iPhone 8 right choice for photography-loving wife?

[Sital]

@Beards Thank you so much. I've decided to give her an iPhone 8 since she will be ecstatic to have a great new phone (you know... girls and their phones ), and the camera is a huge upgrade for her and takes great pictures and is always with her in every moment in life. If she outgrows that camera too and decides that she wants to go even further from there and wants to take her photography hobby to the highest level, I'll definitely give her a Rebel DSLR sometime. ;-) For now, everyone leans towards "A DSLR is really nice but we take most of our photos with the iPhone", and the photo quality in the 7 Plus is really good. I'll jump on pre-ordering the 8 for her as soon as it's announced in September! I hope this thread helps other people in the future.

Personally, I don't think the 7+ photo quality is all that great. My daughter and I both have one and we both think the iPhone 6 took better pictures, especially is low light. And Apple's noise reduction algorithm seems to be especially aggressive.

Having said that, I agree with the sentiment that you can't take a photo with a great camera if you don't have the camera with you.

 

[SteveJobzniak]

@Sital That is the main reason why I am waiting for the iPhone 8. The next generation of the dual-camera setup, where they will fix everything that was wrong in generation 1. ;-) Mainly the telephoto camera and its low light performance not being as good as the regular camera.

 

[Lion007s]

I have a 7 Plus and a Sony mirror less alpha series APS-C camera system I use for events and general photography as a hobby. I find the Sony mirror less alpha series to be the modern day DSLR - lighter, advanced, smaller, all with interchangeable lenses and very pocketable with the basic 16-50mm power zoom - like what the iPhone did to the phone industry, I believe Sony are doing to the camera industry.

Having said that, and as much as I love my camera gear, the quality of photos, and its ease to carry, I still prefer my iPhone as it is always with me and you can get some wonderful shots. You can even do great editing on the phone with several apps available that all deal with RAW too now.

I'll take the Sony when I am keen to do something more advanced, but as they say, the best device is what is always with you. Besides, I think she will appreciate the huge jump from a 5C!

 

[Sital]

@Sital That is the main reason why I am waiting for the iPhone 8. The next generation of the dual-camera setup, where they will fix everything that was wrong in generation 1. ;-) Mainly the telephoto camera and its low light performance not being as good as the regular camera.

You're assuming they think there's anything wrong with it.

 

[macTW]

I'm thinking early about gifts for this year. She's currently using an iPhone 5C to take her cute photographs.

The iPhone 5C camera isn't very good. But the iPhone 6 and 7 were massive upgrades to the camera. And obviously the iPhone 8 will be yet another big leap.

This is for a woman who loves to snap photos of nature, animals, macro photos, and so on. She currently takes everything with an iPhone 5C, but she is getting more and more serious and we've started doing photo editing on the computer to make the photos really pop. So I want to give her a camera upgrade to give her better camera source material. It's a waste to take a really good photo on an iPhone 5C and then be stuck with its low-quality image.

I've read that modern iPhones (6s and up) can now shoot RAW, which disables the phone's image processing software and JPG compression and saves a RAW image from the sensor. That sounds perfect, together with the better camera in the iPhone 7 (and soon 8)!

I'm also thinking that a phone that's always in her pocket might be a better gift than a bulky DSLR camera, and it would also give her a massive phone upgrade.

The question is:
- An iPhone 8 (in September) which should have a very good camera and can shoot RAW.
- Or a dedicated DSLR camera.

What would she miss out on with an iPhone instead of a large-sensor DSLR? Photo quality-wise.

I'm asking here because surely other people here have made this choice and have some valuable knowledge to share?

PS: I won't ask her since I'm planning the gift to be a surprise, and I am sure a phone would be loved regardless of its camera. But if an iPhone 8 can compete with a DSLR then all-the-better!

I would go phone. Someone who uses a phone for photos likely won't make the transition to a DSLR smoothly, as their values are clearly (not wrong not right, just different) on the small screen photos. I'd say iphone 8.

Edit: and yes I realize I'm late to the party. Just thought supporting your choice was good!
[doublepost=1485640707][/doublepost]Also, for everybody on this thread, props for the discussion. I expected the DSLR snobs to show up and shut down anything pro-phone, but there was a lot of quality content here