OK, there's a lot of stuff to be exited about with cameras and photography on iPhone 12 and 12 Pro. Let's unpack (thread).

Hardware: The iPhone 12 and iPhone 12 Pro have seemingly the same sensor as the iPhone 11 and 11 Pro.

For the 12 (and 12 Pro): The main ("Wide") camera lets in 27% more light thanks to a new lens with a f/1.6 aperture.

For the 12 Pro Max, though, you now get a new sensor that is significantly larger *with* a faster (better) lens. This will enable much more detailed shots. It's too bad this is only in the Max, but that's life.

It also gets a very cool new OIS system (more on that later).

Apple is shy on details with the Ultra-Wide lens: it's still 13mm, it's still likely a smaller sensor than its Wide sibling, but images look far sharper edge to edge and it gets Night Mode.

The telephoto is my fav iPhone lens. It's only on the Pro, and on the Max it gets changes. On the regular-size 12, it gets Night Mode, and that's it. But the Max...

A new focal length! 65mm (that'll look like a 2.5x zoom mode). It lets in a bit *less* light than the non-Max.

Let's talk about another Pro Max hardware bit. That low light improvement? It's not just a bigger sensor and faster lens. It also has an extra trick up its sleeve...

Apple mentions sensor-shift image stabilization. What does that mean? Basically, it moves the sensor, not the entire camera unit. This moves a lot faster, for better stabilization.

Basically, you can take better pics, smoother videos, handheld. That'll helps a lot in low light!

I gulped for a second when they said Night Mode is coming to all four (4!) cameras of iPhone 12 Pro. The fourth is the front-facing one, also known as the 'TrueDepth' camera system. Apple isn't mentioning hardware changes, though. Assume it stays the same as it's the same size.

The 12 Pro get yet another piece of hardware: a LiDAR sensor. We took a (very deep) dive into that when the new iPad Pro came out complete with a proof of concept app. https://blog.halide.cam/lidar-peek-into-the-future-with-ipad-pro-11d38910e9f8?source=collection_home---4------3-----------------------

Everyone asked us what LiDAR could do for photography. In the iPad Pro? Not much. The 12 Pro, though, uses it for Portrait mode and autofocus. It'll be VERY interesting to test this in person, so we can't wait to use @halidecamera to take a dive.

Hardware summary:

1112 : Better wide camera (collects more light, better at night), unspecified better ultrawide.
11 Pro12 Pro: Better wide and ultrawide, same telephoto. LIDAR!
11 Pro Max12 Pro Max: No comparison. *Much better* wide camera. More zoom on tele. Beast.

Now, for software. They mention the new A14 chip has a ton of new power to do transformative computational photography. That's where most smartphone photography improvements are nowadays: in software processing. Only so much you can do with a tiny sensor and lens.

Smart HDR was introduced with iPhone XS, and it was far from perfect. It captures lots of images and combines them for a better shot: iPhone 12 will get Smart HDR 3 and an improved version of Deep Fusion, a process that takes better photos in low and medium light.

Smart HDR 3 now takes scenes apart to prevent its teething issue of over-smoothing faces vs. preventing noise in dark areas. Deep Fusion and Night Mode are coming to all the lenses; likely because of the extra processing power of the A14 chip.

Night Mode Portraits. This is big: a lot of crazy computational photography happening realtime. For this to work, the phone has to compare data from LIDAR and multiple cameras to infer depth, render realtime blur while also doing some crazy Night Mode enhancements. A14 only (duh)

Kind of a hardware / software thing: the new chip and better software enable better noise reduction, which means better video in low light (and photos, probably). Apple says the new ISP (Image Signal Processor) on the chip is to thank, but I bet some machine learning is involved.

BIG: Apple brings RAW to the iPhone camera. But it's not regular RAW? Don't expect it at launch, as it is listed as 'coming soon', and only on the 12 Pro. I think @halidecamera is safe, for now. This sounds like an all-new format; an API has also been announced.

Apple's site claims 'Machine Learning' improvements (as well as the LIDAR) will help Portrait mode as well; I expect it to get better roll-off and separation.

There's a lot of other improvements: night mode timelapse; 10-bit Dolby Vision HDR video capture; many unspecified changes. It'll be exciting to take this apart.

Stay tuned for our blog posts on @halidecamera with a complete teardown of the hardware and software.