Anybody who knows about the technique and gear involved in capturing great photos and video knows to look at those 'shot on *insert smartphone here*' ads with a bit of skepticism. Yes, they were technically shot on those phones, but many people don't realize the amount of extra gear and software that goes into the final product.
There is a disclaimer at the end of these videos, of course, but it's easy to miss or subconsciously ignore it when you're hoping against hope that your iPhone 7 Plus will be the last camera you'll ever need.
Have you noticed this disclaimer at the end of the 'Shot on iPhone' ads?
In this short video, YouTuber Marques Brownlee sheds a bit of light on the matter, sharing a little behind the scenes look at some of the really intense gear these commercials use, before diving into some more affordable options that can help get your smartphone video—shot on iPhone or otherwise—closer to those professional grade commercials.
Because while you'll probably never use a rig this advanced:
It's not unthinkable that you could buy yourself a DJI Osmo Mobile and some Moment lenses to help get your shaky hand-held attempts a little closer to the results you see in Apple and Samsung's professional ads.
Just don't beat yourself up if your first few tries don't live up to this level of quality. We don't know exactly what gear Apple used on its latest 'Shot on iPhone' commercials, but we're betting it's closer to the crazy rig you see above, than the pared down little stabilizer and smartphone lenses Brownlee touts in his video.
I will say that smartphone cameras have gotten quite good, but we aren't there yet to even make it a replacement for even an advanced P&S. Yes, the technology, particularly in terms of low-light, high-ISO/low-noise has gotten much better, we still aren't there yet. I mean, my iPhone 7 takes DECENT pictures, but I still wouldn't use it for more than snap shots or taking pictures of notes or other things like that. I wouldn't use it as a replacement for even a cheaper P&S... not yet at least. I still like my DSLR and Fuji, despite the extra weight and bulk. Maybe in another 5-10 years, we might be able to see where the smartphone camera overatkes the advanced P&S cameras in terms of IQ, but not now. That and even 4k on my iPhone 7 is no where near what I could get on a DSLR or dedicated HD video recording device. It's good, but still no competition. If you are serious about using your iPhone though for pics, get Lightroom Mobile. It, among other apps, can take RAW/DNG files.
Just used my new iphone to take some daytime landscapes and was shocked at how horrible the quality is compared to my other cameras. It's still only good for casual snapshots.
Wouldn't it be nice if lies and deceits, even small ones, were made illegal in advertising? Why governments allow it needs no explanation but IMO corruption of any sort than can be discouraged should be. The profit motive seems to be valued more than life itself and this is ridiculous.
The quality of iPhone videos, even without the ridiculous gear attached to them, is fantastic. It's state of the art of a few years ago for high level gear, so if that state was perfectly acceptable, so is this. You really could shoot commercials, or features, on your iPhone if you actually relied on your abilities as a videographer, and not on the gear.
What 99.9% of people do not realize is that the billboards along the highway are printed usually at 110dpi and the great distance to the viewer tricks the eye much as with a newspaper when viewed closer than arms' length.
The good aspect is that any camera including a smartphone is better than not having a camera at all. Digital cameras and no worries about film deteriorating has made it possible to take more photos though unfortunately the majority are done with little or no thought, much like tweets by our "president".
Anyone familiar with "fake news" rampant today will not be surprised by "fake ads". Which is what these iPhone ads are. Technically, they get away from being attacked for false advertising but only just. The "fake news" industry, which includes the "fake terror attacks" promoted by "fake news specialists" such as CNN, has trained us to believe everything we see. Surely, governments and corporations wouldn't be trying to fool us, would they?
They all do it and not only for phones. It is the same for d-slrs and mirrorless cameras.
They show results from videos made by really talented cameraman, add tons of stabilisers, rigs, high-end video lenses. Then the stuff gets edited on video software and the end result is not what the average shooter would get.
iphone fanboys take their twilight zone loyalty to whole new level here. Does this article really "imply that it's unique to Apple"? By the way, I own an iPhone 7, so there.
Oh please. Everyone knows Apple is the only company that will provide the necessary web-click quote for news media, however... everyone does it. Stop implying it's unique to Apple.
In the 1970's, Polaroid shots for print ads came to our studio from the ad agency. The Polaroids were all shot by professionals commercial photographers who did ad work all the time.
We then mounted them inside a custom made copy box that allowed us to shoot the Polaroid converting it to B&W RGB Negatives and made a Dye Transfer Print of it. In the shooting ( Matrix film for the dye baths) process, we manipulated and enhanced it overall for color and contrast. After all that we next did minor airbrush and bleach and dye retouching on it.
Women are not the only ones that get star treatment.
