Kaibelf
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What does this kind of comment bring to the table? Do you feel better about yourself?
MacRumors Readers Share Beautiful Depth-of-Field Photos Shot With iPhone 7 Plus
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What does this kind of comment bring to the table? Do you feel better about yourself?
fourthtunz
macrumors 68000
And its a new phone with software that hasn't even been released!
Maybe it will get better?!!
mlochowitz
macrumors newbie
It is helpful that you get the original and the depth mapped image. You can open both in Photoshop as layers, create a layer mask and paint in or remove the blur as needed to touch up any issues that the software gets wrong in camera.
hiddenmarkov
macrumors 6502a
Maybe I'm just crazy or misunderstanding something, but hasn't the iPhone had the ability to take such pictures for quite some time? Focusing subjects in the foreground while keeping subjects in the back progressively out of focus (which is what this seems to be doing) or vice versa, has been a capability of iPhones certainly at least since the 5. How is this different from that? Here is a picture shot with my 6. Can someone explain in what way this is different than the photos in the story? I'm not trying to be a smart alec here; I genuinely do not understand
Said it before will say it again. Anyone can improve their work, no matter the gear by reading one well written book. Has tons of great work inside to drool over.
Understanding exposure by Bryan Peterson.
Many things covered will apply to even point and shoot and cell phone. Lighting, depth of field, focus points....to help your camera take better pictures you have to help it along sometimes so best if you know the basics of how to at least a little. Key steps to great shots begin even at the non-camera tech level. Framing and composition. Choose what you shoot and how you shoot it before you even press the button basically.
Some guy named Larry may like that blue shirt that is so bright its damn near glowing. Do not make him focal point of the shot if at all possible. If the shirt has your eyes going damn that's bright....your camera's metering will be going man you have no idea what this is doing to me. It will get the shot....but most likely will have blown out color channels in the process. In plain terms..the shot will look a bit off. Larry's shirt bright enough...the channels, blue especially, may be so far gone even editing/post processing won't fix it very well.
Find a more normal neutral colored subject to make the focus point that still has larry in frame, shot may come out much better. This covered in the book. Simple trick...no $100000 gear required.
You won't win any arguments here on this topic. People think shallow DoF is what makes a picture pretty. Most people don't want to take the time to understand why a photo is good beyond the "seat of the pants" feel. For me however photography is about getting out there and enjoying the shoot, the sights the sounds, and then the photo is a memory I get to keep. Photography is awesome, just keep enjoying it .. who cares what everyone else thinks.
If it's not going to be casual, I'd rather carry my DSLR than hack in Photoshop.
dotnet
macrumors 68000
Is it? As the article linked by you explains, a telephoto lens is not a lens that is "long" (whatever one considers long), but one that at smallest extension (infinity focus) is physically shorter than its focal length. This is achieved by combining an positive objective lens of a shorter focal length with negative rear lens. The article also gives examples of really long focal lenses that are not telephoto, but simply big.
If this is how the 7Plus 6.6mm (effective 56mm) lens is constructed then it would be a telephoto lens. At an overall thickness of the phone of 7.3mm it may indeed be difficult to have 6.6mm minimal extension (distance of the optical centre of the lens from the sensor at infinity focus), not to mention the additional extension required to achieve closer focus.
dtrj787
macrumors 6502
I think we all need to remember this is still only in Beta. So they could adjust the effect to return a more realistic bokeh effect. The photo was amazing coming from a phone. DSLR aren't going anywhere and are superior. But some people think having the 7+ is a better investment since it can get close and still have thousands of other functions.
mlochowitz
macrumors newbie
My DSLR photographs are often 'hacked' in photoshop since I'm shooting RAW. I don't carry my DSLR unless I am working, my phone is always with me and I enjoy Photoshop work.
M-5
macrumors 65816
Maybe I'm just crazy or misunderstanding something, but hasn't the iPhone had the ability to take such pictures for quite some time? Focusing subjects in the foreground while keeping subjects in the back progressively out of focus (which is what this seems to be doing) or vice versa, has been a capability of iPhones certainly at least since the 5. How is this different from that? Here is a picture shot with my 6. Can someone explain in what way this is different than the photos in the story? I'm not trying to be a smart alec here; I genuinely do not understand
Yes, it's true that you can achieve that effect with previous iPhones, although previously you could only do it when you focused on objects that were very close to the lens, which is essentially taking macro shots.
