[HN Gopher] Apple unveils the best photos from the Shot on iPhon...
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Apple unveils the best photos from the Shot on iPhone Macro
Challenge
Author : todsacerdoti
Score : 226 points
Date : 2022-04-13 13:12 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.apple.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.apple.com)
| jclardy wrote:
| On the leaf image: "The reason I like this so much is the obvious
| layering. The depth of field created with the iPhone here very
| clearly shows you what the focal point is, and represents a
| fantastic example of how good the software is at completely
| isolating the foreground, leaving the background blurry. A
| perfect example of computational depth of field." -- Peter
| McKinnon
|
| Is this correct? From what I've shot in macro on my DSLR, the
| blur is natural because the focus plane is so thin. I realize the
| phone has a much smaller sensor, but is the blur in macro mode
| computational? I thought that effect was only applied in portrait
| mode shots.
| formerly_proven wrote:
| At that magnification I would expect some amount of blur, and
| the bokeh in the shot is very nervous, so I'd say it's mostly
| optical. Phone camera lenses generally have very poor bokeh,
| though you can rarely see much of it.
| uuyi wrote:
| Yep. The iPhone 13 Pro bokeh is miserably bad. On point
| sources, you're lucky if you can get any out of it and if you
| do it's got a hole in the middle.
|
| Example here: https://imgur.com/a/cPG3YSP
| dylan604 wrote:
| At this point, I don't know how to apply any natural
| photography rules to camera phone results. There is so much
| processing going on that it is hard to even try to do things
| the "old" way. From the skin softening, to the pushing of the
| contrast/color balance/saturation, to the correcting of content
| replacing a person's face with a leaf type examples, etc, I
| really don't want to use the damn camera at all from a purist
| point of view.
| jitl wrote:
| The leaf was actually a leaf. https://twitter.com/mitchcohen/
| status/1476951534160257026?s=...
|
| Using Halide or similar with RAW substantially improves your
| control.
| astrange wrote:
| It doesn't actually do any of those, people just hear
| "computational photography" and make up things in their
| heads.
|
| "Real digital cameras" also have computational photography
| a.k.a. sharpening, auto exposure and auto white balance.
| Arkadin wrote:
| I believe every photo on iPhone 13 pro is enhanced.
|
| https://www.newyorker.com/culture/infinite-scroll/have-iphon...
|
| You're right though that this isn't a "perfect example of
| computational depth of field" as the background leaf looks far
| enough away where you could have achieved the effect optically
| on iPhone sensor with right aperature. That being said the
| blurring does look unnatural to me as it is not even across the
| background leaf despite similar distance from lens. It's not
| clear cut though.
| camillomiller wrote:
| This is the stupidest, laziest, and less informed article
| I've ever read from the New Yorker. I honestly don't know how
| it got published.
| JoBrad wrote:
| You can shoot RAW photos on the iPhone. Don't think most
| laypeople do, though.
| 58x14 wrote:
| If I counted correctly, 8/10 of the selected submissions
| specifically mention the iPhone and the macro feature by name.
| Same with the comments on different submissions.
|
| Okay, okay, I know, it's Apple, this is a marketing campaign.
|
| I guess next time, I'm going to take a photo of the contents of
| my fridge, with the caption:
|
| "Every morning, when I check my new iPhone 14 Pro Max Plus, I'm
| filled with a sense of inspiration. The new Wake Up feature
| really gives me a boost of energy, even on cloudy days like when
| I took this photo of an avocado. The deep, dark green of the rind
| reminds me of the striking new Alpine Green color of my new
| iPhone 14 Pro Max Plus, and the texture couldn't be more vivid
| than shot by the new Macro+ Holographic Lens."
| smoldesu wrote:
| "It's your first day of school Jimmy, show me that smile! You
| know it's going to come out great on the iPhone 16 Ultra Max,
| thanks to it's advanced computational photography and new
| Neural Merge technology! I can even switch it over to the new
| Pro Portrait mode for a better digital Bokeh on the bus."
|
| - A future excerpt from the Federighi household, probably
| some_random wrote:
| It is literally called the "Shot on iPhone Macro Challenge".
| autoexec wrote:
| I didn't even read the text. I just noticed that plants and
| water seem to be huge winners. The one that wasn't a plant or
| water was "sea glass" so... still water. Next time try flowers
| and water.
| [deleted]
| hnlmorg wrote:
| > _If I counted correctly, 8 /10 of the selected submissions
| specifically mention the iPhone and the macro feature by name.
| Same with the comments on different submissions_
|
| The contest was only open to photos taken from an iPhone. This
| is mentioned in the heading, sub-heading and opening paragraph.
| drexlspivey wrote:
| Pretty crazy that you can get this kind of shots with a mobile
| tbh. Until very recently you would require a DSLR with a bulky
| specialized lens. For reference this is what a typical macro lens
| looks like https://images.app.goo.gl/nf5keSiugxyb2pmA6
| skhr0680 wrote:
| A $20 extension tube or reversing ring will turn even any plain
| 50mm prime into a fine macro lens. There really isn't an upper
| limit on lens hugeness or cost for people chasing that last 1%
| of performance.
| kens wrote:
| I bought a cheap DSLR extension tube and a $15 ring light on
| eBay to do macro photography of electronic components. They
| work _much_ better than I expected for the price. I 'm sure
| an expensive macro lens would be better but this setup works
| fine for me.
| m463 wrote:
| My take on macro lenses is that they are sort of bulky
| lenses designed with the extension tube built in, so you
| can go from infinity to 1:1 or similar.
| shagie wrote:
| The issue is the working distance.
|
| You'll note that the photographer there is shooing with a lens
| that has a fairly long barrel. For the Nikkor 105mm macro lens
| - https://coinimaging.com/nikon_105vr.html
|
| At 1:1, there's 15.3 cm between the front of the lens and the
| subject.
|
| But if you're shooting with a rather short lens (e.g. those in
| the camera of a phone) then the working distance is very close.
|
| This becomes important important when photographing insects
| (you'll note there are no photos of insects in that collection)
|
| Some other lenses and their working distances -
| https://www.kielia.de/photography/calculator/working-distanc...
|
| The Olympus 30mm shooting as a macro lens has a working
| distance of 16mm (quite different than the 153mm of the Nikkor
| 105mm macro lens).
|
| The "getting close" also impacts the "how do you light it" and
| keeping the subject out of the shadow of the camera.
| jeffbee wrote:
| The practical working distance is why I like the four-thirds
| system for macro. With a 50mm 1:2 macro lens on a micro43
| body you can work at a distance of 10-25cm from the lens
| front, so you can sneak up on bugs, and on this format you
| can get a useful depth of field with more than a few atoms in
| focus like you'd get on a larger format.
| matwood wrote:
| > This becomes important important when photographing insects
| (you'll note there are no photos of insects in that
| collection)
|
| I've gotten some interesting insect shots using Nikon 70-300
| f/4.5-5.6G ED from a short distance.
