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Not all that impressed with portrait mode...

thomamon said:
So first off let me start by saying I am not all that impressed with Portrait Mode. Now before you start criticizing me let me explain my thoughts as to what makes me feel this way.

You are automatically shooting in the 56mm mode. Which camera is it using to focus on the subject and which is it using to blur the background? If it is using the 28mm camera to focus on the subject, then its digital zooming which explains the noise/loss of quality. I do not like that at all if this is a case.

If its using the 56mm on the subject, then what a terrible waste of a great aperture the 28mm lens has to offer. Part of what makes the camera amazing, is the 1.8 aperture and how well it captures darker objects. quite honestly, a 28mm, with a 1.8 aperture is going to give you a much better depth of field anyway.

Hoping they find a way to help fix this feature in the future. Perhaps, even if its adding the 1.8 aperture to the 56mm lens in the next iPhone.

Opinions?
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Biggest reasons why I skipped the Plus this year besides the added price. Portrait mode is a beta so it won't be anywhere near "great" until some seasoning/trials, I knew from the start that it would be using the 56mm to catch the photo which means less light to the sensor. Also it won't work for video yet. Maybe next year...

That and without shaved down bezels I found my 6s Plus too big to use comfortably (could I? Yes... Loved it? No.) and I knew the 7 Plus would be the same.

The only thing that gave me 2nd thoughts was when I found out that it merged data to brighten up images... but hat turns out only to be for zoomed pics... something that I could use but do not find necessary nor worth paying $120 extra for.
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I7guy said:
I don't have a 7+ yet, but you are getting virtually no depth of field on a camera phone, even though the aperture is 1.8. This is a way to enhance the image and provide some optical zoom without getting a big old DSLR with red ring lenses.
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I have pretty good shallow depth of field from my 7 actually.

14595778_10153867075591781_5738712111070782481_n.jpg
 
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MrXiro said:
Biggest reasons why I skipped the Plus this year besides the added price. Portrait mode is a beta so it won't be anywhere near "great" until some seasoning/trials, I knew from the start that it would be using the 56mm to catch the photo which means less light to the sensor. Also it won't work for video yet. Maybe next year...
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The biggest reason why I didn't skip the Plus this year is it is practically free after I traded in my old 64GB iPhone 6 and got a shiny new 256GB iPhone 7 Plus using the promo last month from AT&T.

Good riddance crappy battery and slow performance. Hello snappy performance and long battery life!

The rest is whipped cream and cherries. :)
 
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"With the iPhone 4S launch nearly two years ago, Apple introduced the Siri voice control system to its customers. At launch, Siri was a gimmicky feature at best, being released with bugs, a highly-computerized voice, sluggish content loading, and unreliable servers. In addition, Siri of 2011 was short on user compatibility, only launching with knowledge of English, French, and German. Apple certainly did not deny the early issues with Siri: the company launched the product in “beta,” a tag that has remained on the software ever since."

From a September 13, 2013 article on Siri.

Siri was most certainly launched as a "Beta" software, and we can see how much better it is now. I look forward to portrait mode getting better just as Siri has. Is Siri perfect yet? Far from it but she is light years better than her first iteration.
 
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MrXiro said:
Biggest reasons why I skipped the Plus this year besides the added price. Portrait mode is a beta so it won't be anywhere near "great" until some seasoning/trials, I knew from the start that it would be using the 56mm to catch the photo which means less light to the sensor. Also it won't work for video yet. Maybe next year...

That and without shaved down bezels I found my 6s Plus too big to use comfortably (could I? Yes... Loved it? No.) and I knew the 7 Plus would be the same.

The only thing that gave me 2nd thoughts was when I found out that it merged data to brighten up images... but hat turns out only to be for zoomed pics... something that I could use but do not find necessary nor worth paying $120 extra for.
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I have pretty good shallow depth of field from my 7 actually.
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Care to post some photos, would love to see the shallow dof.
 
Macshroomer said:
I have actually forgotten to grab my phone before I forget to grab a small classic Leica with a roll of Tri-x in it...;-)
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Lol, who says mine is not?

Enough from me, photos don't happen while glued to the internet...
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Would love to see what kind of photos buy a $1.8M condo...care to share the link to your web portfolio?
 
I7guy said:
Care to post some photos, would love to see the shallow dof.
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I was trying to from my phone while I was at work; but Macrumors kept saying the picture was too big. Forgot about it after I got home.

14595778_10153867075591781_5738712111070782481_n.jpg


Is it buttery Bokeh like on an SLR? No of course not. But for a phone camera this is amazing!
 
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I7guy said:
Well one has more natural color (IMO) but this is a setup. Take a call phone and dslr to NASCAR and got some great stop action photos. How do you think that will go?
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So is that the only use case?I have to pay $1700 for Nascar shots while for $800 I am getting a device which is achieving 90% of the quality at 50% cost not to mention all that bulk and I have to carry my phone with me anyway ? This margin is slimming day by day and I wouldnt be surprised if at this rate even those isolated use cases are covered.Note the Lumia 1020 from 2012 was just 3 years behind DSLRs and the optical clarity of the iPhone 7 Plus is achieving the same quality at 2X zoom with no protrruding camera module.Think what will happen if this trend continues
 
I7guy said:
Well one has more natural color (IMO) but this is a setup. Take a call phone and dslr to NASCAR and got some great stop action photos. How do you think that will go?
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Actually it would be interesting to try.
 
