isn't it fun?!

 

[r.harris1]

I've loved these responses. There is so much leeway these days as to how best to process your images. What could be better?

 

[Ukiyo Evenings]

Lovely to read all these responses indeed, and thank you Molly for sharing that post. I remember thinking when I first saw that marked up image of James Dean worked on by Pablo Inirio, "gosh, I'm glad we can do these things digitally nowadays." Spoilt by technology - well, one of its primary aims is to make work easier. And thanks for the tips about the camera profiles

 

[Clix Pix]

I was thinking about this today..... For me, photography is a journey of discovery, something which in and of itself brings pleasure and excitement, regardless of what the actual results turn out to be. If I've spend an hour and a half walking around the neighborhood shooting and come home to find that for one reason or another I only got a few keepers, that's still OK, because being out there photographing what I was seeing, looking for something new and interesting to shoot is fulfilling in its own right.

Walking along and seeing an interesting object or perhaps elusive wild creatures is fun, and the challenge is in capturing that object or creature in different ways. I can easily spend quite a bit of time with one subject, experimenting with different angles, various perspectives..... And at home, with an object in pride of place on the dining table, another journey of discovery awaits me as I explore the item, shooting it from different angles, shooting it at a distance, shooting it closer up, trying different lenses on it....

Sometimes another discovery happens in the "digital darkroom" as I am editing my images, and suddenly notice an interesting way that I can crop, which can turn an ordinary image into something much more intriguing and interesting, bringing out subtle elements of light, shadows and shapes which can have more impact than the original version did. The abstract image I posted in the POTD thread on October 6th is an example of that. I love discovering unexpected beauty in the most ordinary and mundane of objects!

Those of us who participate in the digital photography subforum share a common bond: a love for photography and the myriad ways in which it allows and encourages us to express ourselves.

 

[kallisti]

Great thread with really good responses!

I would offer a couple of comments.

First: what is your intended output for the images? Sharing on social media? Email? Posting on the web? Printing at small sizes? Printing at big sizes? iPhone images vs images from a dedicated camera may differ in noticeable quality depending on intended output (and on the camera/lens used at the time of capture).

Second: what are your thresholds for what you consider “good enough” for your intended output? Independent of the RAW vs JPEG argument, phone camera files may be fine for you. Or they may not. It depends on your personal sense of what is “good enough”.

Third: what types of subjects are you shooting? Do they lend themselves to the limitations of a phone camera (small sensor coupled to a lens with a very small focal length in traditional 35mm terms)? Are you trying to isolate the subject from the background (something phone cameras aren’t good at because of their tiny focal lengths, unless you are shooting *very* close). On the other hand, phone cameras have a massive depth of field for more distant subjects because of their tiny focal length lens which can be advantageous compared to dedicated cameras with larger sensors.

Fourth: what lighting are you usually shooting in? In good lighting, phone cameras tend to do well. In poor lighting their files suffer.

Fifth: how important is external lighting (meaning strobes/flashes, ability to control the lighting) to the images you want to create?

Sixth: what focal lengths do you need for the subjects you are shooting? Do you need wide or ultra-wide? Do you need moderate or more extreme telephoto? Do you need a zoom lens to cover the focal lengths you usually shoot? A phone camera may or may not be able offer the focal length you need for your photography.

Seventh: do you need specialty lenses or specific lenses to achieve your creative goal? Photographing sports. Macro. Architecture.

All cameras are tools. Like any tool, there are pluses and minuses. There are trade offs in convenience, cost, quality, ease of use, etc.

There are certainly image quality differences between an iPhone and a dedicated camera (depending on the camera/lens, obviously). These differences can become more apparent when comparing professional gear to files from a phone. The better gear may let you capture an image that wouldn’t be possible with a phone camera. Or it may give you a file that is salvageable in post where the phone camera file isn’t.

I have a specific comparison in mind, but my MBP died yesterday so I can’t share. Two shots taken on a cruise with my son jumping across a round window indoors. One with my Nikon D850 and Sigma 40mm f/1.4 lens. The other taken by my mom with her iPhone. The former is a keeper, the latter is garbage. The iPhone just wasn’t the right tool for the job. And nothing would have made it the right tool for the job.

Ultimately there is no one-size-fits-all.

For me personally, I don’t use my iPhone that often as a camera. I have better tools at my disposal to achieve my creative goals. I use it to document where I parked my car prior to a plane trip. I’m not saying it can’t be a viable creative tool, but I have better creative tools available to me that I use regularly.

 

[Ukiyo Evenings]

Great thread with really good responses!