|
| I think people sometimes get too caught up with the gear
| instead of trying out what they have.
| AuryGlenz wrote:
| I would say most really good insect macro images are done
| with dead insects anyways, as they need to be stacked to get
| a decent depth of field.
|
| The "how to light it" is probably a bigger point. Even with a
| ~100mm lens, dealing with the lens' shadow can be annoying.
| m463 wrote:
| why wouldn't a future phone camera macro lens have a ring
| light?
| tomduncalf wrote:
| The macro capability is a really fun addition to the iPhone. It
| can be hard to get a good shot though, quite often focus is off -
| the best way I've found is to use the Halide app, then you can
| enable macro mode and "focus peaking", which will highlight the
| in-focus area with a colour. This means that a) you are
| definitely in macro mode all the time, and b) the focus is fixed
| and you adjust what is in focus by moving the phone around until
| the right bit is highlighted. I have also had good results with
| the default camera though, but it's harder to control.
|
| If you look at the photos close up they don't look amazingly
| sharp, and the "blur" around the edges looks a bit odd (not sure
| if this is just a macro lens thing or something iPhone specific),
| but regardless, it's a pretty awesome capability to have in your
| pocket at all times!
| dylan604 wrote:
| Focusing for macro is definitely a painstaking process. That's
| why they invented equipment to help like focus rails[0]. At
| macro sizes, the focus ring on the lens is just not going to
| help get that final focus. Instead, the camera is physically
| moved closer/further from the subject to get final focus. With
| the super shallow depth of field, millimeters matter so these
| rails allow you to make very tiny adjustments.
|
| [0]https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1532833-REG/dot_line_
| ...
| m463 wrote:
| I would imagine focus stacking would be a future enhancement,
| like HDR has stacked images for a long time
| dylan604 wrote:
| Focus stacking is a style. It doesn't necessarily make it
| better outright. Someone might not want the look of a wider
| depth of field.
|
| HDR is also a style, and at least they made it optional and
| not forced on every single image. Hopefully any focus
| stacking will be optional as well.
| treerunner wrote:
| I get the feeling that iOS runs photos through a neural net
| filter by default. It would be nice to know exactly what is
| behind any given shot, both my personal images and those of a
| collection/competition like this. Thus armed with knowledge, only
| then can we truly judge for ourselves.
| criddell wrote:
| What difference would it make? The computation part of iPhone
| photography is an essential part of it.
| dogman144 wrote:
| Not to be rude hopefully, but those all look like stock high
| quality desktop backgrounds or 1:1 copies of an iphone add.
| Images seem less about artistic meaning and more about coloring
| and related implications about an iphone.
| FollowingTheDao wrote:
| Matt Stoller takes the best Macro shots of Apple:
|
| https://twitter.com/matthewstoller/status/151394228852275200...
|
| Why do you all freely spread this one sided corporate propaganda?
| Bud wrote:
| If you have ten axes to grind about stuff Apple did years ago
| to build its manufacturing capacity, that's cool and all, but
| it has zero place in this thread.
| FollowingTheDao wrote:
| Years ago? Try last year!
|
| https://www.theinformation.com/articles/seven-apple-
| supplier...
|
| And it's sick you think all they did is OK since they needed
| to "build its manufacturing capacity" and you forget it all
| the minute they show you a pretty photograph.
|
| And it is also sick that you think sharing the reality about
| Apple means "I have an axe to grind", and not that I am just
| a person who cares about humanity.
| Bud wrote:
| You're out of line. Think more carefully before referring
| to others as "sick".
|
| You haven't the slightest notion of what I "think" or what
| I have or have not "forgotten" or what I think is or is not
| "ok". I'll thank you to cease pretending otherwise.
|
| You clearly and obviously have an axe to grind, you have no
| objectivity whatsoever, and the stuff you're trying to
| inject into this thread simply has no place here. None at
| all.
| moron4hire wrote:
| I had a friend who was creating a cardboard miniature of a museum
| exhibit he was designing and he wanted to take photos of it "on
| the ground floor" to give a pre-visualization of what it would
| look like. So he pulled out his DSLR and was woefully
| disappointed that all his photos came out looking like photos of
| miniatures, even if he got really close in.
|
| I told him to switch to his smartphone. He'd be able to get in
| closer. The scale of the lens more closely matched the scale of
| the scene, so the relative angles between foreground and
| background objects would more closely match our expectations of
| being a full-sized scene. It came out great. Yes, we had to dump
| light on the thing to get the images to not be grainy. But the
| images had more of an "on the ground" feel.
|
| Because of that (and my own experiences with smartphone
| photography), I feel like these images all fail to use the
| hardware effectively to do something unique.
|
| Some others have talked about the differences in lenses and
| sensor sizes and all that, that makes high-quality smartphone
| photography so much harder than SLR photography. Yes, that is
| true, for the sorts of images that you would take with an SLR.
| But that's not the only kind of images you can take.
|
| The popularity of the SLR is both its biggest advantage and its
| biggest curse. It's advantageous because there are TONS of
| accessories and guides and examples, etc. ad nauseum. It's a
| curse because it sucks all the air out of the room in regards to
| other types of cameras. There are so many, many different types
| of cameras, and they all make unique shots that you really can't
| replicate with the other types of cameras.
|
| Few people have really explored what that means for smartphone
| cameras. It's clear that it would need to be used in ways that
| are unique to the device. Not just "it's the best camera you have
| with you, because your other camera is too heavy to always have
| on you." But stuff like, "because the lens is so tiny, we can
| squeeze shots out of tiny holes that would block a normal SLR".
| Stuff like, "this camera is a Star Trek tricorder connected to a
| global information network." I rarely ever see that.
| MaXtreeM wrote:
| Slight OT: I am thinking about buying a camera. I have never had
| a good camera system nor I ever had a flagship phone
| (iPhone/Samsung/Pixel). I though a mirrorless with good lenses
| would be a good starting choice. I don't want to do professional
| photography, I just want to shoot holidays in nature and my
| upcoming baby. I did some internet research and was blown away
| when people compare photos from best phones to photos from
| mirrorless/DSLR cameras. My impression now after some research is
| that you can get better looking images from camera if you are
| willing to do some post-processing in Lightroom, etc. If you
| compare raw images then a lot of times people tend to say that
| the one taken on a phone looks better (I know it might not look
| more "real", just that people like it more). Would you agree that
| buying a camera is worth only if you are willing to do a lot of
| preparation and post processing but if not just buy a phone with
| all the advantages it brings? Is it even worth buying a camera in
| 2022 if you are targeting a price of about what top model iPhone
| costs?
|
| Let's leave pure love of photography aside for the sake of
| argument.
| stu2b50 wrote:
| If it's for holidays and kids, I'd say stick with a top of the
| line phone, then think about getting a discrete camera for edge
| cases (if you have that kind of money)
|
| The best camera is the one you have available. Kids are mobile
| and wild and often do memorable things at unexpected time.
| Whipping out your iPhone and taking a video or picture is easy
| and pretty much always capable.
