[HN Gopher] Post-processing is ruining iPhone photos
___________________________________________________________________
Post-processing is ruining iPhone photos
Author : retskrad
Score : 182 points
Date : 2023-01-07 17:40 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (9to5mac.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (9to5mac.com)
| rubatuga wrote:
| I've been saying this for a while now. iPhone 8 seems to be one
| of the last of the iPhones without horrible post-processing. My
| iPhone 13 will regularly change the colour of my face to a deep
| orange in difficult lighting conditions, for that "HDR" look.
| natemcintosh wrote:
| Having watched the MKBHD video in question
| (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88kd9tVwkH8), I believe he's
| actually saying that iPhones light people's faces up uniformly,
| even when light is coming distinctly from one side. Most of the
| time, it's a pleasing look, but sometimes it doesn't look all
| that great. Apple went for "it looks better on average". And I
| think that's exactly what most people want out of the default
| camera app on their iPhone. If you want more control, there are
| some really great full manual control apps out there, e.g. Halide
| tpmx wrote:
| Yes. I've been annoyed by this (Iphone 13 Pro Max, iOS 16). Way
| too much AI/machine learning/guessing.
| nayroclade wrote:
| I discovered this issue just last month trying to take a good
| photo of my partner sat next to our Christmas tree. No matter
| what I did, the iPhone kept brightening the image and losing the
| darkened look I was going for. Even after disabling every "smart"
| feature I could, it still uniformly brightened everything and
| reduced the contrast.
|
| What was perhaps the most infuriating thing was that what I was
| seeing in the viewfinder preview looked great. I could _see_ the
| photo, as I desired it, but when I tried to capture it, I got
| something else.
| mozman wrote:
| At some point I just started screenshooting the preview.
| corobo wrote:
| I had a right laugh with this one. Taking sweet shots in the
| moonlight, that sort of ethereal white blue glow over
| everything.
|
| Phone took 5 seconds or so to take each picture and it came out
| looking like it was just daylight. The only way you could tell
| I took it at night was the creation time of the file. The photo
| had things visible that I couldn't even see with my naked eye!
|
| Technologically impressive, sure. What I was taking a picture
| of? Not at all.
| volker48 wrote:
| I would assume you would turn it off if you knew so you could
| take the type of night photo you wanted, but this feature can
| be disabled https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT211306.
| foldr wrote:
| You can turn night mode off and drag the exposure slider down
| if you want a more atmospheric look.
| corobo wrote:
| Aye when I got back I googled why the hell the camera was
| doing superman night vision mode but the moment was lost.
|
| I'll know for future reference but there's been no more
| combos of frosty and full moon so far.
|
| Ah well. Wasn't an important picture or anything, just
| seemed neat. My phone encouraged me to enjoy the moment
| instead :)
| astrange wrote:
| Cameras don't know what time of day it is and can't see in
| the dark like we can. Usually you want night mode on, because
| the alternative isn't "nice dark picture", it's "you can't
| see anything".
|
| If you want to reproduce a complicated scene like that, use a
| full manual app like Halide and then edit the raw back to
| what you remember. Or get an a7s.
| e12e wrote:
| > Cameras don't know what time of day it is
|
| On the other hand the _iphone_ knows what time it is, your
| location, the location of the moon, the weather - it could
| probably guess if you 're outside or inside - so it seems
| like a bit of a waste it can't do a better job at
| anticipating the scene...
| bee_rider wrote:
| I've downloaded the app that the Moment lens folks put out,
| which lets you do things like set ISO and shutter speed, etc.
| Generally I'm suspicious of camera apps because it seems like a
| low-effort way of getting access to a user's photo reel and
| other personal info (oh yah sure we need to constantly track
| your location to help tag the photos!), but I figure they have
| a business model (selling lenses) and a reputation so maybe
| they aren't so creepy.
|
| OTOH I don't really have anything interesting on my phone in
| the first place, so it all really is a bit academic to me.
| astrange wrote:
| Camera apps don't need access to the entire photo library,
| you can give them write-only access.
|
| It does need location as long as the app is open, though you
| can make it imprecise.
| bee_rider wrote:
| Yeah, I'm just generally suspicious of these kinds of apps.
| I put them in the category of free apps that I don't
| understand the business model of. While it is possible to
| use the privacy features of the phone to limit the app's
| access, I don't really want to be running apps where I
| think I need to do that, if I can avoid it. I'm sure lots
| of them are fine, but I'm not able to distinguish between
| the fine and not-fine ones.
| karencarits wrote:
| I guess there are people out there who screenshots their
| viewfinder instead of shooting, apart from resolution that may
| work?
| fastball wrote:
| That's not what MKBHD said in the video at all. He said that
| Apple has recently bumped the megapixels of their camera system,
| and that probably they haven't adjusted their post-processing
| pipeline to account for that. e.g. they need to tone it down a
| bit because now they actually do have more details/photons to
| work with.
