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Author Topic: iPhone Raw  (Read 6527 times)

Chris Kern

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iPhone Raw
« on: September 17, 2016, 03:53:59 pm »

Well, curiosity got the better of me today, so I installed iOS 10 on my iPhone (a 6s model) and used Lightroom Mobile to save a few raw files so I could see what I could do with the phone camera if I had the original sensor data to work with in post.

I've attached four images: (1) a full iPhone frame, (2) a full frame of the same scene shot with a D800E (24-12mm f/4 Nikkor) to use as a control for whatever crud was in the air between me and the subject, (3) a full-resolution crop from the iPhone, and (4) a full-resolution crop from the D800E.

To the extent possible, I processed the raw data from both cameras similarly.  I adjusted the tone curve to recover some shadow detail — I didn't try to do anything with the highlights because the overcast sky had very little texture — added a little contrast and clarity, and moderate sharpening.  I used the color-picker to adjust the white balance from the hull of one of the boats in the foreground.  The colors in the iPhone file looked a little off to me, so I added some vibrance and saturation.  I did not use the dehaze slider since I figured the Nikon file was more useful as a reference without it.

I don't really have any observations about the result except to say that
  • even with a raw file to work with, the iPhone (at least, not this model) can't match the image quality of a "real" camera;
  • the iPhone clearly is more useful for an occasional grab shot with a raw file than an in-camera-produced JPEG.
But you probably knew that already, didn't you?

Telecaster

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Re: iPhone Raw
« Reply #1 on: September 17, 2016, 04:05:31 pm »

Isn't this a rather unfair comparison?! I wouldn't expect a 110 format Kodak Instamatic to hang with a Nikon F3 IQ-wise, but both do what they're intended to do very well.

-Dave-
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Chris Kern

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Re: iPhone Raw
« Reply #2 on: September 17, 2016, 04:12:51 pm »

Isn't this a rather unfair comparison?! I wouldn't expect a 110 format Kodak Instamatic to hang with a Nikon F3 IQ-wise, but both do what they're intended to do very well.

As I mentioned, the reason I included the D800E image was to show how much the fine detail in the iPhone image might have been diffused by whatever was floating in the air between me and the subject.  It was intended as a control, not to disparage the image quality of the iPhone sensor.

philaitman

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Re: iPhone Raw
« Reply #3 on: September 20, 2016, 06:58:01 am »

My discoveries so far are, WOW it's noisy! At least I now have control over noise reduction in lightroom.

TBH my Iphone camera is used almost exclusively with Hipstamatic and a look I've rolled out of various film and lens emulations within. So I'm happy with noisy grainy monochromes.

BTW ProCAM from the app store can shoot DNG and be imported or copied across using any camera sync application (or drag and drop on Windows) no need for Lightroom for those who don't have it.
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Erick Boileau

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Re: iPhone Raw
« Reply #4 on: September 21, 2016, 02:53:26 am »

I use procamera to shoot with my iPhone , the best app to replace the core camera


Envoyé de mon iPad en utilisant Tapatalk
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Chris Kern

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Re: iPhone Raw
« Reply #5 on: September 21, 2016, 11:08:53 am »

Are any of the aftermarket iPhone apps able to save both the raw and JPEG files from the same image?

Erick Boileau

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Re: iPhone Raw
« Reply #6 on: September 26, 2016, 01:08:58 pm »

Procamera save dng + jpg


Envoyé de mon iPad en utilisant Tapatalk
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Chris Kern

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Re: iPhone Raw
« Reply #7 on: September 26, 2016, 01:15:13 pm »

Procamera save dng + jpg
Envoyé de mon iPad en utilisant Tapatalk

Merci bien.

eronald

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Re: iPhone Raw
« Reply #8 on: September 26, 2016, 09:32:14 pm »

Merci bien.

Actually, it's astonishing how well an iPhone stands up to one of the world's best cameras and lenses. The lens alone probably costs more than the phone.

Edmund
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Slobodan Blagojevic

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Re: iPhone Raw
« Reply #9 on: September 27, 2016, 07:48:36 am »

How did you manage that the 100% crops cover approximately the same area (one is 12 Mpx, the other 36 Mpx)?

Chris Kern

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Re: iPhone Raw
« Reply #10 on: September 27, 2016, 11:06:28 am »

How did you manage that the 100% crops cover approximately the same area (one is 12 Mpx, the other 36 Mpx)?

I intentionally cropped the 100 percent images to display the corresponding areas from the center of their respective frames.  That's why the D800E image has larger pixel dimensions: 2094x1675 for the D800E crop as opposed to 1182x946 for the iPhone one.  (I normalized the two full-frame versions to be 1200 px wide, since that seems to be the largest dimension the LuLa forum software can display without launching an independent viewer window.)

Slobodan Blagojevic

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Re: iPhone Raw
« Reply #11 on: September 27, 2016, 11:59:17 am »

I intentionally cropped the 100 percent images to display the corresponding areas from the center of their respective frames.  That's why the D800E image has larger pixel dimensions: 2094x1675 for the D800E crop as opposed to 1182x946 for the iPhone one...

Ah, my bad, I failed to click again on the Nikon crop in order to enlarge it, thus both crops appeared the same size.

Also, I second Edmund's astonishment re iPhone.

John Nollendorfs

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Re: iPhone Raw
« Reply #12 on: September 28, 2016, 11:14:48 am »

Actually, it's astonishing how well an iPhone stands up to one of the world's best cameras and lenses. The lens alone probably costs more than the phone.

Edmund
Edmund, it's really not that astonishing! I've had a MotoX Pure for a year now (21MP sensor). I've made large prints (22"x28") of images shot with that (jpeg) and my D800E side by side, and it's nearly impossible to tell the difference.
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Dr Tone

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Re: iPhone Raw
« Reply #13 on: October 20, 2016, 03:32:41 pm »

You should have included the default jpg image from the iPhone Camera app as well.  Of course you would have been limited in post but it would have been nice to see how much shooting RAW in Lightroom improves things over Apple's jpg engine.
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