|
| Phone cameras, with much processing magic, do produce pretty
| good pictures. And pretty good pictures beat non existent
| excellent pictures because you didn't lug your camera around.
| matwood wrote:
| It depends. I've only bought more gear when I had an exact
| need. My first camera was a D40, and I used it for years until
| it simply stopped working. My next camera was a D7100 that
| added features I knew I wanted after using the D40 for years. I
| still use this camera. Recently I bought a Z5 because I wanted
| FF and to move to mirrorless. My lenses followed similar
| trajectories - want to take bird pictures, need a zoom.
|
| All the time I also mostly had the latest iPhone.
|
| The iPhone takes great pictures with little work in many
| (most?) situations.
|
| Is it worth buying a non-phone camera in 2022? I think if you
| really like taking pictures and are bumping into phone
| limitations, sure. But, if I started today, I would get a
| flagship phone first and grow from there.
| mmackh wrote:
| I do wonder what the subjects in these photos would look like
| with different cameras and lens combinations. Everything about
| those shots scream great composition, but held back by the
| technical aspects: blurry and distorted.
| renewiltord wrote:
| The iPhone's macro photography is best for the fact that I can
| take pictures of labels and stuff for later. Something that was
| made for pretty stuff that nonetheless works quite well for my
| mundane use-case. I love technology like this.
| Kalanos wrote:
| the resolution on these is terrible
| J_cst wrote:
| Close up pictures of flowers and plants. Vivid colours. Extremely
| boring. That's it, saved you a click. You can thank me later no
| prob.
|
| j/k
| qq66 wrote:
| The macro lens is the reason I bought the iPhone 13 Pro and the
| extreme sizem weight, and poor ergonomics of the phone are why I
| returned it. I'd buy an iPhone the dimensions of an iPhone Mini
| (but say, twice as thick) with the fancy cameras, LiDAR, etc.
| wonderbore wrote:
| Saint_Genet wrote:
| Technically impressive but visually uninteresting just about sums
| it up.
| xwdv wrote:
| Is this the climax of smartphone macrophotography? How much
| better could it get from here, seems impossible with the given
| constraints.
| michelb wrote:
| Although not a macro-related problem perse, these look great at
| the size they are taken, zooming in or enlarging them a little
| bit shows some of the flaws (overly processed, computational
| errors).
|
| These pictures have been made by people who have photography as
| a serious hobby and know what they are doing, hence the well-
| lit and positioned scenes. I have not been able to make a
| picture like these without a lot of effort. But it is possible.
|
| That said, it's a pretty incredible feature so far!
| yalogin wrote:
| All of them are extreme close up shots. I am guessing those are
| the ones that ended up being interesting may be?
| jeffbee wrote:
| That's what macrophotography means.
| yalogin wrote:
| TIL. Am not into photography as is obvious
| [deleted]
| thekoma wrote:
| People seem to always be impressed with close-up images of
| plants.
| irae wrote:
| Humans can learn a lot from observing the world around them. We
| do this a lot as kids. So maybe seeing up-close details we
| either can't see with the naked eye or never payed attention
| before can be interesting. At least to me, it feels to add
| completeness to my observation of what nature is capable of,
| and this enhances my conception of how much I was missing and
| it is now "complete" to me.
| whistlerbrk wrote:
| Agree with this.
|
| My children are so close to the ground they can observe
| things I just walk by. They are constantly pointing out to me
| things they find beautiful in their tiny details. Admittedly
| I've trained them to be highly observant but they've outdone
| me in a short time.
| asdfasgasdgasdg wrote:
| The trick to getting the best out of camera phones is to shore up
| their weaknesses with external devices. Cell phone cameras are
| multiple stops slower than "real" cameras (i.e. they take in 1/4
| to 1/8th as much light). So you add light to the scene to shore
| up that weakness.
|
| Most of these pictures were probably lit very carefully with high
| quality lights, or else were taken in bright daylight, and the
| phone was probably held in a high quality tripod. It is also
| likely that hundreds of dollars worth of software was used to
| edit each of these images.
|
| It's pretty cool that you can get such nice results from a phone.
| But you'd probably have an easier time of it on a five year old
| aps-c camera with a macro lens, to say nothing of modern 35mm
| cameras.
|
| These images are somewhat analogous to the videos of fake
| hamburgers that fast food companies use to sell their product.
| That is, the physical conditions where this picture was taken did
| exist. It's not totally CG. But the images are designed to make
| you think that you can get results that practically are out of
| reach for most of the people looking at the photos.
|
| Still knowing that can also allow you to make better cell phone
| pictures by taking into account those weaknesses when you're
| taking pictures. There are valuable techniques to learn from
| these images, aside from the fact that they are all high quality
| art.
| Karawebnetwork wrote:
| > It's pretty cool that you can get such nice results from a
| phone. But you'd probably have an easier time of it on a five
| year old aps-c camera with a macro lens, to say nothing of
| modern 35mm cameras.
|
| Sure, but how often do you have them on your person in time to
| take candid photos?
|
| I am in a lot of entomology and myrmecology online groups and
| people are able to take clear photos of insects that look like
| professional macro photos using their phones. Before that, only
| a handful of pro/powerusers were able to share this kind of
| quality.
|
| When asked what camera he used, one popular youtuber (I cannot
| remember the exact context) explained that while expensive
| cameras are better on paper he often relies on his iPhone + a
| cheap ring light clipped on it. Animals often act in
| interesting ways when you are not ready for it. The ease of
| using the device that is in your pocket often outweight the
| potential increase in quality that would come from setting up a
| studio level setup. The best picture is the one you are able to
| take.
| subhro wrote:
| > Sure, but how often do you have them on your person in time
| to take candid photos?
|
| Totally bad argument in justifying phone cameras. If you are
| having the expectation of getting photos of similar quality
| as shown on the page, my question is, how often do you have a
| high quality ring light on your person along with a stable
| tripod?
| Karawebnetwork wrote:
| A lot of reptiles, fishes and insects are in vivariums that
| already provide a good light source. For wild animals, you
| are fine without a light since they are mostly outdoor and
| unless you're planning for it chances are that you'll
| stumble on them during daylight.
|
| Personally, I have a lot of ring lights because beauty and
| makeup brands give them for free with a lot of products.
|
| But even without all of this, you can get great footage and
| photos.
|
| Take a look at this spider that was walking around my sink
| for example.
|
| The phone (pixel 3, already quite aged) did not have a lot
| of trouble to focus on it even if we are talking about a
| small spider that is only a few milimiter in size.
|
| It's a video so focus comes and goes but the parts where
| the focus is set on the spider are quite clear (ignoring
| the upload compression).
|
| I am no artist and was focusing more on the spider's
| behavior. Someone who is an artist could have snapped great
| macros at that moment.
|
| https://photos.app.goo.gl/z2RALoGeXiAo6uHG6
|
| Another example is this queen ant when it was in it's
| founding stage. The nanitics (first workers) are small even
| when it comes to ant scale. You can see them in great
| details and can even see the translucent parts of their
| gaster with the sugar water inside.