The "depth of field" refers to the physical distance within your image that objects are in focus. With previous iPhones, if your subject was further than 5 inches away you no longer got that shallow depth of field effect.
Traditionally to get a nice shallow depth of field with a person standing a few feet away from you, you would use a DSLR with a 35mm to 50mm lens with a large aperture of f/1.8 or so. Longer focal lengths and larger apertures (smaller f stop number) allow you to have a much shallower depth of field with nice background blurs, although these lenses tend to be extremely large and obviously something you cannot fit into a small cell phone. So what Apple has done is use the combined two lenses to scan the image and create a depth map that basically calculates how far away objects are from the lens so that it can keep the subject in focus and apply an artificial blur to the background that gradually increases as objects are placed further and further from the lens. This creates an artificial shallow depth of field.
I have attached an example of an image without and with the depth effect that the iPhone 7 plus produces.
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I'm not a professional. I just bought Lightroom.
TL24
macrumors 65816
mlochowitz
macrumors newbie
dotnet
macrumors 68000
I don't think that's it. Shallow DOF is simply an element of style that traditionally was unattainable with tiny sensors and wide-angle lenses (except for close-ups). Technological progress simply puts this within reach of those cameras. That in itself is not a bad thing. Will it be overused by people with no sense of style or creativity, at least initially? Sure thing, just like Instagram filters, HDR, selfie sticks, you name it. But statistically almost nobody shooting with a smartphone is an artist or bread-earning photographer. So let people do what they think is pretty, they may get the same enjoyment out of it as you.
You're missing my point. It doesn't matter that they can now get fake shallow DoF, I am simply stating that people swoon over the look, I know I did when I first got into photography, I know everyone I shoot for goes ape when they see stuff like that. Just like on here, people saying something is "beautiful" because it has shallow DoF, the photos in the original post are boring, bushes, etc. Hey, people like what they like, but don't pass it off as something amazing just because it has one technical element it didn't have before. A bush is still a bush in that pic, blurring the background doesn't make the photo any better.
I imagine there are quite a few professionals who don't want to go beyond Lightroom.Well...I just rent Lightroom so I'm not sure what that makes me.
mlochowitz
macrumors newbie
Heavy glass and big sensors might one day be replaced by computational photography. This is just an early step. I'd be happy to carry a lighter kit. For just walking around I find it fun to constrain myself to see what I can do with the phone. It's like only taking a single prime lens on my Fuji, it can make you more creative.
Some of my old DSLR photos with Bokeh and iPhone 7 Plus compares
DSC_0078 = Nikon D7000 Sigma 70-200 2,8f
DSC_4308 = Nikon D7000 Sigma 70mm 2,8f
DSC_0109 = Nikon D7000 Sigma 50mm 1,4f
IP7 = iPhone 7 Plus
IMG_0110 = iPhone 7 Plus
DSC_0078 = Nikon D7000 Sigma 70-200 2,8f
DSC_4308 = Nikon D7000 Sigma 70mm 2,8f
DSC_0109 = Nikon D7000 Sigma 50mm 1,4f
IP7 = iPhone 7 Plus
IMG_0110 = iPhone 7 Plus
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dotnet
macrumors 68000
That's nonsense. Well chosen depth of field often makes an image.
The kitten and red wine shot is obviously the best (two of my favourite things), but that sneaker shot is pretty convincing. Sure, there are still some artefacts around the edge of the shoes, and if you print this large enough you'd probably see more, but for a beta this is a good result. The dog image shows how difficult the task can be.
It's a counter pedant, for sure.
But the initial statement was picking apart the usage of the term "telephoto" with their 56mm lens. So, an attempt to be pedantic over the use of the term. It is, in every definition of the word, telephoto - Full stop. So the correction needed to be made.
Fine, I'll go take two photos from my sidewalk, one of a dog turd with a deep DoF and the same dog turd with shallow DoF. By your logic the shallow DoF makes the dog turd picture great!
That's nonsense.
dotnet
macrumors 68000
Reductio ad absurdum.
Well what is it? Does the shallow DoF make the picture better or not? You can't have it both ways, you cannot just apply "well this often makes it look better" logic because that is NOT the case. A boring photo is a boring photo, no amount of filtering, B&W conversion or whatever will make a boring photo into an interesting one.
People can take awesome photos with the camera on the iPhone, I've seen it done many times. Let's just stop lying that this shallow DoF turns boring stuff interesting, because again that is not the case.