|
| It seems like the author of _this_ article is trying to use MKBHD
| 's cachet to help champion his own point ("I don't like this AI
| post-processing much at all") which I doubt is one Marques would
| agree with, given that the phone which _won_ his blind test is
| one that does just as much (if not more) post-processing than the
| iPhone, the Pixel 6A.
| tqi wrote:
| Totally agree, nothing in the video supports the assertion that
| "Apple should give users the option to take natural photos." I
| would go as far as to say the video essentially says the idea
| that there is such thing as "natural photos" is not an
| objective thing, that ultimately every company has to make
| choices on lighting/contrast/wb/sharpness/etc, and "natural" is
| a matter of taste.
| sourcecodeplz wrote:
| Per the old is new again trend, anyone remember does disposable
| Fuji film cameras you used to take on vacation? Only had like 35
| frames. You wouldn't dare take a photo every 5 minutes and run
| out of film on day one.
| rgmerk wrote:
| It occurs to me that the future of smartphone photography,
| particularly on low-end phones, is likely to use the image as a
| prompt to run through a generative AI trained on professionally-
| taken photographs.
|
| So the end result of your smartphone photograph is an AI's
| hallucination of what a pro photographer with pro equipment would
| have taken of the same scene.
|
| Manufacturers and some consumers will love it because it gets
| photos that look amazing from any old crappy sensor and from any
| terrible photographer.
| messe wrote:
| > It occurs to me that the future of smartphone photography,
| particularly on low-end phones, is likely to use the image as a
| prompt to run through a generative AI trained on
| professionally-taken photographs.
|
| I really hate this idea, but at the same time, I kinda wanna
| try building it.
| almog wrote:
| Not quite that issue and not specifically on iPhone but for me
| the uncanny valley of photos taken with modern smartphone is the
| fake bokeh feature.
| muglug wrote:
| Apple are trying to please two separate groups:
|
| - people who use "proper" cameras and thus have expectations
| about what a photo should look like
|
| - people who want iPhone photos to reflect how they perceive the
| scene.
|
| The iPhone camera app is configured for the second group, as it
| probably should be, but as a member of the first group I'd love
| an opt out button (without having to shoot in raw).
| bredren wrote:
| Apple provides some customization of the default photo
| processing via "photographic styles."
|
| There are several presets which can be further tweaked but only
| using two controls: warmth and contrast.
|
| https://support.apple.com/en-ca/guide/iphone/iph939c00e95/io...
|
| That's not too bad for the oob default camera app. I think it
| shows some awareness that how Apple is processing in the
| "standard" style may not match what everyone wants.
|
| IIUC, Halide and other 3rd party camera apps can largely
| deliver on further post processing customization of non-raw
| photos.
|
| Presumably these apps start with a RAW image in capture though
| and only pipeline it down to some save as some smaller,
| processed image.
| pbhjpbhj wrote:
| >want iPhone photos to reflect how they perceive the scene. //
|
| It seems more about how people wish they perceived the scene.
| Like, over-saturated and with "beautification" filters; there's
| a recognition that this is not how the image maker [the person]
| actually perceives things. It's a dream of reality, a fairy
| tale.
|
| Honestly, some Facebook photos ... all people on my Facebook
| are people I know in person, the filters some use are frankly
| ridiculous; like, I know what you actually look like and it's
| not a manga cartoon with massive eyes and completely smooth
| skin.
|
| /rant
| Espressosaurus wrote:
| I don't think they're trying to please the first group at all.
| Iphone pictures come fried to hell, but since that's what
| people want, that's what we get.
| retskrad wrote:
| Why is Apple, the worlds richest and most valuable company, so
| bad at A.I? Everything, from awful keyboard
| predictions/autocorrect to poor computational photography. Is it
| because Tim Cook doesn't provide enough funding to empower the
| A.I. divisions?
| haswell wrote:
| I would challenge the assertion that they're so bad at
| computational photography, over processing notwithstanding.
| They've been at the forefront of computational photography for
| some time, and issues notwithstanding, the iPhone cameras do
| spit out some excellent results at times. I just want more
| _control_ of that processing pipeline.
|
| As for the overarching reasons for poor AI implementations in
| their other product lines, my pet theory is that Apple's pace
| of progress is what you get when constrained by their stated
| privacy goals.
|
| I have little doubt that they'd be at the top of this game if
| they leveraged user data the way Google/Meta do.
| saiya-jin wrote:
| You have misaligned expectations, whole Apple approach since
| forever to anything is to dumb things down so few power users
| are unhappy but rest doesn't care and appreciates lack of
| choices, or more like hopes best possible choices are done
| for them because they paid premium. Which sometimes works OK,
| sometimes less so.
