We shot this entire review on the iPhone 13 Pro. See real world examples of Cinematic Mode, Portrait Mode, Night Mode and more. Also, find out the one thing that made Jordan declare, ‘It’s like having a fork dragged across my eyeballs.’
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Are you unable to send photos from your iPhone to an Android device? Do you have the ability to send text messages but not pictures? If you are a photographer or use your phone to take pictures, switching phones can be a nightmare, especially from an iPhone to an Android. Sending edited photos from iPhone to Android can be tedious Continue Reading Photodoto
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There are millions of old and outdated iPhones collecting dust. Researchers in Germany have found a way to turn some of those old iPhones, specifically an iPhone 5 camera module, into affordable microscopes for young students. Using LEGO, an iPhone 5 camera, LED lighting and a modern smartphone, students can build their own microscope.
Researchers Bart E. Vos, Emil Betz Blesa and Timo Betz from Georg August University Göttingen and Munster University in Germany set out to build a high-resolution microscope that wasn’t prohibitively expensive. Toy microscopes aren’t very effective, and specialized microscopes cost a lot of money, limiting their accessibility.
The researchers said, ‘Our aim is to introduce a microscope to individual students in a classroom setting, both as a scientific tool to access the micro-world and to facilitate the understanding of fundamental principles of the optical components of a microscope in a playful and motivating, yet precise approach. By basing the design on LEGO, we aim to make the microscope modular, cheap, and inspiring.’
‘Design of the LEGO microscope. (a, b) A photograph and a schematic representation of the microscope, (c) the LED that illuminates the sample from below, (d) the threaded system that adjusts the focus of the microscope by moving the objective, (e) 2 objectives containing a replacement smartphone lens with a 3.85-mm focal distance (left) and a glass lens with a 26.5-mm focal distance (right), (f) the second lens consisting of 2 acrylic lenses in its holder just below the eyepiece, (g) a smartphone used as a camera by adapting the eyepiece.’ Credit: Bart E. Vos, Emil Betz Blesa and Timo Betz
The researchers used an iPhone 5 camera module, smartphone and LEGO housing to craft a high-resolution microscope. Many people already have LEGO pieces around, and iPhone 5 lenses are quite cheap to come by. The researchers found one for under $ 5. The project’s full price, without including the cost of a modern smartphone, is €102 (about $ 120 USD). There’s a bit more to it, but it’s straightforward and inexpensive. Documentation for building your own microscope is available for free.
‘Schematic overview of the light path in the microscope. The object (here depicted as an arrow) forms an inverted intermediate image in the focus of the second lens. The second lens then sends collimated light to the observer.’ Credit: Bart E. Vos, Emil Betz Blesa and Timo Betz
The hope is that the LEGO microscope will make science more accessible to children worldwide. Every child deserves the opportunity to learn about our world, including the parts of it we can’t see with the naked eye. ‘An understanding of science is crucial for decision-making and brings many benefits in everyday life, such as problem-solving and creativity,’ said Professor Timo Betz, University of Göttingen. ‘Yet we find that many people, even politicians, feel excluded or do not have the opportunities to engage in scientific or critical thinking. We wanted to find a way to nurture natural curiosity, help people grasp fundamental principles and see the potential of science.’
‘Examples of experiments conducted with the LEGO microscope. (a) Image of a sodium chloride crystal. (b) Time lapse of an osmotic shock in red onion cells. After approximately 30 s, a 1 M NaCl solution is flowed in. Subsequently, water leaves the cells, causing the cell membranes to detach from the cell walls. After approximately 5 min, distilled water is flowed in, washing away the 1 M NaCl solution, and the cells return to their original volume. (c) Time lapse of the movement of an Artemia shrimp in water. (d) Time lapse of the movement of 2 water fleas in water. The scale bars in panels a, b, and d are 100 lm.’ Credit: Bart E. Vos, Emil Betz Blesa and Timo Betz
In addition to providing the plans for free, Vos, Blesa and Betz also published a paper about the microscope project.
The post 13 iPhone Camera Settings to Improve Your Photos appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Simon Ringsmuth.
There is an amazing array of iPhone camera settings you can tweak, customize, and configure to get just the right shots. Some of these settings are obvious, but others are buried beneath layers of buttons and menus and are easy to miss.
And while anyone can take great shots on an iPhone just by launching the camera and pressing the shutter button, learning a few of the custom options can truly take your iPhone photography to the next level.
Also, most of these iPhone tips and tricks are available no matter your iPhone model – so even if your iPhone is a few years old, you can still access some very helpful settings.
Are you ready to discover 13 highly useful iPhone settings?
Let’s dive right in.
A picture of a lake near the United States/Canada border (shot with my iPhone). When you know how to tweak your iPhone camera settings, you can get the shots you’re looking for.
1. Show and hide camera options
Nestled near the top of the iPhone camera is a thin strip (with the Flash icon on the left and the Live Photos icon on the right, as displayed below). Situated directly between these two icons is a small arrow pointing up, like the ^ caret above the number six on a keyboard:
Tap the ^ icon at the top of the camera interface to show/hide the camera options icons at the bottom.
