Wow...modern phones are amazing.......

[Phil V]

Certainly not knowingly....and re reading my words, I genuinely have no absolutely no idea how that might possibly be the case.

So you don’t understand the simple principle that a larger sensor would have given you more options?
The simple fact my IPhone 16 pro which I take photos with regularly will not perform as well in low light as my R6 is a straightforward matter of physics the majority of people in this thread understand and have described in different ways.

 

[AndrewFlannigan]

... a larger sensor would have given you more options?

I think that would be accurate, if you added the words "at the moment".

If there is the demand, research and development will continue and the next generation of phone sensors may have more pixels and greater sensitivity than today's full frame sensors. Whether there will be a competing full frame sensor generation will depend on commercial realities. None of us can know whether the market for dedicated cameras will remain large enough to justify further development of such devices. If not, I think the multi-use device will become the tool of choice for many types of photography, which are currently done with dedicated cameras.

 

[BillN_33]

Ai answer on the internet
"Are camera sales declining?
Worldwide camera shipments dropped by 94% between 2010 and 2023, largely due to the rise of smartphone photography. Shipments of digital cameras with built-in lenses saw a significant decline, dropping from almost 109 million in 2010 to just 1.7 million in 2023 ......... info Aug 2024"

 

[LeeRatters]

I think that would be accurate, if you added the words "at the moment".

If there is the demand, research and development will continue and the next generation of phone sensors may have more pixels and greater sensitivity than today's full frame sensors. Whether there will be a competing full frame sensor generation will depend on commercial realities. None of us can know whether the market for dedicated cameras will remain large enough to justify further development of such devices. If not, I think the multi-use device will become the tool of choice for many types of photography, which are currently done with dedicated cameras.

No phone camera sensor is going to be 'better' than a 100mp Hasselblad sensor!

 

[LeeRatters]

Ai answer on the internet
"Are camera sales declining?
Worldwide camera shipments dropped by 94% between 2010 and 2023, largely due to the rise of smartphone photography. Shipments of digital cameras with built-in lenses saw a significant decline, dropping from almost 109 million in 2010 to just 1.7 million in 2023 ......... info Aug 2024"

But that's just sales info. Not which is 'better'

 

[whyone]

So you don’t understand the simple principle that a larger sensor would have given you more options?
The simple fact my IPhone 16 pro which I take photos with regularly will not perform as well in low light as my R6 is a straightforward matter of physics the majority of people in this thread understand and have described in different ways.

I do.....but where I quibble with your original post is that, as far as I am aware, I said nothing the acknowledge this fact.

Going back to my original post, I was simply making the point that with a particular (and admittedly quite rare) set of circumstances, the computational sophistication embedded in the best phone cameras today can more reliably produce a better image than a camera with a larger sensor.

The example I gave was an image taken in a slot-canyon in Arizona. The expert recommendations for photographing in these canyons are long exposures (multiple seconds....) with a good quality tripod. When we visited, just post-covid, use of tripods was prohibited.

 

[AndrewFlannigan]

No phone camera sensor is going to be 'better' than a 100mp Hasselblad sensor!

Just you wait until the iPhone 25 comes out with a 200mP 1/1.14 sensor!

 

[LeeRatters]

Just you wait until the iPhone 25 comes out with a 200mP 1/1.14 sensor!

By which time Hasselblad sensors will be still be many times the size, even more pixels and still much 'better'

 

[gramps]

All pixels are not equal.

 

[ancient_mariner]

Just you wait until the iPhone 25 comes out with a 200mP 1/1.14 sensor!

Nah, it will just have a 1mpx sensor and make up the 200mpx image through AI.

 

[AndrewFlannigan]

By which time Hasselblad sensors will be still be many times the size, even more pixels and still much 'better'

Or, perhaps, be a Chinese company's trade name, used on on cheap cell phones...

 

[Phil V]

I do.....but where I quibble with your original post is that, as far as I am aware, I said nothing the acknowledge this fact.

I don’t know what else I can say. You clearly detailed the limitations you were up against! Now you’re saying that’s not what you meant? Or it’s not what you posted? Or it’s not your understanding of what you posted?
But it’s right there in what you posted! For everyone to read.

I looked and tried....I needed plenty of depth of field for the shot, and even with iso in the 12000's (so the extensive dark areas were noisy as hell) it still needed 1/4 sec.

You’re literally describing the limitations here. And those limits change with a bigger sensor.

 

[whyone]

...

You’re literally describing the limitations here. And those limits change with a bigger sensor.

What i was describing there is what I saw when I tried to use my 5D4.....and ended up with some pretty poor images.

The little sensor (with a myriad of computational witchcraft going on) produced more satisfying images.

 

[Phil V]

What i was describing there is what I saw when I tried to use my 5D4.....and ended up with some pretty poor images.

