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Apple Announces Winners of Shot on iPhone Challenge
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“Apple-hate” is your description, and it’s unreasonable and unjustified. It’s not “shot on iPhone plus post production” competition. It was called “shot on iPhone”. Nothing more.
Anyone can tamper with a photo post production. That’s not showing the “awesome” output from the “amazing cameras”. Instead, that’s showing how much extra work is required to improve on the camera output.
The competition would have been far greater had there been no post production, and done all in camera. The rules and execution of this competition were slipshod.
Prize money should have been part of the competition from day one, not a reaction to complaints. And Phil Schiller should not have been on the judging panel. Judges should have been from the great independent photography community.
Choosing winners from iPhones currently only on sale now highlights how lacking this competition was in the spirit of photography, but instead a marketing tool to shift focus back to the iphone which has had a terrible year of sales. It’s as simple as that.
Apple cameras are now able to shoot raw images. Raw images must be post processed. The rules clearly stated editing was allowed and editing programs needed to be specified. Several winners are professional photographers. I would imagine they shot in raw and processed as if it was a DSLR image.
There is nothing wrong with *any* of this. The point is to show you can get professional quality images using an iPhone. Nobody skirted any rules or fooled anyone. The winners took a photo on an iPhone, submitted it to the contest, and were judged accordingly.
You do realize that the editing possibilities are entirely dependent on the data that is captured by the camera sensor, right? You can’t take a picture from a terrible camera and just “edit it” to look equivalent to a profession camera.
Actually it is a “shot on iPhone plus post production” competition. It’s right there in the rules. And of course it’s all about marketing—that’s where the images will be used. Getting awesome photos from iPhones’ amazing cameras is the whole purpose of the contest.
You think there shouldn’t be post-production, winners should be spread across the last ten model years regardless of merit and the contest lacked a “spirit of photography” among other complaints. I disagree 100%.
But sure, you can hate on this contest all you want. Your version wouldn’t necessarily have been any better, just different—and could very well have resulted in ten less-interesting photos for Apple’s marketing purpose. Why would they want that?
No hate here. Just a reality check on the flaws around the comp. Competition details strongly suggest “shot on iPhone”, nothing more. Only in the bottom details does it say post production the stuff out of it.
Share your best photos shot on iPhone
Apple is kicking off 2019 by celebrating the most stunning photographs captured on iPhone, the world’s most popular camera, by inviting iPhone users to submit their best shots.
From January 22 to February 7, Apple is looking for outstanding photographs for a Shot on iPhone Challenge. A panel of judges will review worldwide submissions and select 10 winning photos, to be announced in February. The winning photos will be featured on billboards in select cities, Apple retail stores and online.
Then Phil Schiller on the judging panel...
There’s more depth of photography on the explore tab in Instagram.
It wasn’t a well executed challenge.
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Then why even allow editing.
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I really think we would have got a more broad set of interesting images had no post product been allowed. All in camera, and that’s it.
Pretty much anyone who knows anything about photography would assume that editing was allowed. It’s a part of the process. It isn’t cheating. That’s like complaining that a woodworking competition allows sanding.
No hate here. Just a reality check on the flaws around the comp. Competition details strongly suggest “shot on iPhone”, nothing more. Only in the bottom details does it say post production the stuff out of it.
Share your best photos shot on iPhone
Apple is kicking off 2019 by celebrating the most stunning photographs captured on iPhone, the world’s most popular camera, by inviting iPhone users to submit their best shots.
From January 22 to February 7, Apple is looking for outstanding photographs for a Shot on iPhone Challenge. A panel of judges will review worldwide submissions and select 10 winning photos, to be announced in February. The winning photos will be featured on billboards in select cities, Apple retail stores and online.
Then Phil Schiller on the judging panel...
There’s more depth of photography on the explore tab in Instagram.
It wasn’t a well executed challenge.
[doublepost=1551443958][/doublepost]
Then why even allow editing.
[doublepost=1551444062][/doublepost]
I really think we would have got a more broad set of interesting images had no post product been allowed. All in camera, and that’s it.
But ALL images are processed in some way or another. Film is sent off to a lab (or worked by the photographer) and processed according to various standards, along with dodging and burning, etc. Pushed or pulled vs the ISO. A digital camera that is done as a jpeg in camera has processing applied to it in camera, and you can choose various picture styles, sharpening contrast, etc. to render when the camera converts it to jpeg. A raw file has all of the picture styles stripped away and then it's processed in an editor in the same way a film image would be processed in a lab.