|
| Again, I focused on the behavior more than the art. But an
| artist could have taken a photo instead of a video with
| great results.
|
| https://photos.app.goo.gl/dmzMXLqG5v1cfFKx9
|
| Both of those were candid moments that I happened to snap
| because I had my phone in my pocket while my 4k camera and
| my canon reflex were in their box in my desk.
| kemayo wrote:
| It's a great argument for camera phones, because you don't
| need added lighting or stabilization to get _decent_ shots.
| The pictures you take are better than the ones you never
| took, and if you take a lot of pictures you 're more likely
| to stumble onto a great one even as a total amateur.
|
| I think the pictures on that page are aspirational, to be
| sure... but my own experience with this camera system
| suggest that they're not out of reach.
|
| Here's one of the first macro pictures I took with an
| iPhone 13 Pro a day or two after I got it, completely
| without stabilization, on a momentary stop while I was
| walking my dog: https://imgur.com/uux8RNS (I'm not saying
| I'm a good photographer; this is just for technical
| purposes. It's also unedited.)
|
| Compare that to the "leaf illumination" picture in the
| article. The professional's picture is noticeably better,
| of course. But it's more a matter of framing and choice of
| subject than any hardware limitation.
| asdfasgasdgasdg wrote:
| Well, I often have a "real" camera on my person, because I
| like cameras. It definitely gets me better results than when
| I use my phone camera. That's just my taste. I'm certainly
| not saying your average joe would be best-served by going out
| and buying a GFX-100S.
|
| I'm not sure what YouTuber you're referring to, but most
| popular photography YouTubers mostly use real cameras still.
| Occasionally they'll do a gimmick video where they use a
| phone, but it's the exception, not the rule.
| Karawebnetwork wrote:
| For sure, if I am on a trip I'll have my reflex big bulky
| camera around my neck. But day to day, commuting to work,
| at a friend's, etc., all I have is my phone.
| camillomiller wrote:
| Dude, have you ever even used an iPhone 13 Pro? Believe me, the
| macros you take with this phones are stunning. And lighting and
| stabilization are a determining factor for macro even with
| cameras, actually even more so for cameras than phones.
|
| These pictures btw were not taken this way. The reason I know
| is because I talked to the Italian winner and Apple about
| exactly that.
|
| Check this one out:
| https://www.icloud.com/iclouddrive/0b1PRNfudllgp0q1LyuHrW1OQ...
|
| Taken at dusk. No other lights.
| thr0wawayf00 wrote:
| > But you'd probably have an easier time of it on a five year
| old aps-c camera with a macro lens, to say nothing of modern
| cameras.
|
| That's probably true but as a casual hobbyist, it's so much
| easier to justify spending $1k on a phone and a few hundred on
| apps than getting buying a legit macro camera setup, especially
| used camera equipment.
|
| I was frustrated by the macro limitations of the iPhone 13 pro
| and started perusing for macro camera setups and totally balked
| at the prices. It made more sense to hold out for another major
| camera spec bump in the next generation of phones (which is
| rumored).
| sudosysgen wrote:
| You can buy a competent macro lens for around 200$ (the Canon
| EF 100mm macro), and camera to slap it on for around 400$.
| LegitShady wrote:
| >few hundred on apps
|
| I don't even understand what you think you're going to buy
| that will make you a good macro photographer for hundreds of
| dollars. Hundreds on apps instead of dedicated macro
| hardware? I can't imagine that will do anything but waste
| hundreds of dollars.
| thr0wawayf00 wrote:
| Hence why I'm a casual hobbyist, I'm not trying to win
| competitions or anything here.
| asdfasgasdgasdg wrote:
| What I was personally referring to when I mentioned
| "software" is a photo editing application like Photoshop,
| Lightroom, DxO Photolab, etc. The subscriptions/purchase
| prices of these type of software is $200+. There are free
| software versions of these apps but most photographers do
| not use them.
| matwood wrote:
| PS + LR CC comes in a photography bundle for $10/month.
|
| https://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop-
| lightroom/compare-p...
|
| I've tried a lot of other DAM + editing software and keep
| coming back to LR. YMMV.
| LegitShady wrote:
| You're going to need such software whether you use an
| iphone or a DSLR. There's no difference in cost except
| the hardware.
| asdfasgasdgasdg wrote:
| Sorry, to be extra clear, my point is that you will not
| get these results without such software, because photos
| almost universally require editing in order to look their
| best. But my belief is that Apple, with their "Shot on
| iPhone" marketing, is trying to convey that you will get
| these results straight out of the camera. This is
| unlikely to actually be the case. That's the sum of my
| point w.r.t. software.
| LegitShady wrote:
| You can get 98% of the same capability with much cheaper
| software - you don't need spend several hundred on
| software (affinity photos does focus stacking raws, for
| example). But you're right the best looking photos are
| usually processed somehow.
| Tagbert wrote:
| and you can do most of the photo edits with software like
| Affinity Photo or Pixelmator Pro without the "hundreds"
| price tag.
| asdfasgasdgasdg wrote:
| I don't know what your budget is, but it is not _that_
| expensive to get into a "real" macro setup, at least
| compared to the cost of a new phone. Try this on for size:
|
| https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1485795-REG/7artisans.
| ..
|
| https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=a6100&_sacat=.
| ..
|
| https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1059024-REG/manfrotto.
| ..
|
| https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1459178-REG/viltrox_v.
| ..
|
| These items come out to a total of about $1,000 and will
| vastly outperform any iPhone. Note that I am not recommending
| this particular setup as I am not a macro photographer, I
| just wanted to demonstrate what's possible. I'm also not
| saying you're wrong to wait for a better cell phone camera.
| Your preferences are your own and there is nothing wrong with
| them. Just trying to provide some information.
| dr_zoidberg wrote:
| Compact cameras (under $500) usually have great macro
| lenses too, though you miss the flexibility of being able
| to change the lens. I've owned for quite a while a Micro
| Four Thirds camera from Olympus and that's a very good spot
| to be a hobbyist: not too expensive, but can do "pro
| things" like changing lenses, shoots raw, has a horseshoe
| socket, etc. Of course, the quality is not the same as a
| full frame camera, but then again, I'm not a pro :)
| nl wrote:
| The A6100 (linked above) isn't a full-frame camera
| either.
|
| It uses a APS-C sensor (dimensions of 23.5 x 15.6 mm).
| The Micro Four Thirds sensor is 17.3 mm x 13.0 mm
|
| Full Frame is 24 mm x 36 mm.
| duxup wrote:
| Understanding the strengths and weaknesses of your equipment is
| pretty much the secret to ... everything, including knowing the
| internal software results you get ;)
|
| When photography was a bigger hobby for me I had an old digital
| camera that had a great lens, but tiny sensor and could be slow
| exposure wise. It did have a great set of built in color modes
| that I had trouble emulating in software ( and didn't want to
| spend time on that a great deal ) so I kept around and got a
| cheap-o mono pod and blamo it's slow nature was less of an
| issue.
|
| Folks with fancy new equipment seemed to struggle emulating
| what I got with relative ease.
|
| Now I probably couldn't emulate what they did in many
| situations, but I didn't try either, I knew what that equipment
| could do and it worked.
|
| The world of photography is a funky world of pixel peepers,
| TRUE---ish advice, and folks throwing tons of money at
| equipment and software and hours of editing and ... just
| sticking with some specific equipment for a while / learning
| it's nature can save you A LOT of time and money.
