A Landscape comparison of the iPhone with Canon APS-C and FF

Thanks Mike. Great analysis. Using the grey card was a great idea. I’m still looking for mine that is somewhere in a box following the selling of my Montreal house... In the absence of a grey card I have been using Mother Nature as a reference (like snow for example).

Comments

My experimentation was a bit like yours, meaning that I started using Lightroom to take pictures in the DNG format Along with the built-in app. Unfortunately, Lightroom doesn’t support the ultra wide camera in the DNG (RAW) format. I usually use the standard wide lens more than often and since I have the basic iPhone 11 (not Pro), I do not have the telephoto extra lens, not that it bothers me because I don’t seem to be missing it unless I need some serious reach (then I use my 7D). Actually, I was not even supposed to buy a new iPhone but when my mom’s iPhone 6 battery started acting up, I decided to give her my iPhone 7 equipped with a brand new battery and get a new one. I was not even expecting getting better pictures! For me, smartphone pictures were just... well... smartphone pictures...

Most of the time, the default app on the iPhone is adequate and it’s true that sometimes, it has a tendency to over saturate colors. When that happens, I use the Lightroom app to take the shot. However, Lightroom doesn’t support Live Photo’s and in a few instances, Live Photo’s saved my day due to motion blur (my dog running). I just selected another key frame. I could always set my 7D in burst mode and keep the shutter pressed but then the sorting becomes tedious.

In another instance, the iPhone was way off As you pointed out. I tried to take a landscape picture with large trees where the sky was showing on a overcast day and the iPhone app completely missed the shot as it misinterpreted tree leaves and skies. I had to use the Lightroom app to get the shot correctly. So I’m not surprised that it missed a shot with you grey card. I suspect that the ground was clearer than the iPhone expected (just like my overcast day).

Also, I don’t know if this is your first iPhone, but it is my sixth one (first one was a 3GS) and I can tell you that this latest one showed the most dramatic improvement. My iPhone 7 was telling me when it was using HDR but this new one doesn’t. I guess HDR and image stacking are now essential components of the default iPhone photo app. In some instances with the iPhone 7, I would ignore the HDR photo as it was more than often less good than the standard one (highlights were too extreme). However, I must point out again that this iPhone is a huge improvement over previous models.

You are talking about noise and banding with your original 7D. I must say that I have never experimented banding with my copy of the 7D. However, yes, noise is an issue as soon as I raise the ISO. Under 400 it is usually OK, between 400 and 1600 it is acceptable and above 1600, it is really a last resort thing. Also, my copy of the 7D seems to be plagued by a slight underexposure issue. For several years, I have been systematically using the bracketing function and from time to time, I am using these images or bump a bit the exposure of the “default shot”. That could explain blown out skies. Maybe the lens as well.

You are referring to print sizes in your comparison. In my case, printing is really not important. The only uses I have for my pictures are for myself, here on DPReview and for Facebook friends. Also, I am rarely printing, usually no more than 9x12 and my printer is 10 years old (a 13x19 Epson printer that is as outdated as my cameras).

For my tests, I used my 7D and my G16. Wish I had the 5DIV. Anyone can see my work here but just uploading it is a big task for me as I am stuck with a 1 mbps upload speed and a 5 mbps download speed. This means that when I get home and I add the pictures to my iPad (Lightroom, Photos or Pixelmator), I must take a one hour break before 10 photos are uploaded to my iCloud Drive and distributed across all my devices! I do have an older Windows Server here but manually transferring files remains tedious. Just transferring the DNG files to my local setup is complicated enough.

Questions

First things first, I do not have opportunities to go on trips and get too far of the house because my wife is disabled for the rest of her life and requires constant care and since this pandemic started, I am also sheltering my 85 years old mom from Montreal. Basically, the only photo opportunities I have are on the water on the Sea-Doo and the latter is very incompatible with my 7D (forget the telephoto lenses, by the time I assemble them and if I’m lucky to not drop it in the water, wildlife is long gone...). For that reason, along with the iPhone, I am carrying the Powershot G16 just in case I need some minimalistic telephoto reach. I also have plenty of woods and mountains around here and nothing in terms of organized parks (we do have one 30 minutes from my place but you are not authorized to get out of the car which limits very much the capability of taking wildlife pictures). In my testing, I used both my 7D and my Powershot G16 (both in RAW mode). So here are my questions.

1. Were your DSLRs on a tripod at all times?

2. Was your iPhone on a tripod as well? I bought an iPhone tripod bracket that is very useful for night shots. I discovered today that I could manually push the exposure to 10 seconds using the built-in phone photo app but I haven’t tested it yet. My experience is that where I needed a tripod for my 7D and my G16, I can get away handheld with the iPhone. I am sure this is affecting a bit the level of details of these pictures since we know that the iPhone 11 is stacking/combining photos in its post processing routine.

3. Do you think that the iPhone 11 is a dramatic improvement over previous iterations of the iPhone? For me it is. I can now fit a camera in the small compartment of my Sea-Doo.

My conclusion

1. The original 7D is showing its age and aside from its AFMA function, I never really fell for it. I still like to use my original 350D and my 40D was also doing the job. Number of pixels is not very important for me. I have printed 3 MP photos at 9x12 successfully with older Powershots in 2003.

2. The iPhone 11 is beating my iPhone 7 in every way. And I am barely scratching the surface about the Night Mode, the Pano mode and the Portrait mode in one single device. If I could afford to spend money on just anything, I would sure get a new DSLR camera just to see the improvements but that won’t happen anytime soon.

3. You mentioned that it would be nice to try doing a manual HDR photo using the 5DIV or the 7D. I thought of that too but now I am getting it in an instant. I believe that what we’re seeing here is the dawn of computational photography and that in the years to come, there will be dramatic improvements of this technology. I often make the analogy with automobiles: the next generation (our grand children although I have none, not even children, long story...) after us will probably not know gasoline engines and being required to actually drive 100% of the time.

4. Unless you want to do professional photography or need some action shots and telephoto shots, yes you could now get away with an iPhone. I have a friend of mine who never bought a camera in the past 12 years. She’s been using iPhones for 12 years for her family shots. Of course, she was amazed at the time when I dropped in with a DSLR but now with the iPhone 11, I am sure she is perfectly happy. But truly, maybe she will be one day missing a perfect family portrait on the wall. Fortunately, the iPhone can now achieve that if you stay within a printing size of 11x17 maximum.

5. I have decided to embrace this new “computational photography” technology and as crazy as it might sound today, I strongly believe that it is part of our future. I’m happy that we’re finally talking about it.

I really appreciate the time you’ve spent on this comparison. It is currently out of my reach.