Tap the caret at the top to show and hide a row of options near the bottom of the camera interface. As you can see in the screenshot above, this uncovers a handful of useful options, including filters and real-time cropping.
Another way to access these settings? Press your finger directly on the middle of your iPhone screen with the camera open, then swipe up or down. This yields the same result as tapping on the ^ icon, but some people find the press-and-swipe method to be a little more convenient. Either way, the hidden row of options puts some powerful tools right at your fingertips and can help you instantly take better photos.
One caveat: When you reveal this row of settings icons, your normal photo modes, such as Pano, Portrait, and Video, disappear. You can still access them by pressing on the middle of your phone and dragging your finger to the right or left, but it’s easy to get lost without seeing the name of the mode you are currently using.
I recommend you first set the photo mode (i.e. Portrait, Photo, etc.), and only then reveal the row of camera options icons.
2. Use the volume buttons as your camera shutter
When Steve Jobs introduced the iPhone in 2007, he proudly declared that it would not have a keyboard (much to the chagrin of smartphone users around the world!). Replacing the physical keys was a revolutionary touchscreen that could transform into whatever the developer wanted.
While the touchscreen was a brilliant move, it meant some common actions like snapping a picture became a little more tricky. It’s not always easy to hold your phone just right and press the shutter button at the same time.
Fortunately, there’s an easy fix for this common frustration:
Press the volume-up button to snap a picture.
This feature is enabled by default, but many users aren’t aware that it exists. Once you learn to use it, you won’t ever want to go back to awkwardly tapping the touchscreen to take pictures.
(Also, quick tip: When you press and hold the volume-up button, your phone will begin recording a movie. Release the button to stop recording.)
Many people don’t know this, but the volume buttons on any iPhone can be used to take a picture. You don’t have to change any settings to do it – it’s enabled by default.
3. Shoot in burst mode
An iPhone might not seem like the ideal device for action photography. After all, it can’t compare to a high-end DSLR or mirrorless camera that can fire off a burst of photos in rapid succession.
Or can it?
In fact, iPhones offer a burst mode – and with it, you can get action shots you never thought possible. You can shoot dozens of rapid-fire photos, then choose the best one from the batch.
Here’s how it works:
With the Camera app open, press and hold the shutter button, then quickly slide your finger all the way to the left. Burst mode will activate, you’ll start taking a series of images, and you’ll see a counter with the number of captured shots.
Use this during moments of fast action. You’ll always end up with those split-second, perfectly timed shots – without spending thousands of dollars on high-end camera equipment.
Press and drag the shutter button with your finger to take a burst of photos. The shutter button displays your photo count.
4. Press and hold the volume button for a photo burst
Burst mode is great, but what if you prefer using the camera volume buttons to snap pictures? If you press and hold the volume button, your phone starts recording a movie, not a burst – but did you know that you can force the volume buttons to shoot in burst mode when held down?
First, navigate to the Settings app. Then scroll down to Camera.
Next, look for the option that says Use Volume Up for Burst, and tap to enable it.
If you find the touch-and-drag method of taking burst photos inconvenient, you can set the volume-up button to take a burst of images.
That’s it! Now, if you hold the volume-up button, your iPhone will fire off a burst – and if you hold the volume-down button, you’ll record a movie. It’s the best of both worlds, and a setting I highly recommend. You never know whether you’ll need a burst or a movie, so it helps to have both options at your fingertips!
5. Use the built-in self-timer
Sometimes, you don’t want to take a photo the instant you press the shutter button. DSLRs and mirrorless cameras have a built-in self-timer; it lets you set a delay from the time you press the shutter to the time the camera actually takes a picture.
At first glance, this feature may seem missing from iPhones. But with a quick tap or swipe, you can activate the self-timer and start taking control of your photos.
Here’s what you do:
First, show the row of extra camera options by tapping the caret at the top of the screen (as described in Point 1 of this article).
Then press the Timer icon. Select either Off, 3s, or 10s:
To use the built-in self-timer, tap the Timer icon. Then specify whether to use the 3-second or 10-second delay.
Now, when you press the shutter button, you’ll get a delay before your iPhone snaps the photo.
It helps to have a tripod to hold your phone steady, but the timer works fine for selfie shots, too. That way, you can snap a picture without trying to position the phone and fire your iPhone shutter at the same time.
6. Real-time aspect-ratio cropping
As experienced users know, it’s easy to crop a photo on an iPhone. Just tap on the image, hit Edit, and then press the Crop button.
But while this process works well for cropping your photos after you take them, what if you want to start with a cropped display and frame your image accordingly?
Some high-end cameras allow you to select custom crops when you take photos, and the iPhone has this ability, too.
First, tap the caret at the top of the screen to reveal the hidden camera options. Then, tap the 4:3 button (which represents the 4:3 ratio in which iPhone photos are shot):
To use real-time cropping, access the hidden camera options and tap the 4:3 icon. Then specify what type of crop you want: Square, 4:3, or 16:9. Note that these options might be slightly different depending on your iPhone model.