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| Great advice. It would be fun to see a behind-the-scenes of how
| some of these photos were taken
|
| > But you'd probably have an easier time of it on a five year
| old aps-c camera with a macro lens, to say nothing of modern
| 35mm cameras.
|
| The iPhone camera really is fantastic for what it is (economies
| of scale are an amazing thing) but you're not wrong. Doing this
| sort of photography work on an iPhone is more about the
| challenge than the capabilities.
|
| One of the interesting things about photography is that so many
| capable cameras and lenses have been produced over the past
| couple decades that you can stop by eBay and pick up some truly
| capable gear for relatively cheap if you do your research. It's
| tempting to get pulled into the world of modern full-frame
| cameras and the latest glass, but the truth is that an older
| mirrorless camera combined with some known-good old glass will
| produce amazing photos.
| formerly_proven wrote:
| This is even true for digital gear. At base ISO, cameras like
| a D7100/7200 have as good image quality as it gets for that
| class, and you can pick those up for cheap. Even fairly high-
| end, high-resolution full-frame cameras can be had for less
| than 500 quid (e.g. D800) and those still have outstanding
| image quality; there really wasn't a whole lot of major
| improvements in image quality in the last ten years when you
| control the light (i.e. don't need high ISO).
|
| Things get expensive if you want...
|
| ... best low-noise performance (needs sensor from the last
| ~five years, older stuff usually has color shifts and other
| issues which are not easy to fix)
|
| ... video
|
| ... mirrorless
|
| ... fast AF (especially if you also want mirrorless)
|
| ... all of the above
| kuschku wrote:
| Not even necessarily - the Sony a6300 retails around 300
| bucks used, which gives you 4K30 or 2K120 video at 8bit.
| It's an APS-C mirrorless with fast AF, and its low-noise
| performance is (although a few years out of date) excellent
| for its price.
|
| And in real-life circumstances it's better than a Google
| Pixel.
| foldr wrote:
| > (i.e. they take in 1/4 to 1/8th as much light)
|
| Not sure if this is true for macro. For a given angle of view,
| the amount of light collected is determined by the absolute
| diameter of the aperture (as opposed to the f number). It's
| rarely practical to use a very wide aperture for macro
| photography on a DSLR for depth of field reasons. People do all
| sorts of unnecessarily complex calculations with crop factors,
| but in this scenario all you have to think about is the
| diameter of the aperture in mm. The phone has an aperture of
| perhaps around 3-4mm. You're unlikely to use a wider aperture
| than that shooting macro on APS-C or full frame.
| dylan604 wrote:
| All Macro photography requires extra light, it's not just
| anything to do specific to cell phones. That's why there are so
| many flash rigs designed for this.
|
| Also, the iPhone 13 camera has ridiculously fast lenses[0]:
| Pro 12MP camera system: Telephoto, Wide, and Ultra Wide cameras
| Telephoto: f/2.8 aperture Wide: f/1.5 aperture
| Ultra Wide: f/1.8 aperture and 120deg field of view
|
| If you search for lenses for "real" cameras with those
| apertures and focal lengths, you'll find 4 digit price tags for
| each one.
|
| Sounds like you need some more research into macrophotography
|
| [0]https://www.apple.com/iphone-13-pro/specs/
| twic wrote:
| Numerical aperture alone does not tell you anything about the
| amount of light gathered. The product of aperture and sensor
| size does. Phone cameras still have much smaller sensors than
| DSLRs.
|
| Your advice to learn more about photography certainly seems
| good.
| twic wrote:
| The Hubble Space Telescope has an aperture of a pathetic
| f/24 [1]. I guess they should just fire an iPhone up there
| instead, huh.
|
| [1] SS5.2.2 in https://asd.gsfc.nasa.gov/archive/hubble/a_p
| df/news/SM2-Medi...
| SingularCrane wrote:
| f stops need to be adjusted for sensor size [0]. The iPhone
| 13 Pro cameras all have and equivalent f stop > f/8 [1]
|
| [0]https://photographylife.com/equivalence-also-includes-
| apertu...
| [1]https://www.dpreview.com/articles/6780391159/all-apple-
| iphon...
| esteth wrote:
| stops only need to be adjusted for total photons gathered,
| not for photons per unit square
| Ma8ee wrote:
| Yes, and a much smaller sensor will of course gather much
| less light.
| foldr wrote:
| For the same aperture, sure. But you are not going to be
| shooting macro photos at f1.5 on full frame (for depth of
| field reasons alone). For real world macro photography
| you'd typically be stopping down _at least_ to f8 on a
| full frame camera. At that point the DSLR has a
| considerably smaller advantage in terms of the total
| amount of light gathered.
|
| One thing that people often miss is that you can think
| about all of this just in terms of the absolute diameter
| of the aperture (not the f number, just the diameter in
| mm). For a given angle of view, the diameter of the
| aperture determines how much light you gather. The
| question is simply whether a photographer using a DSLR is
| going to be able to use an aperture that is significantly
| wider (in mm) than the ~4mm aperture of a phone camera.
| For depth of field reasons, it's unlikely that they will
| be able to do so.
| Ma8ee wrote:
| Why wouldn't you need to stop down similarly on a phone
| camera?
| foldr wrote:
| Because depth of field depends on focal length as well as
| f number. Or to put it another way, it depends on the
| absolute diameter of the aperture, not the ratio of the
| focal length to the aperture diameter (= the f number).
|
| (Also, of course, you can't stop down on a phone camera
| as it has a fixed aperture.)
| freedomben wrote:
| Just a meta-comment, but your reply was really good until the
| last sentence.
|
| > _Sounds like you need some more research into
| macrophotography_
|
| That undermined your otherwise very factual
| rebuttal/clarification because it seems like at best an
| impossible standard (everybody could always use more research
| into anything), and at worst a "you don't know as much as me"
| veiled in professionalism/passive aggressiveness. The
| interpretation is up to the reader (some of whom will be
| charitable in their interpretation, others will not).
|
| To be clear I'm not accusing you of "the worst" (I have no
| idea what was in your heart/mind and I don't presume to
| guess), I'm executing on a personal goal to try and help
| elevate conversations through useful/constructive feedback.
| Also I'm not presuming that this comment/feedback is useful
| or constructive as it may not be, but I hope that it is
| because that's my goal.
| nathias wrote:
| I know you think what you're doing is "elevating"
| conversations, but ... "calling out" people for the
| slightest bit of negativity is an extremely toxic behavior.
