(above) Triple Chocolate Mousse
There is nothing to complain about this chocolate cake. It’s a tiny slice but I appreciate its size as I didn’t feel I have much room left in my stomach at the end of my meal at Violet Herb. I adore this restaurant, the food is good, service impeccable… Heck, even the fruit and herbs infused water leaves a positive impression. If you choose to dine here on an ordinary day, the price for such fine dining is actually pretty affordable. However on both occasions I visited the restaurant, it was near empty. It’s pretty odd that this is happening to a dining spot that won best new restaurant of the year on the island… Maybe it’s the recession to blame?
Anyway I took this picture with the iPhone 6s Plus. However this is not SOOC. I had to retouch and do some mandatory post-processing in Photoshop CC 2015 before the picture looked decent to me.
White balance was fixed, minor sharpening applied, retouching on the cake and plate to remove blemishes (and distracting elements). This was a pretty easy job as Photoshop CC 2015’s content aware was spot-on. I also used Efex Color Pro 4 to enhance the contrast and color of the cake to make it more vibrant.
I am not a believer of iPhone photography. Sure it’s convenient, and Chase Jarvis totally won me over with his sensational photobook “The Best Camera Is The One You Have With You” years ago. I was a noob back in 2009 and easily convinced by Javis, how buying his app and using the iPhone to shoot would guarantee great images on the go. When I bought my first iPhone (iPhone 4), I was disappointed how the picture quality sucked in comparison to my cheaper, older Nokia phone. The iPhone is a good smartphone, but not so much as a camera.
I remembered pictures taken on the iPhone 4’s camera looked pretty grainy and noisy in low light situation. To add salt to injury, there is a blue cast in its in-body flash. So it’s definitely not the camera you wanna use at night or in a dim environment since adding flash doesn’t improve the situation. The autofocus was also finicky on the 4. To Apple’s credit, with each release, the AF has improved steadily and there no longer is any color cast on its flash. The AF on the iPhone 6s is by far the most responsive among past models. Just point where you wanna focus on the screen and the job’s done. You can also thinker with the exposure (just the brightness) on the native camera app. For more extensive fiddling with exposure and focus, you would have to use paid third party apps such as Camera+ and Manual. Now why can’t Apple provide such functions for free on the iPhone’s native camera app? Oh well, maybe because if you were concerned enough to desire control of the exposure on your iPhone camera, you might already be grabbing a proper camera to shoot instead of using your smartphone? Oh well, unfortunately there are times the iPhone is the only camera you have on you and it has no choice but to be the “best” you’ve got. To quote one of my Dad’s favorite proverb… Beggars can’t be choosers. You got to live with the iPhone’s limitations.
One thing I found pretty useless in iPhone cameras are their megapixel count. Sure it’s nice to have 8MP (on the iPhone 4) and gradually bumped up to 12MP (on the iPhone 6s)… But does a higher pixel count equate to better image resolution? It feels as though the case was not for the iPhone cameras (tiny sensors probably to blame!). The contrast is flat, the dynamic range is rather limited, the auto white balance is crap. Sure you can use third party apps to fix some of these stuff in-post or upload the images to your computers and get them fixed in Photoshop, Lightroom, Pixelmator or simplistic editors like iPhoto Photos. I’m very doubtful those sample images taken on the iPhone 6s and posted on Apple’s website were SOOC.
Some colleagues at the news desk raved to me how the camera on the iPhone 6 is stellar, how it could finally could be a decent replacement for their point-and-shoots. I was skeptical as usual. When I got the new iPhone 6s, and started snapping around, it does remind me of my old 3.2MP compact camera. That very camera that inspired my moniker. Fiddling with the 6s and the 6s Plus, I’d say it’s worth paying the extra for the bigger phone. The OIS is a critical boost when shooting in dim environment, such as in a fine dining restaurant. I didn’t use flash, just worked with the limited ambient light. The image stabilization works in general use, but if you want to film smooth 4K clips or generate professional level GIFs or cinemagraphs, you are best investing in a proper stabilizer rig. The better ones cost upwards of US$150. I didn’t realize how detrimental the minute shakes would be until I tried churning out a cinemagraph.
I think the iPhone 6s is a worthy purchase on a whole. But I do have doubts about it being at the pinnacle of mobile camera development. It’s a fun phone to use and the variety of quality third party apps to stretch the iPhone camera’s performance keeps me entertained. However I’ll still be keeping my mirrorless interchangeable camera in my bag when I’m out and about. The iPhone camera is strictly for casual use or last resorts for me, though I look forward to the possibility that future releases would prove me wrong. 🙂