I would offer a couple of comments.

First: what is your intended output for the images? Sharing on social media? Email? Posting on the web? Printing at small sizes? Printing at big sizes? iPhone images vs images from a dedicated camera may differ in noticeable quality depending on intended output (and on the camera/lens used at the time of capture).

Second: what are your thresholds for what you consider “good enough” for your intended output? Independent of the RAW vs JPEG argument, phone camera files may be fine for you. Or they may not. It depends on your personal sense of what is “good enough”.

Third: what types of subjects are you shooting? Do they lend themselves to the limitations of a phone camera (small sensor coupled to a lens with a very small focal length in traditional 35mm terms)? Are you trying to isolate the subject from the background (something phone cameras aren’t good at because of their tiny focal lengths, unless you are shooting *very* close). On the other hand, phone cameras have a massive depth of field for more distant subjects because of their tiny focal length lens which can be advantageous compared to dedicated cameras with larger sensors.

Fourth: what lighting are you usually shooting in? In good lighting, phone cameras tend to do well. In poor lighting their files suffer.

Fifth: how important is external lighting (meaning strobes/flashes, ability to control the lighting) to the images you want to create?

Sixth: what focal lengths do you need for the subjects you are shooting? Do you need wide or ultra-wide? Do you need moderate or more extreme telephoto? Do you need a zoom lens to cover the focal lengths you usually shoot? A phone camera may or may not be able offer the focal length you need for your photography.

Seventh: do you need specialty lenses or specific lenses to achieve your creative goal? Photographing sports. Macro. Architecture.

All cameras are tools. Like any tool, there are pluses and minuses. There are trade offs in convenience, cost, quality, ease of use, etc.

There are certainly image quality differences between an iPhone and a dedicated camera (depending on the camera/lens, obviously). These differences can become more apparent when comparing professional gear to files from a phone. The better gear may let you capture an image that wouldn’t be possible with a phone camera. Or it may give you a file that is salvageable in post where the phone camera file isn’t.

I have a specific comparison in mind, but my MBP died yesterday so I can’t share. Two shots taken on a cruise with my son jumping across a round window indoors. One with my Nikon D850 and Sigma 40mm f/1.4 lens. The other taken by my mom with her iPhone. The former is a keeper, the latter is garbage. The iPhone just wasn’t the right tool for the job. And nothing would have made it the right tool for the job.

Ultimately there is no one-size-fits-all.

For me personally, I don’t use my iPhone that often as a camera. I have better tools at my disposal to achieve my creative goals. I use it to document where I parked my car prior to a plane trip. I’m not saying it can’t be a viable creative tool, but I have better creative tools available to me that I use regularly.

I'm so sorry that I missed your post! Thank you for taking the time to go through the thread as well as provide food for thought. I'll try and answer your questions now.

Intended output: I'd say personal viewing, social media and web. I don't use an image sharing platform other than Instagram and we know what the quality is there. I would however, for select photos, like to be be able to print should I wish, but then again, no large prints. The last print I did was an A3 B&W from my Ricoh GR. So: personal viewing, memories and at the most a 4x6 to mail to someone.

Quality: I'm fairly happy with phone IQ these days. The most I've ever had is my Ricoh, and in both instances I've shot JPEG until this thread. I feel this ties in with my output.

Subjects and lighting: Everyday stuff Could be a lamp post, a sunset, street photography. I usually shoot with good lighting and again, have not felt too limited by dark scenes. I'm aware that dim but evocative scenes such as a neon lit side alley will be better captured by a dedicated camera. I'm also not a fan of the artificially brightened 'night mode' output that flagship phones have nowadays. I don't use external lighting as I've not felt the need for it.

Lenses and focal lengths: Again, not something that I particularly put much thought into seeing as I'm more interested in testing the limits of what I have on hand, than exploring the potential of what I can invest in monetarily. I don't like too wide angled and don't require a long telephoto.

I suppose by now you will have gathered that while I like and enjoy photography, for the moment I'm most interested in seeing which phone might be best for the purpose, as that new device will become my primary camera. There are times when I take out my GR and enjoy the different experience, however, I'm not too sure if I'll invest in an ILC until I feel the need to make use of the benefits a dedicated camera provides. Or to put it another way, for now, I'm more keen on spending on a 16" MBP such as the one I'm typing on, or a holiday, than a camera body. I see shooting with phones as a fun endeavor to challenge its limitations and perceptions as a photography tool, and given that I was mulling purchasing my first iPhone, I wondered how it would be camera-wise. I guess the parallel would be one who uses an SLR but then finds joy in a disposable point and shoot. Inherently more limited, but fun because of it

But, this is what I wanted to hear, from people such as you who are passionate about photography, have the right tools AND have an iPhone too.