Now you can choose whether to shoot in a 4:3, Square (1:1), or 16:9 aspect ratio – and you won’t have to go through the painstaking process of cropping your photos individually afterward.
Real-time cropping lets you see how your cropped photo will turn out (without any guesswork).
7. Portrait Lighting
In 2016, the iPhone 7 Plus was released with the first iteration of Portrait mode.
Portrait mode essentially mimics the blurry background effect you can get with a DSLR or mirrorless camera, but with Apple software algorithms. And the blur mimicry has gotten much better since those early incarnations, and now incorporates a feature called Portrait Lighting. This gives your Portrait mode images the appearance of being captured in various lighting conditions, and the result is so good it’s downright uncanny.
To access Portrait Lighting, first put your phone in Portrait mode (find it in the mode options just above the shutter button).
You should see a series of circles above the Portrait label; these are your different Portrait Lighting effects:
Enable Portrait mode, then touch and drag the icons above the shutter button to change the lighting effects. Your phone will show you a preview of the final result in real time!
The default lighting mode for portraits is “Natural Light” but this can be changed to “Studio Light,” “Stage Light,” “Contour Light,” and more. You actually see the effect in real time, so you know how the finished result will look, and you can change lighting modes as much as you want before you take a picture.
Portrait Lighting is a great way to punch up your portraits, and you can even go back and change the Portrait Lighting effect afterward when editing a Portrait mode image in the photo library.
8. Use filters as you shoot
Instagram and other social networks popularized the idea of filters, and now it’s almost strange to see photos without some kind of filter applied. The most common way of using filters is to snap a photo and then apply the filter afterward – but your iPhone camera has an option to use filters as you shoot.
With this, you can see what your edited pictures will look like before you even take them.
Filters can be applied as you shoot your images so you can see exactly what the final result will look like.
To use real-time filters, access the camera options by tapping the caret at the top of the screen. Then tap the icon with three intersecting circles.
The filter options will appear, and you’ll be able to choose from a variety of looks, including Vivid Warm, Dramatic Cool, Silvertone, and more. I find this method much more practical than applying filters after I take a photo, plus seeing your filters applied in real time can have a dramatic effect on your images!
9. Choose your preferred photo format (HEIF vs JPEG)
Until recently, the iPhone shot pictures in JPEG format. But while JPEGs are a good compromise between quality and file size, they’re ill-suited for today’s users, who want features like HDR imaging while still keeping file sizes small.
HEIF is a new file type designed to solve this problem, and it’s now the default format for iPhone photos.
Unfortunately, not everyone has a device that can load HEIF images, which makes sharing iPhone photos somewhat problematic – unless you know a handy iPhone settings solution.
Go to Settings, then Photos, and scroll all the way to the bottom to Transfer to Mac or PC. The Automatic setting will convert HEIF pictures to JPEG when sending them to a device that can’t read HEIF images. (Keep Originals will always send images as HEIFs).
You can also change the image format from HEIF to JPEG or JPEG to HEIF. Go to Settings, then Camera, and select Formats:
High Efficiency is a good option for saving space, but Most Compatible uses the more common JPEG format.
If you tap High Efficiency, your iPhone will shoot HEIFs – whereas selecting Most Compatible forces your camera to use JPEGs.
Generally, I recommend shooting photos in HEIF and leaving Transfer to Mac or PC on Automatic. But it’s always useful to know how to change these settings to your liking!
10. Optimize iPhone storage
If you take a lot of pictures on your iPhone, you might quickly find yourself running out of storage space. And while you can’t add more storage to your iPhone, there is a trick that lets you take tons of photos without worrying too much about using up space on your phone: storage optimization.
Go to Settings, then tap Photos. Look for the Optimize iPhone Storage option:
While you can’t add more storage space to your iPhone, you can take advantage of iCloud storage to help ease your photo storage burden.
This will automatically upload the photos to your iCloud account while keeping tiny, low-resolution thumbnails on your iPhone. Then, when you load a photo, the original is automatically downloaded from iCloud.
A caveat is that you need enough space on your iCloud account to accommodate your photos. Unlike your iPhone, you can add more iCloud storage, but you will have to pay. Prices range from one to ten dollars a month, and the one-dollar plan is plenty for most people.
So if you find yourself constantly running low on iPhone storage because of all your photos, don’t delete them! Just use the Optimize iPhone Storage option and let iCloud take care of the rest.
11. Show/hide the camera grid
Many DSLR and mirrorless cameras have grid overlays that help you compose your shots. They’re a great way to make sure your horizons are level, and you can use them to guide your rule-of-thirds compositions.
But did you know that your iPhone also has a grid?
All you have to do is select Settings, then Camera, and enable the Grid option.
Enable the Grid option in your Settings to display a grid overlay as you shoot pictures.
Now, when you take a photo, you will see a 3-by-3 grid, like this:
The grid overlay is a great way to make sure your photos are straight and well-composed!
12. Adjust the blur strength in Portrait mode
The iPhone camera has a fixed-aperture lens.
What does this mean? Well, unlike a DSLR or mirrorless camera, you can’t decide whether to shoot wide open or stopped down – and so you don’t have control over the background blur.