| Quality discourse requires negativity and fosters a healthy
| span of tolerance for it. Your interpretation is also very
| narrow and passive aggressive itself, to me it seems
| completely neutral that in a case when someone has a strong
| opinion based on ignorance, you remind them of their
| ignorance - not just for people reading it but for their
| own sake.
| buttersbrian wrote:
| Disagree. Attack the arguments, not the person.
|
| Why did that person feel the need to attack the poster?
| What did they gain from it? How did it help the argument?
|
| I don't think there's a single benefit from that line
| other than to be self-serving statement that says "i know
| more than you" when their rebuttal did that more
| effectively while staying on topic.
| thrashh wrote:
| I find that last line perfectly justified.
|
| OP's post was incredibly dismissive and incorrect but was
| written as if it was from an expert.
|
| It's textbook misinformation as far as I am concerned.
| asdfasgasdgasdg wrote:
| My post was correct and the person who was responding to
| me is incorrect. I did not mean to sound dismissive -- I
| intentionally put multiple paragraphs congratulating the
| artists and praising what can be done with cell phones in
| order to try to avoid that look. But it is important to
| realize that these awards are _marketing_ and marketing
| needs to be interrogated, IMO.
| jarcoal wrote:
| It's not really about being justified, it's about being
| gentler with people. We don't have to jump all over each
| other, there is another way.
| dymk wrote:
| I think OP will live.
| lolsal wrote:
| When given the choice, choose compassion.
| dymk wrote:
| I think the reply was plenty respectful, and the whining
| to the contrary is just a veiled attempt to derail the
| conversation.
| YPPH wrote:
| Should that be the standard we hold ourselves to?
| tshaddox wrote:
| I interpreted the phrase as meaning something more like
| "when you make claims about the fundamentals of
| macrophotography with such a confident, authoritative tone,
| those claims should be backed by more research than you
| seem to have done."
| sudosysgen wrote:
| The rebuttal is actually incorrect and suffers from many
| misconceptions typical in photography. This makes the
| condescension much worse, because whoever wrote that did
| not live up to their own standard.
| [deleted]
| dr_dshiv wrote:
| I support your goal! Maybe there is a way to state this in
| fewer words more often.
| Karawebnetwork wrote:
| It really depends on the purposes of the comment.
|
| Direct responses can be intended to educate the person they
| are responding to, but they can also be intended to warn
| people around.
|
| Does this person want to get a point across with empathy or
| do they want to discredit the comment to future readers to
| avoid the circulation of false information?
| BenFranklin100 wrote:
| Stepping past the arrogance for a second, there's more to
| macro photography than f#. A big factor is the working
| distance to the object. Not only is this important for
| skittish live subjects, it's also important for static
| subjects for the practical reason that the extra distance
| provides space for proper lighting equipment. A good used
| Nikon macro lens can be had for less than a grand and a DX
| SLR body for less than $300. That's cheaper than the price I
| paid for my iPhone 13 Pro, which has proven a bit of a
| disappointment for macro work.
|
| Further, the wider open the lens, the more shallow the depth
| of field, which is already quite shallow in macro work.
| Having the space for proper lighting can allow one to stop
| the lens down and capture more parts of the image in focus.
| F# is a secondary consideration as macro often works best at
| f/8 or f/11.
| foldr wrote:
| >F# is a secondary consideration as macro often works best
| at f/8 or f/11.
|
| At typical full frame focal lengths. With the shorter focal
| length of an iPhone you get much more depth of field for a
| given aperture.
| BenFranklin100 wrote:
| Good point.
|
| Lens to object distance is still an important issue in
| practice however.
| Ma8ee wrote:
| Lenses aren't that expensive, especially not prime lenses.
| You get a very decent Canon brand 50mm f/1.8 for $125 new. So
| you could easily get each of these lenses in the lower
| hundreds.
|
| https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/buy/SLR-Camera-
| Lenses/ci/274/...
| kuschku wrote:
| > If you search for lenses for "real" cameras with those
| apertures and focal lengths, you'll find 4 digit price tags
| for each one.
|
| The aperture is relative to the diameter of the first lens
| element. So you can't just compare these values directly.
| _ph_ wrote:
| Sure you can. The f-stop is the ratio of focal length to
| aperture diameter. A aperture of f/4 means, the aperture is
| one fourth of the focal length. At the same f-stop, you get
| the same light density on the sensor surface.
|
| The catch is: a phone has a much smaller sensor, so at the
| same f-stop, across the whole sensor less light is gathered
| and consequently, you have a weaker signal.
| skylanh wrote:
| Wait until you start looking at transmission values...
|
| f-stop doesn't mean much other than the maximum that the
| aperture for that lens can open.
|
| It doesn't indicate lens or element quality, or
| aberrations. There's a reason that pixel peeping, gear
| games, and reviewers are so prevalent in high end
| photography.
|
| As a simple extension to this, most of my lenses work
| better a few stops before maximum f-stop.
|
| So, yes, but no.
| _ph_ wrote:
| You were talking about the light being gathered by the
| lens. That is mostly determined by the f-stop.
| Technically it is the t-stop, but they should be
| reasonably close together not to make a huge difference.
| Quite the contrary, as the phone lens has less elements
| than some modern camera lens designs, the phone might
| suffer less from the difference than the camera lens.
|
| The aspects you are now referring to are about the lens
| quality. Yes, I would expect a real camera lens to be
| much better than the lens of an iPhone. There is no doubt
| about that. But in the posting I answered to, you spoke
| about the comparability of aperture values.
| NAG3LT wrote:
| In practice, light gathering correlates to F-stop quite
| well on most normal modern lenses, transmission losses
| are very low. The main exceptions are deliberately
| apodized lenses, which have considerably transmission
| losses wide open.
|
| For the rest - yeah, f# is just one of important
| specifications.
| canbus wrote:
| f-stops are relative to the size of the glass + sensor. They
| aren't equivalent to f1.5-2.8 on an APSC or full-frame
| sensor.
| asdfasgasdgasdg wrote:
| f-numbers do not have the same meaning across different sized
| sensors. For example, f/1.5 on the iPhone is equivalent to
| f/8.2 on a 35mm camera. This is pretty slow by the standards
| of full frame lenses, and as you can see in my other post, it
| is not expensive to acquire much better lenses than this that
| will achieve much better results with less effort.
|
| See the chart on the first page of this article:
| https://www.dpreview.com/articles/6780391159/all-apple-
| iphon...
|
| For a detailed explanation of how to compare f-numbers across
| cameras have a look at this article:
| https://photographylife.com/equivalence-also-includes-
| apertu...
| foldr wrote:
| F numbers have exactly the same meaning across different
| sized sensors: the ratio of the focal length to the
| aperture diameter. The size of the sensor does not even
| enter into the definition of the f number.