The little sensor (with a myriad of computational witchcraft going on) produced more satisfying images.

I’m not sure I’d be satisfied with those weird people. But you’re entitled to your opinion too.
I’m primarily a people photographer and those ghouls in the OP are not for me. And I’m absolutely certain I’d have fared better with my previous 6d or my R6.

 

[whyone]

I’m not sure I’d be satisfied with those weird people. But you’re entitled to your opinion too.
I’m primarily a people photographer and those ghouls in the OP are not for me. And I’m absolutely certain I’d have fared better with my previous 6d or my R6.

I 100% agree with you about the ghouls in OP's picture.

My example of a phone picture I preferred to the (admittedly compromised by lack of time to set up the photo and support the camera) 5D4 images was a somewhat abstract shot in a slot canyon....certainly no people involved!

I am primarily a wildlife photographer and I can't think of a single instance in this field where my phone would trump my R5's.

 

[ajophotog]

I 100% agree with you about the ghouls in OP's picture.

My example of a phone picture I preferred to the (admittedly compromised by lack of time to set up the photo and support the camera) 5D4 images was a somewhat abstract shot in a slot canyon....certainly no people involved!

I am primarily a wildlife photographer and I can't think of a single instance in this field where my phone would trump my R5's.

There must be somewhere you can poke a phone camera where a conventional camera won't fit, like an entrance to a wasps nest if you are brave enough

 

[Sootchucker]

OK, this thread has taken another unexpected turn. Perhaps I should change the title to

"wow....Modern phones are getting much better than I remember - but still no where near as good as a proper camera",

to avoid offending all those who are shocked and offended by the notion that ANY decent photo (be it a snap, a memory or a serious shot), can be done with anything but a large sensor camera

I'm pretty sure I don't think I ever said that my phone was going to replace my Nikon Z or Sony E systems, or that it did a better job that those cameras, just that it was liberating to capture holiday snaps with just a phone in my pocket without having to carry around a backpack or bag with my "proper" camera and lens(es), and still get a nice shot that I can remember the holiday by.

 

[AndrewFlannigan]

... just that it was liberating to capture holiday snaps with just a phone in my pocket without having to carry around a backpack or bag with my "proper" camera and lens(es), and still get a nice shot that I can remember the holiday by.

There you go again, talking good sense.

 

[Delphin]

We have to remember that the best camera in a phone in not available in the west.

Oppo Find X8 Ultra utilises a 1-inch type sensor, the largest you’ll find on a modern smartphone, it’s around 30% larger than the main sensor on mainstream flagships like the iPhone 16 Pro Max or Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra. There are several others with 1-inch type sensor (Vivo X200 Ultra and Huawei Pura 80 Ultra.), that are extremely hard to get or you would need to import directly.

Phone camera sensors are getting much bigger these days.

 

[NiallerM]

I do.....but where I quibble with your original post is that, as far as I am aware, I said nothing the acknowledge this fact.

Going back to my original post, I was simply making the point that with a particular (and admittedly quite rare) set of circumstances, the computational sophistication embedded in the best phone cameras today can more reliably produce a better image than a camera with a larger sensor.

The example I gave was an image taken in a slot-canyon in Arizona. The expert recommendations for photographing in these canyons are long exposures (multiple seconds....) with a good quality tripod. When we visited, just post-covid, use of tripods was prohibited.

Images. Not photos.

 

[whyone]

Images. Not photos.

Isn't that what I said?!

 

[AndrewFlannigan]

Images. Not photos.

A photograph is an image although an image not produced using a photographic process is not a photograph.

However, photographic processes are now accepted as including electronic images so an image made using the lens and sensor of a phone is, in common usage, correctly called a photograph.

Other opinions are, of course, available.

 

[NiallerM]

Isn't that what I said?!

It's exactly what you said. I was agreeing!

 

[NiallerM]

A photograph is an image although an image not produced using a photographic process is not a photograph.

However, photographic processes are now accepted as including electronic images so an image made using the lens and sensor of a phone is, in common usage, correctly called a photograph.

Other opinions are, of course, available.

Adulterated images are hardly photographs.

I stick to the OED definition:

a picture made using a camera, in which an image is focused on to light-sensitive material and then made visible and permanent by chemical treatment, or stored digitally.

There's nothing there about enhancing or modifying it.

 

[AndrewFlannigan]

Adulterated images are hardly photographs.

All photographs are artificial.

The end result is what the photographer chooses to make it and I don't think that there can be anything wrong with any part of the process that the photographer chooses to employ. Remember Bromoil? Royal Photographic Society exhibitions, at one time, included many such images, yet using your definition, those images were no kind of photograph. So why did the R.P.S. display them?

Photography is generally regarded as an art form and art can mean anything a particular practioner chooses. You are free to use whatever process you choose and so is everyone else.

 

[NiallerM]

All photographs are artificial.