Except that, when shooting in Portrait mode, your iPhone does let you customize the level of blur. This effectively mimics aperture adjustments (through software trickery).
First, select Portrait mode from the mode options. Then tap the f icon in the top-right corner.
A slider should appear at the bottom of the camera screen; it approximates various f-stops of a camera lens:
Once in Portrait Mode, tap the f button in the top-right corner. Then drag the slider above the shutter button left and right to increase and decrease background blur.
Slide all the way to the left for f/1.4 and all the way to the right for f/16. You will see the blur change in real time as you adjust the slider. I often find that the default value selected by my iPhone (usually between f/2.8 and f/4.5) is great, but it’s nice to be able to customize.
You can adjust the blur level of your Portrait mode backgrounds (even on some lower-end iPhones with a single camera).
13. Preserve Settings
This final trick isn’t going to do anything for your photos, but it could save your sanity! If you find yourself frequently using a specific filter, adjustment, or Live Photos setting, you can tell your iPhone to preserve those settings – instead of forcing you to enable them one by one every time you take a picture.
Enabling the Preserve Settings option is simple:
Tap Settings > Camera > Preserve Settings:
The Preserve Settings option lets you keep all your favorite settings in place.
Here, you can specify the settings you want your iPhone to remember. Then, every time you open the Camera app, all your custom settings will remain just as you left them.
iPhone camera settings: final words
Well, I hope you found these tips helpful! Note that these are just some of the iPhone camera settings you can change to help customize your photography experience. There are dozens of other options to change and tweak, and with just a bit of practice, you will soon find yourself adjusting plenty of settings to suit your needs.
Also, don’t be afraid to poke around in the Camera app and Camera Settings menu. You just might find some new options you didn’t know existed!
iPhone camera settings FAQs
Do I need a high-end iPhone to use Portrait mode?
The first iPhones to do Portrait mode combined pictures from two separate cameras. Now, iPhones with only a single camera offer Portrait mode thanks to advanced software algorithms. Even the iPhone SE, the lowest-priced iPhone, can do it with the rear camera and the front-facing selfie camera.
How can I stop my iPhone pictures from looking blurry?
If your photos are blurry, your iPhone is probably having trouble focusing. Tap the screen to focus in one particular area, then give your phone a half-second to adjust focus. That should help keep your photos sharp.
Why can’t I use Night mode on my iPhone?
While all the settings in this article can be used on virtually every iPhone, Night mode requires special hardware and is therefore only available on certain models. If you try to take a photo in dimly lit conditions and your iPhone has Night mode, it will automatically show up as an option. If you don’t see Night Mode appear, then your iPhone probably does not have this feature.
What are the best settings for casual, everyday use?
If you’re feeling overwhelmed at all the iPhone camera settings, my advice is to just ignore everything and go take some pictures. The default values for your iPhone camera are just fine. You don’t have to change, tweak, or customize anything to get great photos.
The post 13 iPhone Camera Settings to Improve Your Photos appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Simon Ringsmuth.
Apple’s new AirTags are a straight-up gift for photographers. After testing one for the past couple of weeks, I’ll be hiding an AirTag in my scooter, one in my car and another one in my camera bag. Read more » Strobist
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The post iPhone Live Photos: A Comprehensive Guide appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Simon Ringsmuth.
Baked into every iPhone is a neat trick – one that combines the serendipity of photos with the magic of video to produce a Live Photo. These aren’t the same as normal photos, but they’re not exactly videos, either.
Live Photos are images that can be edited, adjusted, and shared just like any other image. But they are also tiny video clips: each contains three seconds of video showing a brief moment right before, during, and after you take the picture.
To learn more about Live Photos, including how to use and edit them, keep reading!
What are iPhone Live Photos?
First introduced in the iPhone 6s, Live Photos are a great way to add a bit of context to your iPhone pictures.
Instead of just taking a picture of your kids, you capture the photo – but you also get a brief clip of them running and laughing. Rather than photographing only a flower, your iPhone captures the flower, but it also displays the wind, moving insects, and background noise. A snapshot of your friend holding a freshly caught fish becomes a short clip where you can see the fish wiggling and flopping free.
These short bits of video might not sound like much, but they can go a long way toward bringing a still scene to life. A simple Live Photo can trigger emotions and memories years later that you never knew you wanted to save. The best part about Live Photos is that you don’t have to do anything to create or view them – they’re captured automatically by your iPhone unless you turn the option off manually.
That said, despite the prevalence of Live Photos, there’s still a great deal of confusion among iPhone users. For instance, how do you use Live Photos? How do you edit and share them? What are their benefits and drawbacks? That’s what I aim to cover in the rest of this article.
I shot this as a Live Photo on my iPhone, so I get a bit of motion to go along with the still image.
How to use Live Photos
As with a lot of things in the Apple ecosystem, using Live Photos requires almost zero effort. Any time the camera interface is open, there is an icon in the top-right corner that looks like three concentric circles (pictured below). If there is a line through the icon, Live Photos is turned off. If there is no line, it means Live Photos is enabled. Tap the icon to switch between On and Off.
Tap the concentric circle icon in the top-right corner to enable or disable Live Photos.