 

[Ukiyo Evenings]

I was thinking about this today..... For me, photography is a journey of discovery, something which in and of itself brings pleasure and excitement, regardless of what the actual results turn out to be. If I've spend an hour and a half walking around the neighborhood shooting and come home to find that for one reason or another I only got a few keepers, that's still OK, because being out there photographing what I was seeing, looking for something new and interesting to shoot is fulfilling in its own right.

Walking along and seeing an interesting object or perhaps elusive wild creatures is fun, and the challenge is in capturing that object or creature in different ways. I can easily spend quite a bit of time with one subject, experimenting with different angles, various perspectives..... And at home, with an object in pride of place on the dining table, another journey of discovery awaits me as I explore the item, shooting it from different angles, shooting it at a distance, shooting it closer up, trying different lenses on it....

Sometimes another discovery happens in the "digital darkroom" as I am editing my images, and suddenly notice an interesting way that I can crop, which can turn an ordinary image into something much more intriguing and interesting, bringing out subtle elements of light, shadows and shapes which can have more impact than the original version did. The abstract image I posted in the POTD thread on October 6th is an example of that. I love discovering unexpected beauty in the most ordinary and mundane of objects!

Those of us who participate in the digital photography subforum share a common bond: a love for photography and the myriad ways in which it allows and encourages us to express ourselves.

I missed your post too

I'm glad to see similar thought processes echoed. Thank you once again for sharing your personal perspective.

I enjoy the process too; and as expressed above, the limitations of the tools I choose. This extends to the "digital darkroom" even though it may be an app on my phone which has far less finesse than a desktop running dedicated software. Your quote, "I love discovering unexpected beauty in the most ordinary and mundane of objects!" is exactly how I've explain my photography to my friends and family In my opinion, you could give one person a pencil and paper, and another an entire studio with all drawing and painting tools available. Both can produce stunning results. Besides, I limit the allocation of monies for my 'art'?

 

[kallisti]

I missed your post too

I'm glad to see similar thought processes echoed. Thank you once again for sharing your personal perspective.

I enjoy the process too; and as expressed above, the limitations of the tools I choose. This extends to the "digital darkroom" even though it may be an app on my phone which has far less finesse than a desktop running dedicated software. Your quote, "I love discovering unexpected beauty in the most ordinary and mundane of objects!" is exactly how I've explain my photography to my friends and family In my opinion, you could give one person a pencil and paper, and another an entire studio with all drawing and painting tools available. Both can produce stunning results. Besides, I limit the allocation of monies for my 'art'?

Very thoughtful replies to both my comment and the reply from @Clix Pix. Kudos.

Best of luck to you on your photographic journey! I will share that I upgraded both my own and my wife’s phones to iPhone 12 Pros. Not specifically for the camera upgrades from my iPhone XS Max or her iPhone 8, but for non-camera reasons for both of us.

I think it is important to remember that any camera is just a tool. If whatever camera you are using works for you, then keep using it. “Upgrades” (or any gear purchase) should be based on the limits of your current gear to achieve your creative vision, not on spec sheets or reviews.

 

[Ukiyo Evenings]

Very thoughtful replies to both my comment and the reply from @Clix Pix. Kudos.

Best of luck to you on your photographic journey! I will share that I upgraded both my own and my wife’s phones to iPhone 12 Pros. Not specifically for the camera upgrades from my iPhone XS Max or her iPhone 8, but for non-camera reasons for both of us.

I think it is important to remember that any camera is just a tool. If whatever camera you are using works for you, then keep using it. “Upgrades” (or any gear purchase) should be based on the limits of your current gear to achieve your creative vision, not on spec sheets or reviews.

Your words have been thought provoking, flitting in from time to time over the past week. I thought I’d been satisfied after reading all the responses, watching reviews of the 12s and purchasing an SE to try for a couple of months (also for non camera reasons; I’ve enjoyed shooting with it btw). I can’t seem to ignore the feeling that I actually have reached the limits of my gear to achieve some of my creative vision, and conversely, feel that there is more to be unlocked once I go beyond. So here I am, replying again, but this time to broach a discussion about ILCs. It won’t be in the theme of the thread, so perhaps I should contact you directly? Otherwise I’m fine discussing here. The whole camera buying business is a bit mind boggling to me. I found it easier to decide on my choice of car!