Yes, we’re still here… Sorry for the lack of posts in the last few months… it’s been a hectic time.

This last week I received the new iPhone 12 Pro Max, and I must say it takes amazing photos.  Hard to believe that “computational photography” has come such a long ways since my now two-year-old iPhone XS Max.  I had a chance to try it out at Crater Lake National Park yesterday – alongside with my Sony AR7III (with a 24-105mm zoom), and was floored by the quality of the wide angle lens in the iPhone 12 Pro Max.  Below is an example of the difference (if you can determine) between the two cameras.

First the iPhone 12 Pro Max (below)… using the wide angle lens… edited on the iPhone 12 Pro Max to taste….

Now (below) the Sony A7RIII… edited in Lightroom to taste…

I invite you to tell which one is better.  If anything the iPhone image is at a disadvantage as I had to convert the “.heic” file to “.jpeg”… so it had to go through a lossy conversion twice!  The original image is just incredible.  In fact I had to do a lot less editing to make it look good than I did with the Sony camera (I would have had to do the same with my Canon 5DII camera too).

It’s absolutely AMAZING how far technology has come in smartphones!  I realize that low-light photos will present difficulties for the smartphones due to smaller image sensor size (less ability to detect light)… but for daytime photography… WOW… this really blew me away!