Radon87000 said:
So is that the only use case?I have to pay $1700 for Nascar shots while for $800 I am getting a device which is achieving 90% of the quality at 50% cost not to mention all that bulk and I have to carry my phone with me anyway ? This margin is slimming day by day and I wouldnt be surprised if at this rate even those isolated use cases are covered.Note the Lumia 1020 from 2012 was just 3 years behind DSLRs and the optical clarity of the iPhone 7 Plus is achieving the same quality at 2X zoom with no protrruding camera module.Think what will happen if this trend continues
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It's more like 50% of the quality and 20% of the performance. Where cell phone cameras fail they fail miserably and it's impossible to see (subtle) nuances when uploading compressed images to websites.

But cell phone cameras are getting better but lowered the bar in terms of people thinking cellphone cameras are a direct replacement for digital slrs.
 
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I7guy said:
It's more like 50% of the quality and 20% of the performance. Where cell phone cameras fail they fail miserably and it's impossible to see (subtle) nuances when uploading compressed images to websites.

But cell phone cameras are getting better but lowered the bar in terms of people thinking cellphone cameras are a direct replacement for digital slrs.
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I dont see a 50% difference in the pictures above.What I am seeing from the iPhone are pics that are almost as good as the ones in the DSLR.The only thing the DSLR did better above is the DOF effect and a natural color tinge.The former will get fixed as Apple optimises the software and the latter will catch up through hardware innovations . And no its not about the device but the person handling it.A good photographer will get a excellent pic through an iPhone 7 Plus than a amateur photographer on an DSLR

They didnt lower the bar.DSLRs are standing still allowing smartphones to catch up.$1700 for a slightly better color tinge,a slightly better DOF and a NASCAR frame by frame shot.lmao
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Hanzu Lao said:
Actually it would be interesting to try.
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I am not an expert on this but with some external camera accessories,an pro imaging app it could be done
 
Radon87000 said:
I dont see a 50% difference in the pictures above.What I am seeing from the iPhone are pics that are almost as good as the ones in the DSLR.The only thing the DSLR did better above is the DOF effect and a natural color tinge.The former will get fixed as Apple optimises the software and the latter will catch up through hardware innovations . And no its not about the device but the person handling it.A good photographer will get a excellent pic through an iPhone 7 Plus than a amateur photographer on an DSLR

They didnt lower the bar.DSLRs are standing still allowing smartphones to catch up.$1700 for a slightly better color tinge,a slightly better DOF and a NASCAR frame by frame shot.lmao
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I am not an expert on this but with some external camera accessories,an pro imaging app it could be done
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Of course you dont see a difference that's my point. If the bar is a photo on Facebook or looking at a compressed photo on MR, that bar is set very low. If the bar is a professional coffee table book, it's out of the universe entirely.
 
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I installed 10.1 earlier this week and was excited to give this a try. This is the first photo I took using portrait mode - check out the top of this cologne bottle where the cap rounds off. Definitely some issues to work out there.

Honestly killed my excitement a little bit but given this is in beta, I suppose it's to be expected. Little kinks like this just make the photo cheesy and the feature seem like a gimmick.

IMG_0446.JPG

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Radon87000 said:
They didnt lower the bar.DSLRs are standing still allowing smartphones to catch up.$1700 for a slightly better color tinge,a slightly better DOF and a NASCAR frame by frame shot.lmao
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Lol k. Low light performance? Interchangeable lens? Image sensor?
 
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jerry16 said:
I installed 10.1 earlier this week and was excited to give this a try. This is the first photo I took using portrait mode - check out the top of this cologne bottle where the cap rounds off. Definitely some issues to work out there.

Honestly killed my excitement a little bit but given this is in beta, I suppose it's to be expected. Little kinks like this just make the photo cheesy and the feature seem like a gimmick.

View attachment 668363
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Lol k. Low light performance? Interchangeable lens? Image sensor?
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Thanks for that shot. I don't know if any other cell phone manufacturer is attempting to do this; Apple definitely innovating here. It's going to take a few iterations to iron out the kinks in this.
 
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Honestly, just like with any camera, DLSR, P&S or a cell phone camera as good as the iPhone 7/7+ the depth of field has a lot to do with how much you know about taking a photo and setting it up. You can take a great shot, get the blurred background effect with the 7 as seen in the example above if you know how to square up the shot and position things correctly.

Portrait mode is trying to replicate what can be done with a high quality lens. For what it is, its not bad. In bright situations its much better. I was fooling with it yesterday outside with my dog, much better then the indoor photos however I still noticed some issues with the images. Some issues I think they will be able to work out, however I've seen others i don't think they will.

Look at the photo below, looks pretty good? But then look closer at it. Look at how the bottom of the chair is half blurred then suddenly in focus. I am not sure how it would be able to determine how to make that 100% using software.

IMG_0393_zpsnuhcotku.jpg
 
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jerry16 said:
I installed 10.1 earlier this week and was excited to give this a try. This is the first photo I took using portrait mode - check out the top of this cologne bottle where the cap rounds off. Definitely some issues to work out there.

Honestly killed my excitement a little bit but given this is in beta, I suppose it's to be expected. Little kinks like this just make the photo cheesy and the feature seem like a gimmick.

View attachment 668363
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Lol k. Low light performance? Interchangeable lens? Image sensor?
Click to expand...

Yea, I seen 9to5Mac complaining about this as well. I believe it was mentioned that you need a lot of light for this to work optimally. With little to no light, you will get this or worse results.
 
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