"The Phones will be cheaper than DSLRs!" Canon 1300D Camera with 18-55mm IS Lens = £309.00 Nikon D3400 Camera with AF-P 18-55mm VR lens = £389.00
Apple iPhone 7 = £510 Samsung = £444 Sony Xperia XZ = £421
No doubt there are cheaper phones, new and used, with less spec than these cutting edge monsters that can deliver similar photographic results, but general statements like Marques Brownlee said in the vid about price comparisons, even when they seem to be using pretty high end (camera) phones, gives the impression that DSLR quality is more expensive, when compared to what they were using in the vid, from the prices above, they probably are not. And that is not taking into account used and previous models but still new DSLRs too. ;-)
This is just the price / quality comparison though, no doubt phones are the multi purpose tool to give you more than just photos. ;-)
My point exactly, and the best cameras are on the top end phones. All people showing off 'how to' do things with the phones generally have the latest and greatest. ;-)
You forgot to add the cost of a computer to those dslrs, to make them equivalent to the functionality of an iPhone. A common mistake in smartphone vs Real Camera™ comparisons.
The cine lens pictured doesn't make much of a difference and doesn't improve IQ in any way. What it gives you is the ability to pull focus (thought phone sensor DOF is pretty big) and a little bokeh if your subject is close and the BG is far away.
What does make a difference:
Proper lighting - this above everything else is what makes those videos look good - a tiny phone sensor needs light or its terribly noisy. They're obviously lighting everything with more than another iPhone.
A gimbal to stabilize a really light device with some awful rolling shutter
A higher bitrate/manual control app like Cinematic that allows you to control exposure, shutter speed and ISO and record at a bitrate many times higher than stock - so there's more information for professional editors and color graders to do their thing
And of course extensive post processing including something like Neat Video to clean up the footage and spot on color correction
The youtube channel The Camera Store did a great test with iPhone and quite a few mid to high level ILC's cameras.. They printed the results and iPhone won in landscape image.. There no doubt its a great camera.. In low light thats another story..
Remember those "This commercial was shot on a Nikon D90" commercials way back in... 2009? Does anyone doubt there were rigs, a full crew, etc. for those as well?
Tried bike climbing 181st street from Riverside Drive towards Fort Washington with my cheap bike the other day. Results sucked the same as with my friend's expensive bike.
This is NOT an Apple [directly] payed ads, In other words, Apple does not pay DPR [directly], DPR gets payed by the following parties every time you click the link of: - Marques Brownlee - DJI Osmo Mobile - Moment -...
Possibly, Marques Brownlee gets payed by Apple every time the video clip is being watched by us.
"Pay by per click" is one of different ways that money being made. Penny by penny.
Marques wasn't right in one point: the price comparison. The cheapest DSLR with lens is around € 320 ($350) and that's about the price of a mid-class smartphone with reasonable optics. Considering high-end phones ($600+), a DSLR is much cheaper.
"We don't know exactly what gear Apple used on its latest 'Shot on iPhone' commercials, but we're betting ..." Sorry, but this quote from your article makes the whole premise worthless. Not the kind of quality I expect from DP-review. Please, don't become another clickbaiting-headline generating site!
Huh? Weird. They dont know, because they, dont know. You know? Did you watch the video? Pretty interesting I thought. How does this whole article and video become worthless because they are making an assumption?
The point is that some of the editors on this site represent themselves as journalists and journalists don't speculate and they don't assume. And they don't quit for the day just because it's happy hour at the local pub. They dig until they find out the answers. So the question is whether we, their readers, want to hold them to the highest standards of professional reporting or would we rather that they waste our time with second-rate Work. As with government, we get out of the media what we are willing to put in.
For selfies d "snapshots" they aren't bad, but photography is about capturing light, & given the size of cellphone sensors, they do an "ok" job, but can't even match that of a small camera, in sensor size or lens quality.
Considering that most images are viewed on a phone screen, there's no point in using a better camera. The images taken with my S8 look fantastic on the device, on Facebook, Instagram, etc. But on my PC monitor they look ok-ish. But the target users don't view their images on a PC monitor. And I have to admit: since I have a Fujifilm camera with WIFI, I view most of my images on my S8 or iPad as well.
I totally agree! My smartphone is not the latest model (Galaxy Note3) but the colors look fantastic and very realistic as far as I watch the images on this very device. As you said: on my Eizo computer monitor they just are "ok" and mostly have to be a little pimped when mixing them with images from my real camera.
Market and financial forces exert tremendous influence on how and when product or content is disseminated to target audiences. In that regard, any meaningful standard of transparent accountability seems tenuous, at best. Sadly, each day seems to reach new lows in the realm of how to artfully present distorted information. Or perhaps we are now becoming more and more painfully aware of how low this marketing bar was set a long time ago.