NO image is completely as is from a camera. If it isn't processed in post, it's being processed in camera. Personally I prefer to control the way my images come out, which is why I shoot raw (yes, even on my phone sometimes).
It's possible to cheat in any contest. But it may not be as easy as you think. It's very hard to keep something like that secret and if there is suspicion of cheating, I suspect there are a lot things an analyst can do to show that the EXIF data is incorrect.
Bingo! This is not a generic photography contest but a contest for the explicit purpose of showing what a modern iPhone's camera can produce. But if I spend a week running custom filters all over it using Photoshop on a desktop computer, then I'm no longer seeing that.
Nobody is saying that the pictures violated any rules, but many of us disagree with the rules themselves.
I think one could make a strong case that anybody with a reasonably modern camera from any source (Apple, Samsung, LG, whatever) can use post-processing software to completely eliminate whatever differences there may be between these cameras. Which is why allowing unlimited amounts of post-processing undermines the spirit of the contest.
True, but in-camera processing will showcase the capabilities of the camera. Post-processing showcases the capabilities of the photographer and software independent of the camera.
No it doesn't. The iPhone camera is hardware, not software. The Photos app is software. It is doing the processing, not the camera or sensor. The Photos app is doing the post processing, and in many instances, not doing it well. If you really want to know how the iPhone camera and sensor perform, use an app that allows images to be taken in raw format. Photos does not. Photos takes everything as a jpeg and discards important information. An image that may well have a decent dynamic range taken in raw and processed in a raw editor has clipped highlights and blocked shadows when taken through the native Photos app and processed as a jpeg.
I would argue that the best way to showcase the abilities of the actual camera and sensor are to use anything but Photos.
“Shot on iPhone” = Press the capture button, then boom, you’ve got your photo and you’re done. Nothing more.
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It’s tampering. Anything further than simply capturing the image is tampering with the initial result.
Lolol. You’re joking, right? I have bad news for you. You’re simply wrong.
Seriously
Much ado about nothing. People who complain the photos have been overly post-processed have a point. At the end these photos will be used as marketing material, they will be put on billboards and when the average soccer mum (or the average Joe) pass by, they will think, “OMG, that iPhone produces phenomenal pictures” and will run to the apple store and buy one. Much to their surprise, their pictures will look nothing like this because they do not know the photos have been doctored. Most people don’t like to spend their time postprocessing. Then they’ll tell to themselves “so what?” But most importantly, the sale will have been made with all the post-benefits of this.
It’s a nice way to trick people into buying your product. Deceit is a part of life. Not necessarily the best photographic photos have won but the ones that send the required message. As always, a portrait of a child is always winning - we connect our childhood with good memories - and this time in the Mona Lisa style. Anyway. Most of the pictures look very flat so no deceit here, this is what the iPhone camera is.
A very wisely thought out competition from Apple. The winners have their 15 minute of fame and will get some exposure. It’s been a good opportunity for everyone.
It’s a nice way to trick people into buying your product. Deceit is a part of life. Not necessarily the best photographic photos have won but the ones that send the required message. As always, a portrait of a child is always winning - we connect our childhood with good memories - and this time in the Mona Lisa style. Anyway. Most of the pictures look very flat so no deceit here, this is what the iPhone camera is.
A very wisely thought out competition from Apple. The winners have their 15 minute of fame and will get some exposure. It’s been a good opportunity for everyone.
Those who expect an iPhone camera to make them a great photographer probably also think they’d be able to sketch like Picasso if they use his brand of paper and pencils. Or that they could play great guitar if they buy a Stratocaster.
Maybe they’ll be smart (or disappointed) enough to run back to the store and return it when reality hits. Probably not though.
Instant gratification. Everyone knows you need to spend years practicing on the guitar/violin/piano before getting to a level where you can play beautifully (Personally, I play the Viola). Whereas you get a picture immediately when you press the shutter button. It’s far more likely that you buy an iPhone than a Stradivarius/Stratocaster.
Can't wait for someone to train a neural network on this kind of things and see what kind of repetitive simplistic "artsy" s...tuff it comes up with.
Yes, snapping a picture is easy. Creating a work of art, not so much.
Everyone knows the Big Mac you get on your tray has approximately zero chance of looking anything remotely as appetizing as the beauty from the TV commercial (which was created by a professional food stylist). But try suing them for false advertising and see how far you get.
Putting their best foot forward? Showing their product in the best possible light? (pun intended)... Sure. Deceitful? Tricking their customer into buying the product? Maybe if you’re seven years old and still believe that that Hot Wheels car can jump up and over the four foot bridge, and keep going after sticking the perfect four-point landing on the other side
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