When Live Photos is enabled, you don’t have to do anything different when you take a picture. Any time you press the shutter button, your iPhone automatically captures the picture and a bit of video. It’s almost like a short animation, or like a moving picture you might see in one of the Harry Potter movies.
If you don’t want to toggle the Live Photos setting every time, navigate to Settings and then choose Camera>Preserve Settings. If you have Live Photo checked, the camera app will remember whether you had Live Photos enabled or disabled the last time you used it. That way you won’t have to click the Live Photos icon every single time you want to take a picture – it will be enabled or disabled depending on your previous settings.
To make your iPhone remember whether you had Live Photos turned on or off, toggle the Preserve Settings>Live Photo option.
Once the Live Photos setting is enabled, all you have to do is snap a picture and your phone takes care of the rest. There are no parameters to tweak, no options to configure, and no changes from one iPhone to the next. Every time you take a picture, your phone automatically saves a Live Photo.
What can you do with Live Photos?
Apple cofounder Steve Jobs once said that people don’t know what they want until you give it to them. Live Photos are kind of like that, in that they give you a tiny glimpse into the context of your images.
People take pictures with their phones every day, but those images are devoid of the audiovisual context that Live Photos provide. Live Photos aren’t life-altering or world-changing, but the few seconds of video alongside each photo is so nice that it’s hard to give up once you’re used to it.
In fact, the real benefit of Live Photos isn’t readily apparent until you start scrolling back through images from months or years ago. You see a picture of a parent, child, or loved one – and you suddenly realize you also have a few seconds of their voice and past life. That’s when Live Photos become indispensable.
Personally, I don’t find Live Photos to be particularly useful for landscapes, animals, or everyday objects, but it’s those images of the people in my life that make me glad to have Live Photos as an option.
I didn’t remember what was going on in this picture of my relatives from several years ago. But since it was a Live Photo, all I had to do was tap and hold. Turns out they were caring for a small animal.
How to view Live Photos
While taking Live Photos is easy, viewing them can be a bit confusing. As you scroll through your photo library, there aren’t any indicators that separate Live Photos from normal photos. And when you tap on a Live Photo, all you see is a still image.
Viewing a Live Photo sent by someone else can be tricky, too, because it looks like any other picture.
When scrolling through your iPhone photo library, there isn’t any way to automatically distinguish Live Photos from normal photos.
The key to viewing Live Photos lies in the key to operating your phone: You have to use your fingers. So to view a Live Photo, whether in your own photo library or one sent to you in a text message, you have to press and hold. The pressure will activate the Live function and start playing the video.
(Note: If you are viewing Live Photos on a Mac computer in the Messages or Photos apps, you have to click and hold on with the mouse cursor.)
Viewing Live Photos is one thing, but what about finding them in the first place? With scant visual clues to separate Live Photos from normal images, locating them can be confusing. Fortunately, you can use the Media Type option in your iPhone photo library to show all Live Photos; this eliminates the need to scroll through all your images in the hopes of randomly stumbling across a Live Photo.
Open the Photos app on your iPhone, then tap Albums. Finally, scroll down to Media Types to see all your Live Photos.
There are also a few hints embedded in every Live Photo to help you know what you’re looking at: Every Live Photo has the word “Live” in the top-left corner, along with the Live Photos bullseye icon. And when you receive a Live Photo over text message, you won’t see the word “Live” – but you will see the Live Photos icon, which means you can tap and hold to view the clip.
How to edit Live Photos
One of the most compelling features of Live Photos is how they can be edited and tweaked just like any other image.
You can use the iPhone Photos app to crop, adjust color, change brightness, add a vignette, and even use filters such as Mono, Silvertone, Dramatic, and more.
You can also change the Key Photo – the image that shows up when you first view a Live Photo (before video playback begins).
When editing a Live Photo, you can tap and drag the horizontal bar at the bottom of the screen to change the displayed still photo (also known as the Key Photo).
I’m a fan of Live Photo editing capabilities; they reinforce the idea that Live Photos aren’t to be treated differently from any other picture. Editing prohibitions or restrictions would be a big drawback – but at present, the only thing you can’t do with a Live Photo is use markup effects to draw on it.
(If you do want to add markup, the Live Photo is discarded and you’re left with a still image. It’s not necessarily a bad tradeoff, just something to keep in mind.)
Apple also gives you some fun ways to edit your Live Photos that go beyond what you can do with normal images. When viewing a Live Photo, you can tap the Share button to save it as a movie, which can then be sent to anyone for viewing on any device – iPhone, Windows computer, etc. You can tweak things even further with some fun effects, too.
For instance, tap and hold on a Live Photo, then – without letting go – swipe upward. This brings up an Effects menu, where you can make a Live Photo loop, bounce back and forth from the end to the beginning, or create a long exposure that blurs all the frames together. These can be shared like other Live Photos, exported as movie files, or uploaded to websites like Giphy.com, which can turn the content into animated GIFs.
If you sync your pictures to iCloud then download a Live Photo to your computer, you get two files: a still image and a movie, which is the Live Photo.
