Take hundreds of photos to find all major issues with new iPhone cameras; Android can help Apple!

You could say that the iPhone camera has many problems…

Apple uses small sensors; does not give you a pro mode for better control over your images; the iPhone can sometimes turn people orange (or blue); the ultra-wide and zoom cameras aren’t as good as the first, and so on…

However, all of that aside, the beef I have with the iPhone camera is a bit more specific, or rather more “technical” but at the same time just related to “how good a photo looks “if I may say so…

The way I see it, what’s wrong with the iPhone camera goes back to the very reason you decide to take a photo. Then it ends with, well… the end result, which more often than not doesn’t match the original description of what you were looking at / the very reason you decided this moment was worth watching captured, stored and celebrated.

If none of that makes sense now, I’ll be (much) more specific when we look at the sample photos I took (then edited)! So what are the “real” problems with the iPhone camera and how can you fix them in seconds by pressing the edit button in your Photos app?

Here is my take…

The real problems with the iPhone 13, iPhone 14 camera have to do with Apple’s general photography philosophy

As I hinted, the real problem with the iPhone camera (at least in my opinion) is ultimately the fact that Apple does not allow us to better control our photos (before taking them)!

Instead, as iPhone 13 mini and iPhone 14 Pro user (all the photos you’re about to see are taken with the iPhone 13 mini, which I prefer to carry), I get whatever comes with Apple’s understanding of a “good photo”, and I have to… take care of it.

The lack of granular camera control on phones isn’t just an Apple problem, because Google, for example, also forces users to adhere to its photography philosophy. omitting a pro mode from the Pixel’s camera (the newer Pixels don’t even let you take full-resolution photos). on the other hand, Good examples are Samsung, Xiaomi, Vivo, OnePlus, Oppo, Huawei (and more), thanks to their expert professional modes/settings and dedicated alternate auto shooting modes, like Genuine Leica on Xiaomi phones, which stems from Xiaomi’s multimillion-dollar partnership with… Leica.

• iPhone photos are often too bright, giving a washed out look and therefore a false representation of the scene – this is by no means exclusive to night shots (in fact, quite the opposite), but it’s much easier to spot when taking pictures in night mode

• Aggressive HDR can render iPhone photos extremely flat and lifeless, devoid of any “drama” that “real” cameras often give us; Technically, this is because the iPhone wants to bring the highlights (the bright parts of the image) and the shadows (the darkest parts of the photo) closer together, instead of trying to separate them authentically. .

• Related to the latter and opposite end of the spectrum, iPhone HDR often fails to stack images properly, which can lead to exaggerated highlights that are nearly impossible to recover.

• Over-sharpening – perhaps the easiest problem to grasp with the iPhone camera has been around for 2-3 generations now; unless you’re shooting in RAW/48MP mode (if you have that luxury), trees, branches, and buildings (or anything with a well-defined texture) are bound to look sharper than they should

Take “real” photos with your iPhone 12, iPhone 13, iPhone 14! It takes 30 seconds to edit; I took hundreds of pictures to make sure

How to take DSLR-like photos with your iPhone? It’s easy! Take the photo and try changing the settings after pressing the Edit button in the Photos app. What generally makes my photos much more realistic and “real” is:

• Remind glow around 30-60% (strongly recommended)
• Dial down Brightness around 20-40% (highly recommended)
• Reduce Noise about 15-25% (recommended for photos with lots of textures, which may look too sharp)
• Add Thumbnail for a stylistic look (recommended for a more authentic “camera” look and where you need to bring the “drama” back into the scene)

I took hundreds of photos and edited them to be better and more authentic (original photos on the left, edited on the right)

Apple, please give us a more authentic shooting mode; let’s turn off HDR and maybe change the lens vendor for the iPhone 15

As you can see, the iPhone’s photo specs are as promised – high brightness, increased sharpness and inconsistent HDR. And as mentioned at the beginning, this usually leads to “lifeless” photos, which don’t just look different reality but also often look… worse.

Just like the editing suggestions I gave at the beginning, it was so rare that I had to add some vibrancy to the iPhone photos. In 95% of cases, I simply reduced the brightness and brightness of the photos, which automatically restored some of the color of the photos. What’s interesting is that there’s a smartphone on the market right now that takes pictures pretty much the way I like them or the way I think the iPhone should also, and this phone is the Xiaomi 13 Pro (also, the Xiaomi 12S Ultra which offers an identical experience). It’s not a Xiaomi 13 Pro story, so I won’t go into too much about it, but the Leica Authentic mode in this device’s camera app is what separates it from the rest of the pack (Pixel 7, Galaxy S22iPhone 14).

What Xiaomi is doing now is exactly what I imagine is the future of the smartphone camera – giving users some options for photo styles – which are very different from filters in that they are not arranged above your photo but are the photo you are taking.

New iPhone 15 camera rumors and photography styles – the right direction

But wait, doesn’t the iPhone have… Photographic styles?

Yes, it does, and yes, they help! However, they are far from giving the photos a natural look. For example, Photographic Styles don’t allow you to individually change highlights and shadows or reduce artificial sharpness in photos.

Anyway, the rumors of iPhone 15 saying that Apple is about to switch to using newer/better Sony sensors that allow for improved HDR – something current iPhones can often get wrong…

Better hardware and photography styles are definitely the right direction, but I think Apple should double down and make photography styles the centerpiece of the next-gen iPhone camera, similar to what XiaomiOnePlus, Oppo and Vivo do with their Leica, Zeiss and Hasselblad partnerships.

Giving people the option to take vivid or more natural/authentic photos could take the iPhone camera from really good to exceptional…for more people. Do you agree? And will you use some of the editing tips I’ve shown here for your own photos? Let me know!