The end result is what the photographer chooses to make it and I don't think that there can be anything wrong with any part of the process that the photographer chooses to employ. Remember Bromoil? Royal Photographic Society exhibitions, at one time, included many such images, yet using your definition, those images were no kind of photograph. So why did the R.P.S. display them?

Photography is generally regarded as an art form and art can mean anything a particular practioner chooses. You are free to use whatever process you choose and so is everyone else.

I don't think that any single person has the right to define their work as they see fit.

I was at some of the sessions at Les Rencontre d'Arles earlier this year. This foggy area between what is photography and what is something else is very much a live topic, and the subject of finalising arrangements regarding classifications of material. AI is not the only interloper; photos have been subject to modification for both artistic reasons and also for reasons of revisionism for many years.

 

[ancient_mariner]

It seems to me, where the photographer takes and develops an image (either directly or throught the usual development process) but does not change the underlying picture, that is a true and representative photograph. Where they add parts of other photographs that they have taken to them, that image is still his/her photograph, though obviously it is no longer a representative image. Where the photograph is processed and has additional parts added or taken away by software or individuals not under his/her direct and specific control, that is no longer their image. They may still own the copyright to the resulting picture, but it's no longer their work.

That's how I would evaluate AI assisted images.

 

[NiallerM]

It seems to me, where the photographer takes and develops an image (either directly or throught the usual development process) but does not change the underlying picture, that is a true and representative photograph. Where they add parts of other photographs that they have taken to them, that image is still his/her photograph, though obviously it is no longer a representative image. Where the photograph is processed and has additional parts added or taken away by software or individuals not under his/her direct and specific control, that is no longer their image. They may still own the copyright to the resulting picture, but it's no longer their work.

That's how I would evaluate AI assisted images.

Intentionality plays a big part too.

 

[ajophotog]

Photographs, the representations of the world produced by cameras.

 

[AndrewFlannigan]

Where the photograph is processed and has additional parts added or taken away by software or individuals not under his/her direct and specific control, that is no longer their image. They may still own the copyright to the resulting picture, but it's no longer their work.

So where does that leave Andy Warhol and all the many other people, generally regarded as artists, who incorporate other people's work into their own?

What about the many painters who, in the past, would incorporate the work of others into their own work. Picasso incorporated work from Velázquez, Poussin, Delacroix, and Manet, as well as many others, into his paintings. Copying has been described as the most sincere form of flattery in art, so the idea that everything has to be the maker's own work, seems peculiar.

 

[NiallerM]

So where does that leave Andy Warhol and all the many other people, generally regarded as artists, who incorporate other people's work into their own?

What about the many painters who, in the past, would incorporate the work of others into their own work. Picasso incorporated work from Velázquez, Poussin, Delacroix, and Manet, as well as many others, into his paintings. Copying has been described as the most sincere form of flattery in art, so the idea that everything has to be the maker's own work, seems peculiar.

If you go into the musical sphere you find that sampling is nt a free use.

 

[Ed Sutton]

I don't think that any single person has the right to define their work as they see fit.

In that case, who do you think has that right?

 

[NiallerM]

In that case, who do you think has that right?

Stating who it isn't doesn't oblige me to say who I think that it is. That is illogical. I can provide another example, though, of someone who shouldn't be allowed to decide: camera manufacturers and their marketng departments.

 

[ajophotog]

Don't use a flash, that artificial light will change the look of your photograph

 

[Ed Sutton]

Stating who it isn't doesn't oblige me to say who I think that it is. That is illogical. I can provide another example, though, of someone who shouldn't be allowed to decide: camera manufacturers and their marketng departments.

Why dodge the genuine question?

If artists cannot declare their work to be art who can?

 

[NiallerM]

Why dodge the genuine question?

If artists cannot declare their work to be art who can?

It's not a dodge. It is an entirely logical position to hold that you hold negative knowledge, but not the positive form.

The whole discussion of what actually constitutes art is a very nebulous one, but it is not a decision I would think resides with the source of a work; they have a vested interest in promoting it to be so.

 

[ancient_mariner]

So where does that leave Andy Warhol and all the many other people, generally regarded as artists, who incorporate other people's work into their own?

What about the many painters who, in the past, would incorporate the work of others into their own work. Picasso incorporated work from Velázquez, Poussin, Delacroix, and Manet, as well as many others, into his paintings. Copying has been described as the most sincere form of flattery in art, so the idea that everything has to be the maker's own work, seems peculiar.

I'm not sure you've understood my comment. Andy Warhol took other people's work and carefully changed it to make it his own unique piece. He might be accused of appropriation or theft of the original work, but the final piece looked like it did because he carefully crafted it that way. Some photographers (thinking Crewdson for example) use a large crew to create photographs, reputedly sometimes not even pressing the shutter himself, yet the work is plainly his because he guides it.

