iOS 16 Camera updates? Improvements?

[kave]

Great photo, thanks for the inspiration.

 

[kave]

For the first time since iPhone 3G I might skip an iPhone upgrade this year. The price on a 14 pro max is about 200€ more than my 13 pro max. How are you all thinking? Is it worth it for the camera?

 

[Stanick]

I had not seen this thread, and I find everything you comment interesting. I also take the opportunity to comment on the same thing that I already did in the general thread, and that is that I notice that the telephoto camera, since beta 5 at least, is used in far fewer situations. And it shows in the quality of the photos and videos, where the result is very poor, even in situations with good light, a lot of detail is lost. in the photos there is even the watercolor effect instead of textures in many shots. I have a 13 pro and until now I was delighted with the camera, but since the last betas, something has changed and the quality has decreased. even the best it had, which was almost identical white balance between the three sensors, is no longer the case. I notice the drop in quality because I compare shots I took in iOS 15 and I can recreate in iOS 16, and the change in some aspects is very evident.

I have seen this on my 11 pro with each new release of iOS since iOS13. Camera quality degrades with each release, and now in ios16 the camera quality of the 11 pro is mediocre. Night mode is almost unusable, compared to what it was on ios13. That’s how it goes with “old phones”. Apple just don’t optimise them for the new software releases.

 

[kave]

So you are suggesting Apple not only stops improving for older phones but actually making them worse with each release? The oldest phone I have in use is an Xs and that camera is still as good as when it was new.

 

[Reeneman]

I don’t think that they decrease the camera quality of older phones.

 

[Wizec]

iOS 16 has wrecked the macro feature on my iPhone 13 Pro. It now hunts and hunts for focus and I can’t get a sharp picture anymore.

 

[kave]

Have you had the phone on something that vibrates like bicycle handlebars? I have perfect Macro mode on mine, been using iOS16 since July.

 

[Wizec]

Have you had the phone on something that vibrates like bicycle handlebars? I have perfect Macro mode on mine, been using iOS16 since July.

😂 no

 

[Stanick]

So you are suggesting Apple not only stops improving for older phones but actually making them worse with each release? The oldest phone I have in use is an Xs and that camera is still as good as when it was new.

No. Not really. I don’t think they purposely degrade the quality. I think it’s matter of optimisation for the newest hardware only. For old hardware situation, the new software may not necessarily produce better results. Friends with 11s and 12s have also noticed this, especially with night mode. It used to be great. Outstanding even. Now it’s mediocre. Attached is a picture I took just now with 2 second exposure in night mode. The surrounding is not even dark, there is light coming from the window and the sun is just beneath the horizon so it’s not even night time. As you can see, the picture quality is rather bad. Before, especially on iOS 13, the quality would be much better, sharp, in focus, bright. Now its… meh.

 

[ddublu]

Even with iOS16 I am still seeing almost watercolor-like images in some cases. As a photographer, this is especially frustrating. I haven't changed any settings and am using the highest quality setting on the phone.

 

[Stanick]

It might be a controversial assumption but could it be that the camera software is binding the pixels even on the old phones with 12 mpx sensors, essentially producing 3 mpx images scaled up to 12? This might explain the watercolour issues.

 

[ogmios]

It seems that the cinematic and portrait is improved on the iPhone 13 Pro, but the big issue that I am running into is that any portrait or cinematic taken with ios16 is not compatible to edit the DOF on a mac or iPad running IOS15... Am I the only one?

 

[kave]

Same with my new iPhone 14 pro, no edits of portraite mode photos on Mac OS 12.5.1

 

[eyeseeyou]

I guess I haven’t been paying attention to the natural blurred background/bokeh the 1x camera on the iPhone 13 Pro can produce. On previous iPhones I think I’d have to go into portrait mode for this level of background blur.

Has it always been like this or is this an improvement from iOS 16?

 

[Reeneman]

I guess I haven’t been paying attention to the natural blurred background/bokeh the 1x camera on the iPhone 13 Pro can produce. On previous iPhones I think I’d have to go into portrait mode for this level of background blur.

Has it always been like this or is this an improvement from iOS 16?

Really good point. We would need a direct comparison to iOS 15.
On my opinion the bokeh looks slightly stronger with the current iOS 16 but it might be a placebo.