
iPhone 8 Plus: The best smartphone camera we’ve ever tested - uptown
https://www.dxomark.com/apple-iphone-8-plus-reviewed-the-best-smartphone-camera-ever-tested/
======
mtw
Note : take the review with a pinch of salt. DXOmark do not review phones or
cameras from companies that are not "collaborating" with them. They also have
paid partnerships with a few manufacturers (see Oneplus 5 launch).

In this case, DXOMark magically added a metric (bokeh and zoom) just one week
after the iPhone 8 review. Of course this is a good plus for Apple. Before
iPhones were behind Google Pixel, behind HTC U11, Samsung S8+. They were not
in the top 10. Now magically, they get to be on top. I wouldn't be surprised
if there wasn't a discussion or collaboration between doxmark and apple to
review their metrics to have iPhone 8 and X under the best light possible

~~~
guelo
Comparing their subscores it's obvious that without the new zoom and bokeh
categories the Pixel would have stayed on top.

Pixel v iPhone 8+

90 - 89 : Exposure and Contrast

80 - 78 : Color

98 - 74 : Autofocus

70 - 64 : Texture

65 - 68 : Noise

50 - 73 : Artifacts

81 - 84 : Flash

24 - 51 : Zoom

30 - 55 : Bokeh

91 - 89 : Video

I guess picking the "best" comes down to how important those features are to
each customer. Though Google isn't standing still, the Pixel 2 is announced in
two weeks.

~~~
bitexploder
As a Pixel owner I must say it's camera is very good. I used iPhones for a
long time due to security features. Pixel's camera and reasonable hardware
security lured me away. Pixel has no pure equivalent to Secure Enclave, but it
is good enough. The HDR+ on it is great.

~~~
brentis
Every time I was caught by the richness of the Pixel. The iPhone 8 was ok, but
seemed artificial. iPhone 7+ looks downright bad in some pics which goes to
show how challenging the scenes must be as its camera is pretty decent.

------
bspn
This feels like groundhog day. New iPhone [insert model] has the best camera
ever! Fast forward two months: new Google [insert model] has the best camera
ever!

I think we're getting to the point where the incremental gains we're seeing
with each new phone cycle are almost unnoticeable to the average user who just
wants to take photos of their kids to send to Grandma.

~~~
sho
> the incremental gains we're seeing with each new phone cycle are almost
> unnoticeable

I don't think so. As someone with a whole lot of expensive "real" camera gear,
I was _astonished_ \- and I don't really say that lightly - with what I saw a
friend getting out of her iphone 7+. If three years ago you had shown me some
of these images I would have sworn they were taken by at least five grand
worth of gear, expertly used. And by all reports the 8 is another giant step
up.

This techcrunch review tells the story:
[https://techcrunch.com/2017/09/19/review-
iphone-8/](https://techcrunch.com/2017/09/19/review-iphone-8/)

I find this all incredibly exciting. It reminds me of the great
democratisation of electronic music, where all of a sudden you didn't need
$30k worth of hardware synths to make music - a single computer would do. A
cambrian explosion of creativity ensued.

High quality and highly capable cameras - _and video cameras_ \- in the hands
of the masses? Bring it on I say! How many thousands, if not _millions_ , of
incredible, moving, moment-defining images will be captured now we don't need
a pro photographer on hand to do justice to a scene?

If we're gonna have cameras in smartphones - and we're gonna - they may as
well be good, and Apple is setting the pace - and forcing down the price. Good
on them.

~~~
hsitz
I think your post actually proves the point of the person you were disagreeing
with.

If you, someone experienced with "real" camera gear, were "astonished" by the
iphone 7+ pictures and thought they were taken by "five grand worth of gear",
then for the average person further gains are going to be unremarkable.

Yes, I understand that a camera gearhead finds everything new and each small
improvement incredibly exciting. But for the average picture taker none of it
is a big deal; what they have is already quite good, certainly good enough. Of
course, it won't be hard for marketing to convince people that they should go
out and once again fork over more of their hard earned money for "the best",
even if it's in reality a minor improvement.

Also, for the real photographers the equipment is secondary. Better gear helps
very little with creating better pictures. I assure you, people were making
awesome pictures with digital cameras ten and twenty years ago, with specs
that anybody would laugh at now. Good photographers can produce good pictures
no matter what camera they take them with. (And, conversely, bad photographers
produce crap no matter how good their cameras.)

~~~
jlebar
_I think your post actually proves the point of the person you were
disagreeing with._

 _If you, someone experienced with "real" camera gear, were "astonished" by
the iphone 7+ pictures and thought they were taken by "five grand worth of
gear", then for the average person further gains are going to be
unremarkable._

That's kind of a strange argument, no? You're saying that _if_ experienced
photographers think the improvement is large, _then_ average people can't tell
the difference?

That's very strange.

Have a look at e.g. this paper from Google.
[http://www.hdrplusdata.org/hdrplus_preprint.pdf](http://www.hdrplusdata.org/hdrplus_preprint.pdf)
These changes certainly count as "astonishing" to me (let's say, an
"enthusiastic amateaur" photog), and I think you'd be hard-pressed to argue
that this tech is insignificant to the average user.

~~~
slantyyz
>> That's very strange.

Not really. A layperson takes stuff for granted because they don't know better
(or what to look for). An expert knows better and can appreciate the
differences.