But, if I take one of my pictures and using the AI tools in a piece of software, allow the program to replace the sky with a stock one from the library provided in an unguided manner, I would suggest the image has lost integrity and there has been a philosophical loss of ownership of the image. Worse, if such images are used in competition we end up with the minner being the person with the best AI implimentation rather than the person who actually took the best picture. There are already often strict guidelines about compositing in some competitions, and I expect them to become more stringent. Last year I entered a picture in the TP DPOTY where I had composited the image to add rain falling, but I added it carefully, blending and angling the additional image, and also declared what I'd done at the time of entering - this was important for personal integrity, and also so that others could object if they felt it was unfair.

Copying painters were known to be copying - the actual making of the image was all their own work, but the creativity and strict ownership of the piece belonged to someone else. However those who just incorporate aspects of others work into their own, just like Warhol, would own the final image because it was their creativity and vision that produced the final work. Obviously that would be open to abuse, and could also result in tawdry, shameful work being presented as belonging to one artist when they had simply ripped off another artist badly in order to attempt to demonstrate creativity of their own - they might own the 'new' work, but it would still be a pile of foetid dingos kidneys.

And so, back to AI 'enhancement'.

Nice for phone snaps, but we need to be careful about representing an image about which we've made relatively few choices that influence the final look of the work, as if it were our own. In another thread I think it was @gman who demonstrated the 'incredible' image enhacement ability of his Samsung phone, when as he kindly demonstrated what was really happening was the AI was guessing what was in the picture and replacing the photo with other content. This showed up when the leaves of one kind of plant were replaced by the leaves of something quite different. There was no enhancement, but only replacement.

 

[Ed Sutton]

It's not a dodge. It is an entirely logical position to hold that you hold negative knowledge, but not the positive form.

The whole discussion of what actually constitutes art is a very nebulous one, but it is not a decision I would think resides with the source of a work; they have a vested interest in promoting it to be so.

Anyone who decides what art is has a vested interest in it, be that curators, critics or dealers, even the uninterested general public. At least the creators know what their intentions are.

 

[NiallerM]

Anyone who decides what art is has a vested interest in it, be that curators, critics or dealers, even the uninterested general public. At least the creators know what their intentions are.

They don't have the same investment as the person trying to gain financially or reputationally from it.

But art is a side issue. Photographs are functional too.

 

[NiallerM]

I'm not sure you've understood my comment. Andy Warhol took other people's work and carefully changed it to make it his own unique piece. He might be accused of appropriation or theft of the original work, but the final piece looked like it did because he carefully crafted it that way. Some photographers (thinking Crewdson for example) use a large crew to create photographs, reputedly sometimes not even pressing the shutter himself, yet the work is plainly his because he guides it.

But, if I take one of my pictures and using the AI tools in a piece of software, allow the program to replace the sky with a stock one from the library provided in an unguided manner, I would suggest the image has lost integrity and there has been a philosophical loss of ownership of the image. Worse, if such images are used in competition we end up with the minner being the person with the best AI implimentation rather than the person who actually took the best picture. There are already often strict guidelines about compositing in some competitions, and I expect them to become more stringent. Last year I entered a picture in the TP DPOTY where I had composited the image to add rain falling, but I added it carefully, blending and angling the additional image, and also declared what I'd done at the time of entering - this was important for personal integrity, and also so that others could object if they felt it was unfair.

Copying painters were known to be copying - the actual making of the image was all their own work, but the creativity and strict ownership of the piece belonged to someone else. However those who just incorporate aspects of others work into their own, just like Warhol, would own the final image because it was their creativity and vision that produced the final work. Obviously that would be open to abuse, and could also result in tawdry, shameful work being presented as belonging to one artist when they had simply ripped off another artist badly in order to attempt to demonstrate creativity of their own - they might own the 'new' work, but it would still be a pile of foetid dingos kidneys.

And so, back to AI 'enhancement'.

Nice for phone snaps, but we need to be careful about representing an image about which we've made relatively few choices that influence the final look of the work, as if it were our own. In another thread I think it was @gman who demonstrated the 'incredible' image enhacement ability of his Samsung phone, when as he kindly demonstrated what was really happening was the AI was guessing what was in the picture and replacing the photo with other content. This showed up when the leaves of one kind of plant were replaced by the leaves of something quite different. There was no enhancement, but only replacement.

There are important consderations.

There is another question, which sprigs from using reductio ad absurdum: this goes to what scenario is in place if (when?) these algorithms become really efficient in terms of processing, and also gain access to libraries upon libraries of source imagery? It becomes almost feasible that machines can then perform the act of replacing, or inserting artefacts to images with complete accuracy. Then what? What use are images if I can summon up a photorealistic picture of me in a Charvet shirt sitting outside the Louvre reading the NYT of today's date?