If you have your iPhone pictures synced to your Mac via iCloud, you can even separate a Live Photo into its component parts: a single HEIC image file and a QuickTime movie file. (HEIC files are similar to JPEG files, but they offer more color information and better compression.) You can then edit and share each file individually, or you can use software such as iMovie or Adobe Premiere to stitch multiple Live Photo QuickTime movies into a single video.
Drawbacks to Live Photos
There are a few caveats to keep in mind when using Live Photos.
For one, while Live Photos are a great way to add a bit of context to your memories, they do take up more storage space than traditional photos. The exact file size varies, but Live Photos are generally about twice as large as normal photos. Even if you have 256 GB or 512 GB of storage space, Live Photos can eat through this pretty quickly.
That’s not to say you shouldn’t take Live Photos; just be aware of your storage limitations.
If you find yourself running low on iPhone storage, it’s possible that Live Photos are part of the problem.
Also, Live Photos exist only within the Apple ecosystem. Other Apple users can see the entire three-second clip – but if you send a Live Photo to an Android user, they’ll only receive a single JPEG image. There is a process you can use to export a Live Photo as a movie clip or animated GIF file, but those extra steps are an obvious inconvenience.
And Live Photos offer no customization options, which might bother folks who enjoy tweaking things to fit their own preferences. Every Live Photo is exactly 3 seconds – no more, no less. Every Live Photo is also shot at the same resolution and quality settings, and these limits can be somewhat frustrating. It would be nice if Apple had the option to shoot longer Live Photos, but I wouldn’t count on that changing anytime soon.
This still image turned out great. But what if I had just a few seconds of him swinging at the tennis ball? Thanks to Live Photos, I do. Once you start using Live Photos, you might never want to go back to still images.
iPhone Live Photos: final words
Live Photos are a great way to get more enjoyment out of everyday images.
While drawbacks exist, the benefits mostly outweigh the negatives – and it can be incredibly rewarding to look back on these brief video snippets years later. You will find yourself enjoying your images in a whole new way, and the creative sharing options might open up new doors you never knew existed.
Now over to you:
What do you think of iPhone Live Photos? Do you plan to use them often? Do you prefer them to still images? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
Live Photos FAQ
How do I turn on Live Photos?
With your camera app open, tap the little bullseye icon in the top-right corner. If the icon is yellow, then Live Photos are enabled. If the icon is white, Live Photos are disabled.
How much storage space do Live Photos use?
As a rule of thumb, Live Photos are about twice the size of a normal image. Most Live Photos are about 6-7 MB in size, though this varies depending on the subject you’re shooting.
How do I share a Live Photo to an Android phone?
When you tap the Share button, use the “Save as Video” option. This will convert your Live Photo into a movie file, which you can send to an Android phone (or share with someone who uses a Windows computer).
How can I turn a Live Photo into an animated GIF?
Your iPhone can’t do this by itself, but you can save a Live Photo as a movie and then upload the movie to a GIF website such as Giphy. The GIF website will convert your movie into an animated GIF, which you can share with others.
The post iPhone Live Photos: A Comprehensive Guide appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Simon Ringsmuth.
Apple’s iPhones have a front-facing camera for selfies and FaceTime, but the front camera’s performance and image quality pales in comparison to the rear cameras. For those wanting a high-quality selfie or to record video content of themselves, your options have long been to use the front-facing camera so you can see your phone’s display or to try your luck with the rear-facing camera and hope everything is framed properly. Ulanzi has a new product, the ST-09 Phone Tripod Mount for Apple Watch, designed to solve this exact problem.
By using a paired Apple Watch and the ST-09, you can mount your smartwatch to the ST-09 and clamp it onto your iPhone. With the accompanying Apple Watch app, your Watch’s face becomes a live viewfinder mounted to the back of your iPhone.
As Gizmodo says, it may ‘seem like a foolish use for the $ 200+ smartwatch strapped to your wrist. But as you think about it more, you realize the mount solves a problem that many amateur vloggers who rely on their smartphones for all of their productions needs run into: using the back camera to film yourself is all but impossible.’ The target audience is somewhat niche, perhaps, but the ST-09 is an inexpensive, simple solution. Provided you already have an Apple Watch, of course.
On the bottom of the mount is a tripod a 1/4″ hole for mounting a tripod. On the top of the mount is a cold shoe, which can be used for attaching a fill light, microphone or other accessories.
Ulanzi ST-09 product details. Image courtesy of Ulanzi. Click to enlarge.
If you’re worried about scratching your devices, Ulanzi states that the product features an anti-scratch silicone pad design for the Watch mount and the clamps which adjust to your phone. Speaking of which, the tension distance is 58-89mm, meaning it will fit most iPhones, including the latest iPhone 12 models. With respect to Apple Watch model compatibility, Ulanzi only mentions the Series 5, so Gizmodo observes that the ST-09 may only be compatible with the Series 5 and Series 6 Apple Watches.
The Ulanzi ST-09 can adjust from 58mm to 89mm in order to fit a variety of iPhones. Image courtesy of Ulanzi.