|
| I mean underlying a lot of Apple stuff is _linux_. Do you
| feel you have linux device and its might and endless
| configurability when working with iphone? My wife can 't
| force that f!@#!@ device to allow her pattern unlock of her
| phone without losing warranty, Apple rather prefers her
| having no safety at all (since face ID simply doesn't work
| for her line of work, and typing minimum 6 digits code 100x a
| day is extremely annoying... no other choices on 13 mini).
| haswell wrote:
| > _You have misaligned expectations_
|
| Which expectations would those be and how are they
| misaligned? I have no allusions about what using Apple
| products entail. That doesn't mean I can't want things.
|
| But my comment was more about the state of AI than
| anything.
| astrange wrote:
| There ain't no Linux anywhere. Not even GPL.
| counttheforks wrote:
| > I just want more control
|
| Then Apple is not the product for you.
| haswell wrote:
| Setting aside that Apple is not a product, tradeoffs are
| the name of the game regardless of vendor.
|
| I use apps like Halide to fill in the gaps in the stock
| camera app, and shoot with a standalone camera when I want
| full creative control.
|
| That doesn't mean I don't have a wishlist.
|
| The funny part is that the primary theme of my comment is
| about the control Apple gives you over your data - control
| you do not have when picking other products - and arguable
| a more important thing to allow me to control.
| counttheforks wrote:
| Sorry for not being born in an English speaking country.
| Would you prefer if I'd said "Then Apple's products are
| not for you"?
| haswell wrote:
| Nitpicks about sentence structure aside (sorry, that was
| needlessly snarky on my part), that wasn't really the
| point of my comment.
|
| I've decided that Apple products are, indeed, for me.
| Wishing they would provide certain features doesn't
| change that.
|
| Apple has shown repeatedly that they are continuing to
| invest in camera controls. The "RAW" button, support for
| ProRes, etc. are a few examples of this. Giving
| "creators" access to more creative modes in the camera is
| hardly an idea that is so opposite Apple's norms to
| imagine they might include it someday, or to conclude
| that I should abandon the ecosystem because they don't
| have it today.
| skavi wrote:
| Are they actually awful at it? Or just worse than Google? Is
| there a smaller company doing all these things better than
| Apple?
| drdaeman wrote:
| OpenAI?
|
| Siri is incredibly stupid (ChatGPT also is, but at least it
| has a whole order of magnitude better at understanding;
| unlike Siri, which randomly fails at the most basic requests
| to the extent it's just about useful for "Hey Siri, turn
| bedroom lights off" - but even that doesn't always work as
| expected), and while they don't have photo retouching AI,
| Dall-E is quite renown in for working with images, so surely
| if they'd dabbled in that space they would be successful.
| corobo wrote:
| "Siri, timer, hour and a half"
|
| "Alarm named Timer set for 01:30"
|
| Learn British already, Siri! Also getting 01:30 from "hour
| and a half".. I get how it's happened technically but
| that's dumb as hell.
|
| Every damn time I both 1) forget to move the laundry to the
| dryer 2) jump out of my skin at 1:30am
| OGWhales wrote:
| The autocorrect is impressively awful. I'd much prefer a simple
| autocorrect over what they have now, which will "fix" correctly
| spelled words with something that doesn't even make sense. I've
| had a few times where it learns something from a typo I made a
| few times and it simply would not unlearn it without a complete
| reset of the keyboard.
|
| One of the most confusing examples I have of the terrible
| autocorrect is that anytime I wrote "20", it would always get
| replaced with "2.0" and "50" would always get replaced with
| "5-0". I finally realized it was because I had two apps on my
| phone, one which had "2.0" in the name and the other "5-0".
| Once I deleted those apps, it stopped replacing those numbers.
| It's really baffling to me their autocorrect would work that
| way.
|
| Similarly, I've resorted to using a 3rd party camera app to
| avoid the occasional picture coming out looking like an oil
| painting. I've been using halide mark ii, which works quite
| well, although I can't recommend it anymore due to their new
| business model being a very pricey subscription. Luckily I got
| grandfathered in, so the app still works for me.
| asdff wrote:
| I've turned it off entirely. I'd rather have a typo of the
| correct word than the wrong word entirely when communicating
| with people.
| devilbunny wrote:
| The Apple keyboard is junk, especially if you use it in
| swiping mode.
|
| Swype on Android (and briefly on iOS) - RIP - was simply
| better in every imaginable way, but whoever bought it just
| buried it. Far better prediction (once they fixed the bug
| that interpreted a common swipe as "nee", which I almost
| never use, instead of "me", which I use constantly) and a
| host of useful features. Need to capitalize a word? Just
| Swype above the keyboard once during the motion. Need a
| double letter? Squiggle a bit on that letter as you move
| through the word. Swype-X, C, V for cut, copy, and paste.