So camera phones are the modern equivalent of the box cameras of the last generation. As we suspected all along.
Yes I realize the metaphor is not exact since camera phones are not fixed focus, fixed exposure, fixed everything. But the gap between a camera phone and a real camera is roughly the same.
The problem with the premise of this article is the author does not know what was used. But one thing we know for sure, it was shot using an iPhone, so its sensor is what's in question. And we know it has a great lens. So the bottom line is, the answer is, we don't know what was used.
But we know that Apple (other manufacturers are available) did not feel they could rely on the phone alone to produce the results they wanted. So neither can you. There is a reason they used extra kit - the phone itself is not able to produce those results.
We don't know that because this article doesn't tell us. For all we know the extra gear could have been a lens hood or a tripod. I don't like this article because it implies that thousands of dollars worth of accessories were needed but gives no proof of that.
Amazing how fans will always try to justify Apple no matter what. The truth is that those ads trick people into thinking that, if they buy an iphone, they will get the same results, and this is not true.
Nothing to do with Apple. It is about an article that makes claims without any evidence and suggests the disclaimer means thousands of dollars worth of additional equipment was needed to bolster the results.
The point of the video is that if you see the disclaimer "Additional Equipment and Software Used" it means something besides the iPhone was used. The only conclusion we can draw from the videos is the additional equipment may or may not have been used. Since the iPhone has a very wide angle lens, you might be able to tell by perspective if any additional equipment was use.
"The truth is that those ads trick people into thinking that, if they buy an iphone, they will get the same results" No, they only said: "Shot with an iPhone" period. Not: "Your videos will look just like this".
Which is different to those Samsung ads with pictures taken with Canon cameras.
I don't care for the so-called professional photographers. I am happy with my photographs, created with a camera and a lens, without human, equipment and software assistance.
Well how about that. Color me surprised. I thought "gear doesn't matter," it DOES? Wow. [/sarcasm off]
And by the time you've done all that the "bulk" of gear starts seeming pretty irrelevant I'd say. It makes all of these comments about how even "lugging" a Sony RX100 is just SO much grunt work or such seem really silly.
The smart phone camera definitely has its uses but it can never replace a camera, even for a P&S one. First, the handling is worse off than a camera. Secondly, one seldom can keep it on shoot mode for too long. Thirdly, a phone call can come in anytime to disrupt you while you are trying to shoot. Forthly, the lack of an optical zoom make fast composition a bit difficult. Well, the list goes on.
Even with a good camera, one still require an eye for composition, lighting and exposure. So, thinking that one can shoot "award winning quality" photos by just having an expensive i-phone is an illusion.
Most PS cams are PoS tho. And I'm not sure I understand your last point. Even with a good camera, one still require(s) an eye for composition, lighting, and exposure. Correct. But the illusion then should be that gear doesn't automatically lead to award winning quality, not that iPhones can't shoot such quality.
Main problem with smartphone cam is that it doesn`t motivate you to shoot properly (e.g. spend your time, think, look for composition) because you already know it`s abilities (but not yours) and the result can only be good in ideal conditions.
My point is that: - aperture is fixed, you cant change it - depth of field is huge - no control over it - ISO higher than 400 is mostly useless, so very little control over ISO - lens is fixed, so no control over FoV - at least you can change shutter speed
" Forthly, the lack of an optical zoom..." Ah, yes, but you are forgetting about the famous iPhone "optical" zoom. A development from their Marketing Engineering department's optical labs. Amazing how many reviews, blogs and commentators now believe the iPhone has an "optical zoom". Perception is reality, and if can adjust the meaning of words a teensy bit through the power of marketing, voila - an "optical" zoom in a mobile phone.
So let them call it "dual cam switching", and promote it on its own merits, and not pretend it is something which it is not. After all, if it is better than optical zooming, why would it want to pretend to be something worse? And if it is not, well, there's the deceit.
I think we all know what Sho-Bud means, and it's hard not to agree with him. Yes, there are exceptions, but they are few and very far between.
Level of stupidity in ads is intolerable. "Chew this NEW AMAZING bubble gum, and that girl will be YOURS!" Unsurprising, though; after all, they sell image/emotions, not products. Average level is so bad that, say, on YouTube I automatically vote down a video that does not allow me to skip an ad (that goes before it) after 3 seconds, I just can't stand the torture.
There are ads that are, arguably, works of art. Say, MasterCard's campaign ("There are things that money can't buy. For everything else, there's MasterCard"). It's a marketing masterpiece. And yet, it doesn't make it any less stupid in my eyes. What information does it give me? Why is it better than Visa? No info, just an attempt to manipulate me based on emotions.