The problem Ulanzi is trying to solve has been tackled by different manufacturers over the years. Gizmodo recalls the DJI Osmo Action, an action camera with a front-facing camera. (You can check out our hands-on with the Osmo Action right here). GoPro followed suit shortly thereafter with the Hero9 action camera. Smartphone manufacturers, on the other hand, have not gone this route. Smartphone displays drain battery and a second display on the rear presents power, engineering and cost concerns.
The Ulanzi ST-09 can be ordered directly from Ulanzi for $ 19.95 USD. The accessory is current on sale from its regular price of $ 29.99.
Customers have gotten their hands on Apple’s latest family of iPhones, including the largest iPhone ever, the iPhone 12 Pro Max. While customers have been enjoying using the new phones, over at iFixit, the team has been busy tearing them apart. They’ve taken apart the iPhone 12 mini and the two medium-sized iPhone 12s, the 12 and 12 Pro. Over this past weekend, the iFixit crew got to work dismantling the iPhone 12 Pro Max.
Image courtesy of iFixit and Creative Electron.
Before diving in, it’s worth recapping the iPhone 12 Pro Max’s features. It is powered by an Apple A14 Bionic system on chip and includes 6GB of RAM. Internal storage options include 128GB, 256GB and 512GB options. The phone features a 6.7″ Super Retina XDR OLED display with a P3 wide color gamut and Apple’s True Tone technology. It is the largest display ever in an iPhone, and according to DisplayMate, it’s a fantastic display.
iPhone 12 Pro Max camera modules. Image courtesy of iFixit.
With respect to photography, the iPhone 12 Pro Max has unique components. It has a 12MP triple camera system like the iPhone 12 Pro, but the Max includes a 47% larger image sensor, a faster F1.6 lens, improved image stabilization, a new 65mm (equivalent) telephoto lens, and improved high ISO performance. If you want to learn more about the performance of the new camera system in the iPhone 12 Pro Max, check out this article: ‘Halide’s deep dive into why the iPhone 12 Pro Max is made for ‘Real Pro Photography’.
X-ray image of the iPhone 12 Pro Max’s rear camera module. The bottom left camera, the standard wide angle camera, has a 47% larger image sensor than the camera found in the iPhone 12 Pro. The four black magnets around the same camera are used for the new sensor-shift image stabilization feature, found exclusively in the iPhone 12 Pro Max and not Apple’s other iPhone 12 models. Image courtesy of Creative Electron and iFixit.
After taking apart the iPhone 12 Pro Max’s new case construction, iFixit was able to investigate the new camera array. As you can see in the x-ray image above captured by Creative Electron, the standard wide camera (shown bottom left) has a noticeably larger image sensor. You can also see magnets around the sensor, which are being used for the new sensor-shift image stabilization tech found exclusively in the iPhone 12 Pro Max. For those lamenting the lack of the larger sensor in the standard iPhone 12 Pro, iFixit states that ‘There’s a decent chance this sensor wouldn’t fit in the cramped corner of the smaller iPhone 12 Pro without compromises.’
Close-up image of the standard wide angle camera module in the iPhone 12 Pro Max. Image courtesy of iFixit.
There’s a lot to see inside the iPhone 12 Pro Max. You can head to iFixit’s teardown for more photos and information about the different internal components and how they relate to the features of the iPhone 12 Pro Max. You can also see a replay of iFixit’s live-streamed teardown of the phone below.
Sebastiaan de With, Co-founder and Designer of the professional iOS camera app Halide, has shared a deep dive blog post into the photographic capabilities of Apple’s iPhone 12 Pro Max, showing a technical breakdown of all three cameras packed inside the flagship device.
In many of the articles we gathered in our iPhone 12 Pro Max review roundup, reviewers said they didn’t actually notice that big of a difference in image quality between the iPhone 12 and iPhone 12 Pro Max. This came as somewhat a surprise considering how promising the technology in the iPhone 12 Pro Max looked, but without having further information to work with — or a review unit in our hands — it’s all we could go off of.
As it turns out though, the cursory first-looks and reviews didn’t paint the entire picture for what the iPhone 12 Pro Max is capable of. Thankfully, Sebastiaan took matters into his own hands and has provided an incredibly detailed look into why initial reviewers didn’t notice nearly as big a difference as expected and provides a number of examples to showcase what’s actually capable with the new iPhone 12 Pro Max when you use it in a more advanced capacity.
Sebastiaan starts by revisiting the specs that set the iPhone 12 Pro Max apart from all the other iPhone 12 models: a 47% larger sensor, a faster F1.6 lens, improved image stabilization, 87% high ISO sensitivity and a new 65mm (full-frame equivalent) telephoto lens. As impressive as those specs are for a smartphone camera, they don’t mean much without context and examples to back them up.
To that point, Sebastiaan shares the above graphic to show just how much larger the new sensor is compared to the one found in the other iPhone 12 models. While the larger sensor should help with noise, Sebastiaan notes the difference is far less noticable during the day, compared to when the sun starts to set. He uses the below comparison shot to show just how well the iPhone 12 Pro Max (bottom image) handles noise compared to its smaller iPhone 12 Pro (top image) companion. As you can see when viewing the full-size image, it’s clear the photo captured with the iPhone 12 Pro Max (bottom image) holds much better detail in the shadows and doesn’t show nearly as much noise.