| Swype-spacebar to bring up an editing keyboard that offered
| single-character cursor movement. Want to curse? Feel free,
| it won't forget it with the next version upgrade. Keyboard
| learned a typo? Delete it from your user dictionary and it
| won't appear anymore.
|
| That was a startup. Apple could buy out any patents they had
| with pocket change. But they didn't, and I can't figure out
| why.
| cs702 wrote:
| This is an accurate assessment IMHO. And the problem goes beyond
| contrast and shadow adjustments. On a few occasions, I've had
| recent iPhones blend the bodies of two people in a group photo
| into single, weirdly fused 'body blob'. Which is a shame, because
| iPhones have such amazingly good hardware. Apple, please fix
| this!
| grugagag wrote:
| I wish this could be turned off altogether.
| lucideer wrote:
| It can be disabled in camera settings under "Smart HDR"
| tillinghast wrote:
| I know that there is already a reply to this effect, but to
| repeat YOU CANNOT TURN OFF SMART HDR ON NEW IPHONES.
| Astonishingly stupid.
| OGWhales wrote:
| It seems you are not able to turn this off for the newer
| models, as I don't see this settings on the iPhone 13 but I
| do see it on an iPhone 11.
| actionfromafar wrote:
| There are/were apps which could turn it off.
| projektfu wrote:
| It really seems like machine learning is moving us into Nutri-
| matic territory. Avoid: big tech drink machine.
| croes wrote:
| Simple rule: Every "smart" feature needs an off switch
| CobaltFire wrote:
| Reposting my comment from
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34258744 as I think it's
| relevant to the sentiments here.
|
| I've addressed the technical side of this argument before, but I
| want to address a side that bother's me quite a bit but I don't
| see addressed often.
|
| Adding computational aspects into photography means that the
| images taken on these platforms will all have the same artistic
| interpretation at the level that that computation works. This is
| fine for snapshots, etc. Where it hurts is in artistic
| expression. It's almost as if all photos will go through an
| artistic AI after being taken.
|
| This process can, and likely will, increase the acceptability of
| those pictures that we use those cameras for most often. I truly
| think that computational photography will hurt the artistic
| expression and the feel of images taken outside of those
| situations.
|
| Right now, with a "real" camera shooting RAW, you keep as much
| detail of the image as possible and the photographer (artist)
| edits it to present what their mind's eye told them was there
| from that RAW data. With anything using computational photography
| the computer algorithm has already modified that data
| permanently, pushing and shaping it towards what that algorithm
| has determined is most pleasing for the largest number of people.
| I feel like this is a major win for most people who don't care
| about the art side of photography, but a major loss we aren't yet
| acknowledging for those who want to explore the artistic
| expression of the medium.
| kaba0 wrote:
| > It's almost as if all photos will go through an artistic AI
| after being taken.
|
| With all due respect, this is so far from the truth that it
| really takes away everything from the argument. How is
| computational photography any different than simply using other
| statistical methods to improve the signal-to-noise ratio? Is
| ISO and changing shutter speed any different? That also changes
| the actual thing.
| l33tbro wrote:
| You can't control the parameters of computational
| photography.
|
| Shutter and ISO are subtle and predictable variants that you
| know exactly what tweaking them will do. Computational
| photography is a black box.
| CobaltFire wrote:
| Exactly this.
| bsaul wrote:
| of course.. my iphone 12 pro takes worst pictures than my se2...
| post processing has been a disaster for years on iphone..
| h1fra wrote:
| On tiktok you will find various tutorial of how gen z is actually
| aware of this (without knowing it) and actively fighting the post
| processing. Especially the low-light picture post processing,
| where they show how they take a picture, quickly open the preview
| and screenshot the photo before the post processing is done.
|
| It is actually stagering how bad the photo looks after compared
| to without.
| KingLancelot wrote:
| [dead]
| CharlesW wrote:
| Note that on iPhone models XS, XR, 11, SE (2nd gen), and 12, you
| can turn off Smart HDR (the specific post-processing being
| criticized here).
|
| https://support.apple.com/guide/iphone/adjust-hdr-camera-set...
|
| Personally, I've never regretted just always shooting RAW.
| karencarits wrote:
| I have the same problem with the Google pixel phone, my photos
| are post-processed to such a degree that I don't find them
| pleasing, especially portraits. Fortunately, I can choose to get
| the RAW files
| jnnnik wrote:
| True - however I have found that even the RAW files aren't
| quite as raw as I'd like them to be, especially in terms of
| dynamic range. Best bet so far has been too use Open Camera if
| I feel like I'll want to be doing manual edits. Guess I'm a bit
| spoiled coming from a Sony Xperia with a camera that's great at
| being rather true to life, but the processing GCam does has
| ruined a whole bunch of photos for me.