"It takes one to know one.... Is faking common practise at the company you're working for?"
Ah but you really feel what the advertisment show? You really get the impression you are in an exotic location down in a boat on a river each time you drink coca-cola?
Your previous brand of laundry detergeant couldn't make any of the clothes you had before look clean but the new one manage to remove any issues even hopeless ones ?
Your mobile phone always download everything instantly whereever you are on earth than to the perfect coverage of your provider?
And if only you had the right brand of underarm deodorant, you could do intensive sport for 4 days in the most difficult conditions and still not stink at all without needing to wash.... I wonder why people that do sport before work even think they need to take a shower before putting back their suit...
"Yes, they were technically shot on those phones" Not even always the case as proven several times...
Funnily enough I've worked on such a shoot and SOME images were shot on the phone, but some from other cameras were mixed in too. And since the production company made no proper prior research to check whether mounting a phone on the intended "thing" was possible nor whether the phone's features were even at all capable of shooting what it was supposed to in the first place (hint: they weren't) it nearly ended being all lies. I did drool a little when proposing a solution and getting the OK to root the sample phones from the representative of the manufacturer on location so that we could edit system parameters and use a couple of apps to work around the limitations and make the whole thing work at all.
Dude—share! For the shots that were actually done on phones, what were the techniques that produced the best images? What two or three things did you learn that day that helped your own iphone video shooting and that you can pass along to the rest of us?
There was no "technique to make the best images", it was merely "put the phone on an action thing where there's usually a GoPro so we can show the phone fiming something crazy"... when the GoPro is obviously much more appropriate. There were only a few seconds of worthy non-vibrating phone footage, but that did the job for them. Was 2 years ago for "a popular Android phone that charges fast".
IOW it goes back to the advice from long-time National Geographic photographer Jim Richardson. “If you want to be a better photographer, stand in front of more interesting stuff.” One thing I think I have noticed is that in a lot of the iPhone videos they don't move the camera very much or very fast. They have a lot going on in the scene but the camera is locked down. Yes?
Don't we already have enough rules, laws, prohibitions, and regulations? Every time someone doesn't like something they demand another government intervention in our lives. What happened to caveat emptor? Exercise your own responsibility for your actions instead.
How do you expect any single person—even a smart cookie like yourself—to be able to outthink a company with unlimite resources that can call on the country's smartest (and devious) most writers, heartbreakingly soulful art directors, steely-eyed cinematographers, the most advanced imaging and processing technology, the pick of exquisite lenses... Get the right talent together and they can make a movie that you won't even know is a movie—for all you know, you could be in a movie right now.
While phone makers have a long history of "faking" promotional videos (hello Nokia) phones have been "good enough", especially for video, for some time now.
Providing that you can work with wide angle and deep DoF, you might not need anything else (even an extended selfie stick hanging vertically down can be an effective stabilizer).
Now, the tricky part is lighting and composition and no amount of equipment will help you if you suck at those.
That's why they hire highly capable professionals to film those videos.
Every company is lying to a degree. If you think Samsung are honest... or LG... Apple ads though with their clinical cleanness and brightness, also promote fakeness as a style, which is probably the worst element in their videos.
That rig in the photo is a prototype of what Nikon should have been producing for ten years now - a DSLR where the phone clips onto the back to provide all the controls/apps/storage/connection/etc/etc/etc imaginable.
But they don't.
They could argue that people wouldn't upgrade their DSLR regularly any more, just their phone hardware or software.
But that's happened anyway. And worse is they're using their phone's inbuilt P&S camera instead of that DSLR with its 10 year old firmware and lack of connectivity any more which just sits in the cupboard.
That money was paid back and they didn't need it. It was money to prove sincerity in porting Office to Mac. Apple was in trouble, but $150 million was a drop in the bucket even then.
This is same as the US space programs mania during the Cold War; spending millions on expensive rigs and rockets, hiring best minds in science and PR only to put — a monkey into a rocket. (While their competitors decided to put a real man instead and beat them with real results). That futile advertising mindset lives today; braindead companies go the same lengths to spends millions, use best videographers and hire incredible rigs only to tie in a monkey camera.
There were very good reasons to use a monkey versus a man. The US space program was very transparent, and every launch was watched live by millions of Americans. A failure would devastate the entire program. The USSR did not have public launches, but did put a dog in orbit first, perhaps your memory is selective?
Laika, who had previously been a stray, launched on a one-way trip on board Sputnik 2 in November 1957, was originally claimed to have died painlessly in orbit about a week after blast-off. She actually died from overheating and panic just a few hours after the mission started. The original plan had been to let her starve to death. Let's be a bit more accurate about the so-called "monkey-cam: here.
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