Camera Reviews: iPhone 11 Pro

Get ready to snap some great photos and film your buddies all day long, because this camera is awesome and so is the battery. But we’re not here to talk about the best smartphone currently on the market. We’re here to talk about cameras. And I gotta say this thing is here to impress. There’s definitely a lot of talk about how this new iPhone will give mirrorless and DSLR cameras a run for their money, so let’s dive in and take a look!

Specs rundown:

So we’ve got three lenses with individual functions. One for wide, one for zoom, and one for ultra wide. While Apple’s website’s specs page for this phone doesn’t offer the focal range of the lenses, based on use and functionality, it seems like 13mm, 26mm, and 50mm. Apple does state that the ultra wide offers a 120* field of view at f/2.4. The wide gives an aperture of 1.8, and the telephoto has an f/2. The site also describes a 2x optical and 10x digital zoom, which is the same as the Samsung Galaxy S10’s triple camera system. Pretty decent for a phone camera!

As far as design goes, it’s pretty bulky on the back of the phone, and my finger hits it fairly often as I’m trying to hold it. The bezel sticks out relatively far, the edges of the lenses are sharp and uncomfortable, and I’m pretty concerned about how protected they are from scratches. Compared to other phone models, these lenses jut out considerably.

The pros:

  • Low apertures give nicer-looking photos, crisper action shots, and better low light.
  • Three lenses that have specific purposes are better than one “do it all” lens.
  • Switching between the three lenses is seamless, and having them arranged in a triangle makes you less likely to need to adjust composition when you change the focal length.
  • The cons:

  • The structure of the lenses really worries me. They’re sharp, they jut out unnaturally, they trigger trypophobia, and with the fragility of Apple devices prior to this one (I swear they make more money on screen repairs than hardware and accessory sales!), I’m certain that these lenses will at the least get scratched to hell within a few weeks, and at most outright crack through the center.
  • I’m surprised that the Pro line of the iPhone hasn’t allowed for more customization, like allowing for two different video resolution settings for front and rear facing cameras. The front-facing camera is lower-res, so why would I want 4k video for it? That seems like a waste of the very limited space on the phone.
  • My final take:

    So will this new iPhone will put ILC and DSLR cameras in the past. I’m not seeing that, here. Not even remotely. This camera is a wonderful phone camera, and is definitely one of the best on the market. As far as replacing a mirrorless? No way. Try to take a photo with this phone camera and print it out on anything bigger than an 8×10 and see what happens. Macro functionality on this phone vs on a Canon 6D with a macro lens — there’s no contest. The heart of the matter is, the sensors, lenses, and GPU in a phone camera simply do not compare to that of a DSLR or mirrorless camera. It’s apples to chairs. Completely different universe.

    The iPhone 11 Pro is a fantastic phone, and has a wonderful camera to go along with it. The photo and video quality is top notch for people who are just looking for quick fun things to post on Instagram or TikTok, but don’t go thinking you can go pro photographer with it. It’s still a phone first.

    Think I’m way off base? Agree? Let me know in the comments below!

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