| magic_hamster wrote:
| We circled back from replacing everything with our smartphone to
| realizing that phone cameras don't perform as well as purpose
| built photography gear.
|
| This was always going to be the case because no matter how good
| your software is, phone cameras will never have the optics, and
| probably not the sensors too, of a DSLR camera.
|
| To cover this, manufacturers employ all sorts of clever post
| processing, which in turn make it so that your final image is
| different from the preview you're seeing (which is also heavily
| altered from what the sensor is seeing, probably).
|
| With new tools such as AI introduced into post processing, we are
| just seeing more artifacts in what has been a fairly extensive
| process already. You can only push the tiny sensors and lenses so
| far but every manufacturer still wants the public to perceive
| their latest release as if a lot of progress has been made.
|
| Perhaps people expect too much from their phone.
| azinman2 wrote:
| Ultimately it comes down to physics. Tiny sensors and lenses
| can only do so much.
| snapetom wrote:
| My argument to people that ask was always that there were
| things I do (specifically for fast action) that a phone will
| never be able to do due to physics. This article is just more
| ammo for me - you can't trust phone manufacturers not to
| manipulate. Today, Apple, but tomorrow Google, Samsung, etc.
| Even if you shoot RAW on a camera, there's no guarantee
| manufacturers won't mess with them somehow in the future.
| system2 wrote:
| Sensors are getting better and from the looks of it the
| manufacturers are not ashamed to slap quarter sized lenses.
| ajsharp wrote:
| Yep. It auto-sharpens everything. Looks like trash.
| speeder wrote:
| Personally I don't care for phone photos, they always suck for
| me. I use my phone camera to do stuff like send photo of a
| document when needed, or take a photo of a package as proof it
| arrived intact or something like that.
|
| The reason is that phones for years been screwing the photos no
| matter what you do, at one point both me and my dad bought a
| Motorola phone where they promised it would have an "eco-system"
| of accessories, with existing ones including more advanced
| cameras, game controllers and so on. We went to a place full of
| beautiful animals, took a ton of photos, but when we checked his
| photos, all of them were horribly screwed, like everything was
| pink, or even literally sheared, I found out the reason is that
| when you use the viewfinder, the phone skips some processing, as
| soon you take the photo, it mandatorily does some processing, in
| Motorola's case with a very buggy chip that would inevitably ruin
| your photos. Poking in the photo files it looked like the
| algorithm was managing to misalign the file in memory before
| doing the calculations. Something similar to mixing endianess.
| cardamomo wrote:
| I recently visited an art gallery, where during a tour of the
| facility the owner shared that he has art appraisal clients
| worldwide, with whom he works remotely. I asked, "So do you send
| a photographer to capture high quality images of the artwork?" He
| simply took out his phone and shared that smartphone images have
| gotten so good that it's the only equipment they need for the
| appraisal. Secretly, I was aghast that the professional appraisal
| of works worth tens of thousands of dollars might rely on a
| device that opaquely alters raw images. I didn't say anything,
| but I left hoping that not all art appraisal rested on post-
| processed smartphone images.
| photoGrant wrote:
| Every camera and software pipeline for a photograph alters the
| raw images. You're just more aware of it.
|
| The iPhone can shoot raw and avoid these issues, it's how I use
| mine. The complaints people would have if the iPhone didn't
| post-process for the average consumer... Every camera phone
| I've ever used has horrible defaults for JPG processing --
| avoid it by shooting raw and using something like Darkroom to
| finesse.
| tomxor wrote:
| > Every camera and software pipeline for a photograph alters
| the raw images. You're just more aware of it.
|
| No, you use a half decent professional camera and you can
| even opt for RAW format, the only processing your getting is
| the averaging algorithm for your exposure and ISO settings.
| Even without that all you are getting is some JPG
| compression, not half baked ML trying to move people's faces
| around, that's bonkers. Also pretty sure you are not getting
| RAW on any phone unless you are running some very custom
| OS/software, even then seems pretty pointless considering how
| noisy it's going to be.
| photoGrant wrote:
| Sorry, your no is a little confident -- and you're entirely
| wrong. A camera generating a RAW file for you is doing much
| more than just sending you the data from the binned pixels.
| Where you want to step in on that line determines how much
| control you have.
|
| It's the reason some still pick RED vs Alexa. Your RAW File
| & Colour Science aren't just up to you, they're carefully
| mastered with an ODT -- On Device Transform.
|
| Also, let's see how Nikon go in the near future with
| Snapdragon.
|
| These images are 90% shot on iPhone -- raw and edited in
| Darkroom on iOS. https://instagram.com/grant.pal
| scottiebarnes wrote:
| Any camera or photo only gives you a version of reality.