|
| >For example, f/1.5 on the iPhone is equivalent to f/8.2 on
| a 35mm camera
|
| This is a meaningless statement unless you specify what
| sort of equivalence you're talking about. I assume you mean
| to say that they're equivalent in terms of depth of field
| and in terms of the total amount of light gathered for a
| given angle of view. This, however, just goes to show that
| the 35mm camera doesn't have much of an advantage for macro
| photography. If the 35mm camera has to stop down at least
| to f8 (which it probably will, to get sufficient depth of
| field) then it won't gather any more light than the phone.
|
| The basic point here is that for a given angle of view, you
| can only gather more light than the iPhone if the iPhone
| has depth of field to spare. Otherwise you can only gather
| more light than the iPhone by sacrificing depth of field.
| This is because both the total amount of light gathered
| (for a given angle of view) and the depth of field (for a
| given angle of view) are determined by the absolute
| diameter of the aperture.
| sudosysgen wrote:
| You're telling people to do more research but don't
| understand how photography in general works.
|
| The speed of the lens is not the main factor. A Micro4/3 lens
| at f/2 is cheaper than a full frame lens at f/2, which is
| cheaper than a medium format in turn. The iPhone's sensors
| are much smaller still than FF.
|
| The lenses on the iPhone are equivalent to some of the
| cheapest lenses in any given system.
|
| Indeed, a comparable system would be the 10-18mm EF-S plus
| whatever kit lens you have.
|
| Talking about relative aperture and angle of view at the same
| time is incredibly misleading. If you want to talk about
| angle of view, you need to use absolute aperture.
| ghostly_s wrote:
| Most of the photos Apple highlights in this campaign are also
| shot with very expensive external lenses.
| camillomiller wrote:
| This is false FUD.
| galaktus wrote:
| Why would you make such false claims?
| Bud wrote:
| False. Not a single one of them used any external lens at
| all, according to the page itself. This may be true for the
| campaign as a whole, but it's not true for the page under
| discussion in this thread.
| balls187 wrote:
| my Iphone 13 Pro has very (very) impressive low light
| performance.
| gnicholas wrote:
| > _the phone was probably held in a high quality tripod_
|
| Why is a high-quality tripod needed? You can just set the
| camera to be on a timer so that it's not shaking (from you
| touching the shutter button) when it captures the photo. I
| think it's also possible to use an Apple Watch to trigger the
| shutter.
|
| > _It is also likely that hundreds of dollars worth of software
| was used to edit each of these images._
|
| Do photo contests typically allow entrants to heavily edit
| photos?
| mym1990 wrote:
| "Do photo contests typically allow entrants to heavily edit
| photos?"
|
| This is going to depend on the genre of the contest, but for
| most contest types outside of the journalistic realm editing
| style will very much be a part of the process. You will
| typically submit the final print and no one will know what
| the original picture was. There are some contests out there
| with some pretty outrageous editing though!
| rococode wrote:
| I'm no expert but I think these shots often use slower
| shutter speeds, for example 0.5s instead of 0.01s. This
| increases the amount of light, but any movement that happens
| while the shutter is open will cause blur. Movement causes
| blur at fast shutter speeds too, but it's less noticeable
| because obviously you can move much less in 0.01s than you
| can in 0.5s.
| gnicholas wrote:
| I get that, but even a cheap tripod (I use a Joby) will
| hold a phone still for .5 seconds, won't it? You can put
| the phone on a 10 second delay, so any movement generated
| by you touching the shutter button would have dissipated by
| the time the photo is taken.
| infinityio wrote:
| > Do photo contests typically allow entrants to heavily edit
| photos?
|
| To my knowledge - yes
| dietrichepp wrote:
| I disagree that bigger cameras are better for macrophotography.
| I say this because of the physics of how light works in
| macrophotography, which matches my experience doing
| macrophotography with larger cameras (6x7cm and 4x5").
|
| The long story short is that reducing the aperture has two
| effects on image sharpness. Smaller apertures increase the
| depth of field, bringing more of your scene into focus. Smaller
| apertures also introduce diffusion, which makes the whole image
| softer. This tradeoff means that there is a medium aperture
| which makes your image as sharp as possible.
|
| Photographing people with a 35mm camera, the aperture which
| maximizes sharpness is often achieved with apertures somewhere
| around f/5.6 or f/8. It is advantageous to use a 35mm camera
| because the larger sensor size can reveal more detail and
| capture more light. 35mm also gives you access to larger
| apertures and those nice, blurry backgrounds.
|
| In macrophotography, large cameras just aren't as advantageous.
| The small apertures that you typically use will produce soft
| images, and the soft images can be captured well enough on a
| small sensor. Small cameras give you very blurry backgrounds to
| begin with, so you wouldn't choose a large camera to blur the
| background. Additionally, small cameras require less lens
| movement, proportional to their size, to focus at the short
| distances required for macrophotography.
|
| I do some macrophotography with my RZ67. Mostly pictures of
| flowers. It's fun, but I know that it would be much more
| convenient to use a smaller camera, and I wouldn't be
| sacrificing image quality. One of the big reasons I use the
| RZ67 is because it uses a bellows to focus, and the bellows is
| long enough that you can focus very close. However, there's a
| lower limit to the size of the subjects I can comfortably
| photograph, and if I were serious about macrophotography, I
| would use a smaller camera.
|
| Summary: Large cameras are better at taking pictures of large
| things, small cameras are better at taking pictures of small
| things.
| asdfasgasdgasdg wrote:
| I appreciate your perspective, but most folks who are at the
| top of the macrophotography game use 35mm cameras and macro
| lenses. It's not actually the case that smaller sensors are
| net beneficial for taking macro photographs, otherwise we'd
| see a different trend. Even if these folks were just looking
| for the "real camera" ergonomics, they'd be using m43, but
| few of them do. (Perhaps you get some advantage of more depth
| of field, but 35mm camera lenses can be stopped down to
| achieve the same effect, when it is desired.)
|
| There are exceptions, as my sibling comment points out, but
| if you go to a list of the top macro photographers and check
| each one out, 90+% of them will be using 35mm cameras.
| mark-r wrote:
| You're just looking in the wrong places. Check this out:
| https://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/4438556
| asdfasgasdgasdg wrote:
| I'm not surprised that there exist folks doing macro work
| on M43. And I'm not surprised that you can find such
| people in the corresponding forum on dpreview.com. :) I
| was not making a universal claim of nonexistence.
| dietrichepp wrote:
| I'm always floored by the amazing results you can get
| from focus stacking.
| dietrichepp wrote:
| People use the equipment they like with good ergonomics--
| equipment they are familiar with. Very few people
| understand their equipment well enough and understand the
| physics well enough to justify their choices from a purely
| technical image-quality standpoint, and very few people
| actually try out different equipment to see what the
| results are (which might cost thousands of dollars, just
| for starters).
|
| Instead, most people come up with all sorts of
| justifications for why their equipment is the best. And
| that's ok. In the end, photographers take good pictures and
| we are happy. There is no underlying need for photographers
| to use the "best" equipment available to them, and in
| actual practice, you will find photos in galleries taken
| using a camera phone or a cheap plastic Holga, hung right
| next to pictures taken on a 4x5" that look immaculate.