Click to enlarge.
Sebastiaan posits that the reason most reviewers didn’t notice the difference in image quality as much is twofold. First, many photos taken by reviewers were done during the day, when high-ISO and larger photosites don’t make nearly as big a difference. Second — and arguably even more importantly — most reviewers were using the stock iOS camera app, which uses various intelligent image processing technology to create the final image, which can soften parts of the image with noise reduction and other artifacts. To see how good the iPhone 12 Pro Max camera was without all of the image processing, Sebastiaan used Halide to capture Raw (DNG) images, which ‘omits steps like multi-exposure combination and noise reduction.’
Click to enlarge.
If you’re wondering just how much of a difference it makes when using the stock iOS Camera app versus a camera app that can capture a Raw image, such as Halide, take a look at the above comparison shot Sebastiaan captured in San Francisco at sunset. Notice the lack of detail in the distant buildings, the muddiness of the windows on nearby apartments and the overall ‘watercolor’ effect that happens when too much noise reduction is applied. Sebastiaan shows multiple other examples that highlight just how much of a difference it can make to use third-party apps capable of capturing Raw images compared to those captured with the stock camera app.
Also tackled in the deep dive is the improvement in image stabilization, which is now sensor-based rather than lens-based, as well as the new 65mm telephoto camera, which offers a slightly longer reach (65mm, full-frame equivalent vs the 52mm full-frame equivalent of other iPhone 12 models)
All in all, Sebastiaan concludes his breakdown by saying the ‘results [are] mind-blowing’ as the developer of a camera app. He summarizes it all saying:
‘It achieves images previously only seen in dedicated cameras, with sensors four times its size. It allows photographers to get steady and well exposed shots in conditions that weren’t imaginable a year ago. It captures low-light shots beyond anything we’ve seen on an iPhone. By a lot.’
That’s high praise compared to previous reviews, but the data doesn’t lie. To read the in-depth dive (which you absolutely should), head on over to the Halide blog using the link below:
The iPhone 12 Pro Max: Real Pro Photography
You can keep up with the Lux team — Sebastiaan De With, Ben Sandovsky and Rebecca Sloane — on Twitter and download Halide Mark II in the iOS App Store.
Image credits: Photographs/images provided by Halide, used with permission.
The embargo has lifted on iPhone 12 Mini and iPhone 12 Pro Max reviews ahead of their availability this coming Friday. So, just as we did with the iPhone 12 reviews, we’re rounding up and summarizing a number of reviews from across the web as we were unable to get ahold of review units.
For the most part we’ll be focusing on the iPhone 12 Pro Max in this meta-review collection, but some videos and text reviews cover both the iPhone 12 Mini and 12 Pro Max, so you’ll get a little mix of both.
MKBHD
In this video review, Marques Brownlee, better known as MKBHD, shares his thoughts on the new iPhone 12 Pro Max. As you may remember from his iPhone 12 Pro review, he had expected the iPhone 12 Pro Max would perform even better thanks to the camera improvements inside, but much to his surprise, he noticed hardly any difference in image quality, even between the iPhone 12 Mini and iPhone 12 Pro Max.
The Verge
To accompany its comprehensive video review, The Verge has also shared its longform text review titled ’The best smartphone camera you can get.’ In it, The Verge Editor-in-Chief, Nilay Patel, focuses almost entirely on the camera capabilities, praising improvements of the larger sensor, saying the iPhone 12 Pro Max ‘took better, more detailed, and less noisy photos than the Pixel 5 and Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra.’
Engadget
In addition to its video review embedded above, Engadget also posted a text review of the iPhone 12 Pro Max titled ‘Better, not just bigger.’ In it, Engadget Senior Editor Chris Velazco praises the larger screen, best-in-class performance and the improved camera system. However, similar to Brownlee’s assessment, Velazco says the better cameras in the iPhone 12 Pro Max ‘aren’t exactly game-changers.’
CNET
Similar to Engadget and The Verge, CNET also published both a video review and text review of the new iPhone 12 Pro Max titled ‘Big phone energy.’ Echoing the sentiments of the other reviews, CNET Senior Associate Editor Patrick Holland says ‘when [comparing the 12 Pro Max’s photos] to photos from the regular 12 Pro, the differences don’t jump out at you right away.’ However, he notes ‘that’s less of a strike against the 12 Pro Max, and more of an indication of how good the cameras are on the iPhone 12 Pro.’
Andy To
For a more real-world example, commercial videographer and YouTuber Andy To used the new iPhone 12 Pro Max to capture his trip back home to Oakland in a cinematic fashion using only video recorded with the device. The five-minute video lacks any narration, simply showcasing what’s possible with the camera array. The whole video was shot on HDR video mode without any external lenses. All footage was shot at 4K/60p or 4K/24p and the footage was edited in Final Cut Pro X.
We’ll post more video and text reviews of the new iPhone 12 Pro Max as they go live. If you know of any we’ve missed, link them in the comments below.
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