| Exposure, white balance, 35mm vs 50mm vs 120mm, etc., can all
| affect the image subtly. So even with "pro tools", your RAW
| images are getting doctored by photographer choices.
| rubatuga wrote:
| You are conflating RAW and iPhone images, which is not a good
| argument. RAW allows you to change exposure and white balance
| after shooting.
| shmoogy wrote:
| You can shoot raw on iPhone, I think resulting file is .dng
| but I never really look at them, they just go into
| Lightroom.
| stemlord wrote:
| Yeah to extend your point, this struggle with how to even
| define objectivity has been present at the core of science
| and journalism throughout modernity.
|
| The drawings in old field guides are curated to a supposed
| "idealized" form based on their use case (i.e., to be
| recognized in the wild by other researchers). Those specific
| idealized versions don't actually exist, though.
|
| There was a famous instance of a ww1 phototographer (dont
| remember his name) who would allegedly move dead bodies
| around in his shots to better capture what he thought was the
| emotional reality through the resulting image rather than
| what the literal scene was.
|
| We can have all the computerized scanning of the universe at
| our disposal but ultimately there's always the analog hole of
| our judgement in its interpretation
| tuatoru wrote:
| You're also missing gp's point. The photographer _should_
| be in control of interpretation, because she knows the
| intended use of the photo. Phones assume everything is a
| selfie.
|
| The idea that "reality is the goal" is the product of not
| bothering to think at all. Choosing what to make an image
| of, and framing the image, will _always_ be in service of a
| story or "emotional reality". It always was, from cave-
| wall paintings onwards.
| brookst wrote:
| Even worse, our perception of the image is deeply colored by
| the visual cortex and bio-optics of our eyes, all of which
| can vary person to person. None of us will ever see anything
| the way it "really is."
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| Oh c'mon. There is a stark difference between optical
| limitations, artifacts, or color balance and machine learning
| enabled post processing.
| kevincox wrote:
| To some degree there is no such thing as the true image.
| However many devices, especially some smartphones are really
| going past "representing reality" and into enhancing what the
| viewer wants.
| cardamomo wrote:
| This is really my point. I'm not arguing that the appraiser
| should only look at the artwork with their own eyes.
| Rather, the degree to which phones are enhancing photos is
| not transparent to the average end user and therefore is
| risky to use in an application that relies on the details
| of an image being scrutinized.
| arcticbull wrote:
| iOS allows you to shoot in RAW and avoid all (some?)
| post-processing. [1] I believe its even easier to set up
| in Halide.
|
| Is it possible the appraiser was doing so?
|
| [1] https://support.apple.com/en-
| ca/guide/iphone/iphae1e882a3/io...
| bee_rider wrote:
| Note that this is only available on certain models. Not
| to contradict you or anything, the appraiser might have
| had one such model!
| astrange wrote:
| Just use a third party camera app and it's available on
| any iPhone.
|
| I promise all dedicated cameras are also doing (almost
| all of) this kind of processing though. It's needed to
| develop raw images at all. The specific tuning is just up
| to taste.
| [deleted]
| tuatoru wrote:
| > So even with "pro tools", your RAW images are getting
| doctored by photographer choices.
|
| Exactly the point and exactly what is needed. Photographer
| choices, not camera choices. A pro[1] photographer knows what
| to do for different subjects, light, and goals, but phone
| software has no clue. Every image is a selfie for instagram.
|
| 1. Or an amateur who bothers to learn and experiment.
| CharlesW wrote:
| > _Secretly, I was aghast that the professional appraisal of
| works worth tens of thousands of dollars might rely on a device
| that opaquely alters raw images._
|
| I'm not sure if you mean "raw" in RAW sense, but FWIW this
| critique applies to Smart HDR specifically. If you shoot and
| share RAW images with an iPhone Smart HDR is not used, and you
| will reliably see something closely resembling reality.1 I
| shoot everything in RAW, trained by the regret of not doing
| this for special shots earlier in my life.
|
| 1 _" You can, of course, take a RAW photo using apps like
| Halide (it's worth noting that ProRAW photos are still post-
| processed), but then you'll have a much larger image file just
| to get a more natural result."_
| cardamomo wrote:
| You're right, I don't mean RAW. Thank you for clarifying!
| gfxgirl wrote:
| as others have pointed out, the defualt photos app is designed to
| do the best for the average user.
|
| If you want control of every feature and no post processing then
| download a different photo app like
| https://apps.apple.com/us/app/halide-mark-ii-pro-camera/id88...
|
| This to me is no different than the popular digital cameras vs
| the pro cameras. The built in app is targeting the masses. it can
| never make every choice perfectly and further it doesn't need to
| please everyone. That's the entire point of having apps
| hnarayanan wrote:
| As someone who (so very excitedly) upgraded from an iPhone X to
| an iPhone 14 Pro, I was and still am so disappointed sometimes by
| how artificial the photos on the new phone looks. I thought it
| was just me, now I see why it's a more general thing.