|
| > Perhaps you get some advantage of more depth of field,
| but 35mm camera lenses can be stopped down to achieve the
| same effect, when it is desired.
|
| The premise I'm operating under is that you'll make, more
| or less, the same artistic choices with different
| equipment. In other words, if you shoot micro four thirds
| and switch to 35mm, you double the f-number (e.g. go from
| f/11 to f/22), get roughly the same depth of field, roughly
| the same field of view, roughly the same image sharpness.
|
| There are two problems here. One problem is that the image
| is not particularly sharp to begin with, so any extra
| resolution provided by a better sensor is wasted. The
| second problem is that larger lenses are operated farther
| from their ideal focal distances.
|
| The formula for focal distance of an ideal lens is
|
| 1/f = 1/d1 + 1/d2,
|
| where f is the focal length, d1 is the subject distance,
| and d2 is the distance to the image. Normally, d1 >> d2,
| and you can consider a 50mm lens on a 35mm camera as the
| same as a 25mm lens on micro four thirds. For
| macrophotography, d1 [?] d2, and changing the sensor size
| has a radical impact on how far a lens must be moved to
| remain in focus in relative terms. That is, when you double
| the sensor size, you have to more than double the distance
| you move the lens.
|
| This means that larger lenses are operating farther outside
| their ideal focal distances, and this has a negative impact
| on image sharpness. Macro lenses are specifically designed
| to be operated in this range, but the fact remains, larger
| lenses are still operating in a more extreme regime
| compared to smaller lenses.
|
| You get pretty good results by just copying what most
| people use, but the fact than 90+% of people are using
| equipment X does not mean that equipment X is ideal. Plenty
| of musicians have completely incorrect notions about what
| kind of impact various choices they make about their gear
| has on how they sound, too--these beliefs often
| _completely_ fail to hold up under any reasonable amount of
| scrutiny.
|
| Photographers commonly believe that larger lenses take
| better pictures. Reality is more complicated--there are a
| ton of tradeoffs both with lens design from a practical
| perspective and tradeoffs involving the underlying physics
| that make the situation much more complicated.
| petepete wrote:
| This lines up with what Don Don Komarechka says on the
| subject. His images are fantastic and he shoots micro 4/3.
|
| https://www.donkom.ca
| HidyBush wrote:
| >Cell phone cameras are multiple stops slower than "real"
| cameras (i.e. they take in 1/4 to 1/8th as much light).
|
| this is not true. the iPhone camera's sensor receives the same
| density of light from its f/1.8 lens than any old traditional
| camera using an f/1.8 lens. this means the stops are identical.
| of course the total amount of light that passes through the
| iPhone's lens is much smaller than a normal camera's, but that
| has no bearing on the photo's exposure. the real difference
| rests in the signal to noise ratio, which is determined by
| pixel density, and that's why smartphone photos are incredibly
| noisy.
| camillomiller wrote:
| This
| twoWhlsGud wrote:
| That: https://www.dpreview.com/articles/2666934640/what-is-
| equival...
| galaktus wrote:
| > Most of these pictures were probably lit very carefully with
| high quality lights, or else were taken in bright daylight, and
| the phone was probably held in a high quality tripod. It is
| also likely that hundreds of dollars worth of software was used
| to edit each of these images.
|
| Like they do with "professional" cameras as well.
| camillomiller wrote:
| Actually way less than with pro cameras
| mrbonehead wrote:
| jacobolus wrote:
| > _"Most of these pictures were probably lit very carefully
| with high quality lights, or else were taken in bright daylight
| [...] hundreds of dollars worth of software was used to edit
| [...] analogous to the videos of fake hamburgers"_
|
| You don't have to speculate. Most of the photographers directly
| tell you how these were set up:
|
| > _love going on early morning walks with my iPhone 13 Pro. The
| 'golden hour' brings the best out of nature_
|
| > _I've used a spot studio light on the lily with a dark
| background._
|
| > _This one instance was during the sliver of golden hour when
| the sun is shining directly into my window, illuminating all of
| the tiny cells in each leaf._
|
| > _I used two items that I found in my kitchen fridge: a
| strawberry and a can of soda. I placed a clear vase on my
| kitchen counter, poured the soda into the vase, and used a
| piece of black paper as the background. I then dropped the
| strawberry in the vase of soda and waited. Slowly, bubbles
| began to form on the surface of the strawberry, and its texture
| was completely transformed._
|
| > _This image was taken along the edge of Riverside Park in
| Manhattan while on a morning walk with our puppy this winter._
|
| > _This tiny, shimmering liquid jewel is delicately nestled at
| the base of a leaf after a tropical storm, almost imperceptible
| to the human eye._
|
| > _The photo was taken when my 3-year-old son discovered the
| blossom of the tulip at home. I then appreciated the flower
| with my son and took out my iPhone, trying to capture the
| moment when the sun kissed the flower, which created a perfect
| shadow at the petals. As I moved my iPhone closer to the
| flower, it automatically turned on macro mode,_
|
| It is entirely possible for someone on a tight budget to make
| their own studio-like lighting, and there are good photo
| editing tools available for free. Saying <<don't bother to be
| inspired by these lovely smartphone photos because some
| professionals spend thousands of dollars on lighting and
| Photoshop>> is lazy cynical negativity in the extreme. And
| <<people who win photography contests are typically more
| careful tool users than an average person with no experience>>
| is hardly a deep insight.
| bee_rider wrote:
| I am a little suspicious of some of these, though. For
| example in the last one, it seems a bit weird that his son
| discovered a tulip, and it just happened to be directly in
| front of a perfectly black background (?). I suspect some of
| the stories have been tweaked to play up the convenience of
| having the phone handy. But they are still very nice shots!
| matwood wrote:
| I love the descriptions b/c they explain the 'art' behind
| photo taking. It's people being creative, which is really
| what photos should be about.
| barrell wrote:
| I got the canon 100L macro lens last spring for my 6D mark II
| (after drooling over it for literally 10 years), and ended up
| getting the iPhone 13 Pro when it came out. So I'm a macro noob
| with no other equipment.
|
| Can confirm, everything out of my dslr + macro lens comes out
| _perfect_. It 's ridiculous how hard it is to take a bad
| picture with those. Fluorescent lights, cloudy days, handheld,
| they're all perfect.
|
| That being said I've definitely used and shared more images
| from my iPhone macro mode. There have been a bunch of misfires,
| lighting is hard, sharpness is not there across the board - but
| it definitely scratches that itch and I find myself using my
| macro lens less.
|
| Although after writing this I fully expect to run around my
| house for an hour next time the sun is out to take some macro
| shots with the macro lens :D
|
| TL;DR - even as a pixel peeper the convenience of having macro
| on the phone puts dust on my dslr macro lens.
| dotancohen wrote:
| I hope that you like flowers. All but two of the photos are
| leaves or petals.
| atultw wrote:
| "A Drop of Freedom" reminds me of Apple's old flower wallpapers
| with the black background
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