Certainly impressive. Considering the form factor of a phone.It doesn't always get it right, but it does have gradation. Check out the chair compared to the laptop compared to outside the window:
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Hands-On With the New 'Portrait' Mode Beta Feature in the iPhone 7 Plus
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Really impressed with how well it seems to detect the different 'planes' of the image. This is better than I expected. They still need to work on the blur effects, though. It's too.. blurry.. for lack of a better word. Need a bit better definition on contrasting lines/colors in the background of images.
Would be nice to get a setting to simulate a particular f-stop. Right now it feels like the first few planes are so blurry that everything is being shot at f/1 or something. Tone it back and it will look more realistic, I think, especially for daylight shots.
Would be nice to get a setting to simulate a particular f-stop. Right now it feels like the first few planes are so blurry that everything is being shot at f/1 or something. Tone it back and it will look more realistic, I think, especially for daylight shots.
Is there such a thing as a mirrorless DSLR?
I thought "mirrorless" and "DSLR" were different categories of camera.
Who. Cares. What. Professionals. Think.
Does anyone really think this feature is intended to win over professionals ?
Seriously
It's not perfect. Your focusing screen can't show any depth of field less than f/2.8 or so.
Leica M user here (film and digital with lenses going back 50 years thanks to my grandpa who had quite a nice setup). I love shallow depth of field shooting, which is partly an artifact of low-light work, but can be used artistically. I hope it can be dialed back to be a bit more subtle.
As the saying goes, the best camera is the one you have with you. I find my iPhone a wonderful tool for that reason.
I'm tempted by the 7 Plus, not to replace my real camera, but to improve the shots I already use my iPhone for.
Ironically, this new iPhone feature needs "lots of light" to work well, where as my f/1.2 35mm lens is a favorite for night photography in the city. It's a mass of glass and metal, though, compared to the svelte glass and metal of the iPhone.
As the saying goes, the best camera is the one you have with you. I find my iPhone a wonderful tool for that reason.
I'm tempted by the 7 Plus, not to replace my real camera, but to improve the shots I already use my iPhone for.
Ironically, this new iPhone feature needs "lots of light" to work well, where as my f/1.2 35mm lens is a favorite for night photography in the city. It's a mass of glass and metal, though, compared to the svelte glass and metal of the iPhone.
I do photography (5D MKIII) and blah blah blah this iPhone stuff isn't as good.
On a different note, what the iPhone IS doing is simply incredible. For a first BETA, I say wow. This isn't a gimmick. Not even slightly. Subject isolation is just the best.
On a different note, what the iPhone IS doing is simply incredible. For a first BETA, I say wow. This isn't a gimmick. Not even slightly. Subject isolation is just the best.
As a professional in the field, I think it's fine. In no realistic way can any smartphone replace a practical DSLR, but for quick snaps straight out of my pocket, this is all very much welcomed.
I do hope that in time, as the algorithm improves, that the smudgy edges that are being produced as a result of this effect is corrected.
A camera does not make a photographer.
Photography is the capture of light and that requires both an eye for photography as well as technical knowledge that has nothing to do with the camera itself. Lighting a subject and framing it beautifully is a skill. An iphone with SLR like qualities isn't going to make someone a pro photographer any more than handing them a $10,000 SLR will.
I welcome technology advancements and implement them in my own work. I'm excited about where this is going but we're still several generations away from a small lens and sensor along with algorithms mimicking full sized lenses and sensors. Still, a phone isn't going to replace the feature set that professional photographers require in a fast paced, high demand environment. Nonetheless, I'm happy to leave my SLR at home when I travel and instead shoot with a camera that slips into my jeans pocket.
Apple is claiming they have the only processor fast enough to perform all the calculations from a pair of sensors to allow a complex effect to be performed in real time.
And they're right. Nobody else is even close.
Why exactly would you need a man purse to carry the 7+? wearing ladies sized clothing are you? I'm 74.2" tall, wear appropriate sized clothing and can fit an iPad mini in my pocket........so a smaller phone is definitely no problem.
I don't expect the beta version of this to compete with raw DNGs of my Leica shot through some impressive glass... but... this is off to an impressive start. I had played around with the Android version of this, where you need to raise the phone after the shot to generate the depth map. It was likewise impressive, but the problem was you had to think to much to use it.
What I do expect is this software to improve. Already, the photos generate a great first-impression, so long as you avoid getting critical. In real photography, that's actually what counts: your subject, your artistic rendering of it, and the technical limitations can be an interesting creative constraint. I used to shoot a lot of Tri-X film for the lovely grainy, high contrast results... technically flawed, but lovely!
What I do expect is this software to improve. Already, the photos generate a great first-impression, so long as you avoid getting critical. In real photography, that's actually what counts: your subject, your artistic rendering of it, and the technical limitations can be an interesting creative constraint. I used to shoot a lot of Tri-X film for the lovely grainy, high contrast results... technically flawed, but lovely!
But how else can people bash the iPhone?
Nobody wants to hear "The iPhone is the best smartphone camera in the world, and their portrait feature is superior to every other phone."
So they change the narrative to:
"Meh, it's not as good as a DSLR and a portrait lens. Therefore it's a useless gimmick."
So many people upset that Apple has once again brought a feature others have tried before and came up with a superior implementation of it.
I'm betting they won't be phased. The real magic in photography is in the photographer's eye and their compositional skills, not in knowing how to apply any particular technique. More people will be able to use this effect but that doesn't mean they will suddenly know how to use it effectively or how to compose an interesting image with it.
By extension you must think taking this kind of photo with a DSLR is also a gimmick.