| shwoopdiwoop wrote:
| I'm in the same boat, also upgraded from the X to 14 Pro just
| like you. It's infuriating the amount of alterations it
| performs without my asking. Also equally infuriating is how
| buggy the whole camera app has become. Changing lenses
| uncontrollably, weird glitchy artefacts outside of the main
| canvas, live photos stutter, the additional "step" it does when
| showing a photo after it loads which ruins the whole looks.
| It's a fall from grace and I don't understand how Apple thinks
| it's acceptable to ship this.
| astrange wrote:
| > Changing lenses uncontrollably
|
| Settings > Camera > Macro Control
|
| There are some other cases (like if you have your finger over
| one camera it might switch) but that's the really noticeable
| one. You'll usually regret changing it though.
| tjfl wrote:
| I recently found and bought https://camerapixels.app/ which I
| love and it seems (to a hobbyist photographer) to give me a
| lot of control. The exposure and focus bracketing is really
| neat and pairs up with Affinity Photo 2 (and I'm sure many
| others). It has replaced the default camera app for me.
| mustacheemperor wrote:
| The sensor in the 14 pro is very impressive but at this point I
| take all my photos with Halide because otherwise it seems like
| a lot of that capability just goes to waste.
| [deleted]
| eurekin wrote:
| To play devils advocate...
|
| How people imagine one can faithfully squeeze dynamic range of
| ~10 to 120k nits onto a typical 250 nit screen? How about a
| printed medium that reflects at most 100 nits in typical viewing
| conditions?
|
| I love the expression that professionals use, simply "tones are
| good". That's it, zero insight on to how it's done.
|
| Our eyes (or eye-brain combination) has also been found to do
| quite a lot of processing on it's own. For example white
| balancing (famous blue/gold dress story). Relative colour
| perception. Illusion of depth based on "cues", etc.
| suddenexample wrote:
| I think it's kind of hilarious that tech "journalism" now
| encompasses a summary of someone else's YouTube video.
| hef19898 wrote:
| Political journalism does it with Twitter, so...
| [deleted]
| ndneighbor wrote:
| Anecdotally, this seems to line up with the migration from iPhone
| 11 -> 12. I notice that in photos of anything including the sun,
| it would throw off the sensor/software stack. The even
| funnier/frustrating thing is that, because the HDR post-
| processing is done after when the photo is taken usually the end
| result is much different than what you see in the viewfinder.
| kevingadd wrote:
| I'm a little shocked that you can't turn "Smart HDR" and these
| other enhancements off. I would have assumed it was a toggle, so
| getting to the end of the article and seeing "Apple should let us
| turn it off" in reference to photo-ruining enhancements is wild
| to me - I've always considered Apple the brand you go to if you
| want a phone with a good camera but it sounds like that may not
| be true anymore if they stick to this?
| Qluxzz wrote:
| For the smart HDR you can. It's under: Settings -> Camera ->
| Smart HDR
|
| There is also the "Scene Detection"setting which I have turned
| off.
| alistairSH wrote:
| Both those switches were removed between iPhone 12 and 13
| models. Which is sad, because they'd go a long way to avoid
| the issues described in the article.
| fab23 wrote:
| It seems that not all iPhones do have this setting available.
| Not sure if this is related with the availability of RAW
| images, which is only supported on iPhone 14 Pro.
| Qluxzz wrote:
| I only have a regular iPhone 12.
| Hamuko wrote:
| Isn't it supported starting on iPhone 12 Pro?
|
| https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT211965
| fab23 wrote:
| I may have missed something and had the impression that
| this was a "new" feature for iPhone 14 Pro only. But as
| the linked support documents mention, it is available on
| iPhone 12 Pro and later Pro models since iOS 14.3.
| Godel_unicode wrote:
| 13 pro shoots ProRAW as well.
| mahmoudhossam wrote:
| This is probably a "Pro" feature because I can't find it on
| my iPhone 13.
| Qluxzz wrote:
| I only have a regular iPhone 12.
| shock-value wrote:
| I'm on a 14 Pro and cannot find these settings either.
| codetrotter wrote:
| I'm on 14 Pro also and I found the settings where they
| are supposed to be.
|
| Are you running iOS 14.3 or greater?
|
| Go to Settings, scroll to Camera, choose Format. There
| you can turn on Apple ProRAW.
|
| https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT211965
| alistairSH wrote:
| ProRAW still does some post-processing. And doesn't
| enable the scene and smart HDR settings mentioned above.
| goalieca wrote:
| I realize all sensors need some sort of filtering to clean the
| raw data up.. but ios goes way beyond acceptable.
