The introduction of LiDAR and ProRAW on iPhone 12 Pro and iPhone 12 Pro Max marked an exciting seachange for Apple, putting professional consumers at the forefront of innovation.
What makes the new hardware even more exciting is that it can work together not only with Apple’s own Camera and Photos apps, but third-party alternatives that offer deeper levels of customization for specific use-cases. Adobe Lightroom for iOS, for example, fixes exposure in real-time via the camera, offers integrated cloud storage, and indeed offers a powerful suite of photo editing tools that supports RAW files, though there is a cost associated with this.
VSCO, on the other hand, allows you to control the shutter speed and ISO settings before taking a shot and offers customizable white balance, and separate focus and exposure points, though it’s known to lag on some iPhones. Camera+ 2 is considered to be one of the best long exposure and macro shooting camera apps for iPhone, with a macro mode for close-ups, allowing you to feel like you’re using a $10,000 camera when you’re actually holding an iPhone, but it requires you to have at least two cameras and its image editing software is not as powerful as some more advanced iPhone camera apps. Slow Shutter Cam, on the other hand, offers a remote trigger via Apple Watch, as well as a motion blur feature to create panning-like images and a painting mode for a longer exposure, whilst Snapseed, which was acquired by Google but continues as a standalone offering, offers a huge range of editing tools, and it’s free.
Other honorable mentions include Lapse It, which is a time-lapse photography app that allows you to change the rate of capture (the interval between shots), and tweak various settings including exposure, ISO, focus, and white balance, and the best part is that it’s free. $2.99 NightCap Pro is an astrophotography-centric app that allows for DSLR-like via extending the ISO to 6400, and it saves in TIFF files, offering more flexibility than JPEGs. It also offers an intervalometer, which allows for night-sky time-lapse, and ISS mode, which is preset to record the light-trail left by the International Space Station. However, you use this one, make sure you have a tripod – Digital Camera World has put together a list of the best tripods and supports, claiming the Manfrotto PIXI with Universal Smartphone Clamp is the best value for money, though also gives the TwistGrip a mention.
Although the HuaweiMate 40 Pro has been described as the best camera phone money can buy, the truth is that the iPhone 12 Pro Max is the best overall package, combining incredible photography hardware with truly unbeatable software. Apple continues to reign supreme, head and shoulders above its competition, and the innovations introduced with the iPhone 12 demonstrate that.
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