| cardamomo wrote:
| Related: "The Hottest Gen Z Gadget Is a 20-Year-Old Digital
| Camera" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34290375
| SoftTalker wrote:
| 95% of phone users will never notice this stuff. They are the
| same people who were happy with point-n-shoot cameras 20 years
| ago. They just want focused, clear photos, and image-stabilized
| video that will maybe be shared on social media and then
| forgotten.
| dorkwood wrote:
| In my experience, regular users not only notice, but they want
| more of this sort of thing. They don't want their photos to be
| a reflection of reality. They want them to be better.
|
| I was at a family gathering a year or so ago, and my mother was
| taking pictures with her phone. I noticed that one she took of
| me, her, and my two siblings was applying a heavy skin
| smoothing algorithm. I asked for her phone, and discovered that
| she had "skin smoothing" turned up to 100 on her Android.
|
| I took some comparison photos with it on and off and put it to
| the group. Everyone but me agreed that the heavily skin-
| smoothed photos were better. Even the men.
| svnpenn wrote:
| I work in IT. I manage our mobile devices, and I was shocked to
| recently find out that iPads (and I assume iPhones), have _no
| option_ to choose the resolution of the resulting pictures.
|
| Why is Apple like this? I dont always need a 9 MB or whatever
| photo size, it would be nice to be able to take lower res images
| to save space.
| egman_ekki wrote:
| But how would you run out of iCloud space, then?
| giuliomagnifico wrote:
| You can't not post-process a photo, because you can't use/view
| the RAW file captured by the sensor, or better, only the company
| who build the RAW/DAC conversion can issue the "codec" to open
| the RAW file.
|
| The issue is "how many interpolations/adjustments are these
| companies making when converting the RAW to an image file?" Too
| much according to the article.
| ArtWomb wrote:
| Android Camera2 APIs allow RAW capture. But images still
| require a bit of magic to "de-bayerize" added color filters and
| noise ;)
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demosaicing
| happytoexplain wrote:
| It seems like an oversimplification to imply all processing
| exists on a gradient with no significant lines we can draw
| between one type and another. E.g. content identification has a
| pretty clear qualitative difference from whatever "dumb"
| mappings do to get from RAW to values in some color space. One
| isn't just "more processing" and the other "less processing",
| colloquially.
| The_Colonel wrote:
| This is the type of pedantry which is technically correct, but
| contributes nothing to the discussion.
| shock-value wrote:
| It's not just a matter of degree or quantity of post
| processing. Some techniques are qualitatively different than
| others.
| kevingadd wrote:
| I think it's important to distinguish between signal processing
| techniques like debayering, auto-leveling etc and "we're using
| machine learning to identify humans in a picture and adjust
| their contrast". We can have the former without the latter,
| they're not all just "post-processing".
| humaniania wrote:
| If you care so much use ProRAW and process them yourself
| https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT211965
| samjmck wrote:
| It's not because RAW exists that people aren't allowed to
| criticise post-processing
| adzm wrote:
| The article says ProRAW also does post processing though. Is
| that incorrect?
| foldr wrote:
| It blends multiple shots for better dynamic range, but
| doesn't do any heavy processing. If you want a pure single
| exposure RAW file you can get that using third party apps
| such as Halide.
| traspler wrote:
| Afaik it ,,just" debayers the raw sensor image because of the
| unusual pattern Apple uses. Related:
| https://lux.camera/understanding-proraw/
| chazeon wrote:
| I tried to use some of software that takes "RAW" photo and
| downconvert to JPEG. It is painfully slow.
| berkut wrote:
| That's only available on the Pro phones though...
| newaccount74 wrote:
| It used to be that iPhones made great, tasteful photos by
| default. That was why people bought them.
|
| If I wanted to spend time processing every snapshot I take with
| my phone, I wouldn't use my phone at all, I'd use my X100T and
| get pictures that are much better than anything the phone can
| do.
| flobosg wrote:
| > I wouldn't use my phone at all, I'd use my X100T
|
| That's what I'm actually doing. My Pixel 3 died suddenly in
| November 2021. Since it was an emergency, I bought a cheap
| phone with a horrible camera, intending to upgrade it quickly
| and taking photos with my X100T in the meantime. A year later
| and I'm still using that setup. The camera is portable enough
| to take it everywhere, the processing presets are good enough
| for me, and I have the RAW files available just in case. I'm
| probably in the minority of people who would do something
| like this, but I'm pretty happy so far.
| vouaobrasil wrote:
| This is what I hate about phone photography. It's not the fact
| that some processing has to be used to make up for the tiny
| sensor. It's not the fact that phones only have a limited set of
| focal lengths.
|
| It's that the development of the processing engine of phones is
| geared towards garnering likes on social media, and therefore, it
| is being taken in very grotesque directions.
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