~~~
2bitencryption
A layperson might not know _why_ one photo looks better than another, but they
can certainly tell that it still looks better.

An expert might know _why_ , and be able to pick out a few reasons more why
one is superior to the other, but the layperson still has a pair of eyes.

~~~
slantyyz
>> they can certainly tell that it still looks better

The thing is that this is highly subjective and widely varies from person to
person. Sometimes it's related to the content (subject) of the photo,
sometimes it's the colors, sometimes it's the sharpness, etc.

And sometimes the reason why the photo is "better" has more to do with the
photographer's camera settings or technical choices than how good the camera
is on paper.

I consider myself somewhat knowledgeable of cameras, but I will consistently
say that a high DOF iPhone portrait is better than a portrait with razor thin
DOF with silky bokeh shot on a Sony A9, when the A9 is clearly the superior
camera. That's because my definition of "looks better" is highly subjective
and unique to my own tastes and biases.

~~~
sho
> a high DOF iPhone portrait is better than a portrait with razor thin DOF
> with silky bokeh shot on a Sony A9

I agree completely. I appreciate the gear like anyone else, but it's all about
the end result. A recent iphone plus in portrait mode can genuinely capture an
amazing looking, high apparent DOF photo. Yes it's all computer trickery but
who cares. It looks great. An expert with an A9, with the right lens, primed
for the shot, _might_ be able to do better but - and here's the important part
- 99.9% of the time they're not there.

------
avaer
With all of the processing wizardry that goes into phone cameras these days,
gets me thinking: will we reach a point where cameras are digital paintbrushes
that construct a human-pleasing image out of hints from the real world, rather
than tools that capture the real world?

There are probably plenty of people that will pay for a phone camera that
makes them look less like themselves if it makes them look more attractive in
subtle ways.

~~~
dEnigma
Every time a friend of mine bought a phone in a country like China or Korea,
the camera app had built-in filters to smooth the face and prettify the eyes.
Often times these were also the default setting. So I think we are already at
that stage in some parts of the world

~~~
LiquidFlux
Samsung did this with the Note 3, and I suspect other flagships around this
time.

The rear-facing camera would default to their 'Auto' mode, switch to the
front-facing and you have to switch out of something like 'Beauty' mode with
tons of post-processing for selfies.

~~~
roywiggins
Selfies are inherently at a disadvantage, because shots are very close range
with a wide angle lens exaggerate depth. Portrait photography is usually done
with longer lenses, which you can't fake computationally so easily. So I think
some of the selfie postprocessing is trying to make up for that.

~~~
ballenf
Also most people are "ugly" up close. As in, we see micro features that
distract from the macro.

------
askdufuga
The Pixel photos are the best of the lot. I don't understand why the author
thinks the iPhone 8+ is better, except that it's newer and from Apple.

Pixel: [https://cdn.dxomark.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Pixels-
IM...](https://cdn.dxomark.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Pixels-
IMG_20170921_113146.jpg)

iPhone 8: [https://cdn.dxomark.com/wp-
content/uploads/2017/09/ip8Plus-I...](https://cdn.dxomark.com/wp-
content/uploads/2017/09/ip8Plus-IMG_0660a.jpg)

That's not even close. Wider angle. Better range of contrast. Better sharpness
of details. Hard to say which is truer to the colors without being there, but
the colors look better on the Pixel.

\---------- Edit: By their own ratings, the Pixel phone beats the iPhone on
every metric scored:

Pixel v. iPhone 8+

90 - 89 :Exposure & Contrast

85 - 78 :Color

93 - 74 :Autofocus

93 - 64 :Texture

89 - 68 :Noise

84 - 73 :Artifacts

88 - 84 :Flash

\--------

89 - 96 :Final Score

How does the iPhone receive an overall rating substantially higher than its
highest individual rating?

~~~
usaphp
Don’t you see that the face colors on the pixel are not realistic, she looks
dead white. Also try zoom into her face, you will see how much worse the
quality is as well

~~~
alexeldeib
I think that particular photo could go either way. Personally, I went from an
iPhone 6 to a Pixel and then to the 7 plus, and I find the camera lacking in
comparison to the pixel now. The front camera is fine, but the back camera on
the Pixel was faster, sharper, and produced more vivid colors. Can't speak to
the 8, but I personally found the test images not representative of the
Pixel's quality in comparison to the other models listed.

~~~
eeeeeeeeeeeee
"Vivid" often doesn't mean it's color accurate.

I think both the Pixel and iPhone Plus take some of the best mobile camera
photos out there. The Pixel is much, much better at low light. However, the
iPhone reproduces colors in a more realistic way. Most Pixel photos usually
seem to have a harsher color tone, brighter/whiter, very cool like LEDs. The
iPhone seems to favor a more warm color temperature, which I think generally
produces worse low light photos, but more accurate color reproduction.

------
terda12
As someone who owns a $1300 Fuji x100F, color me impressed. The only thing
really separating my Fuji from the iPhone 8 is the level of detail when zoomed
in, otherwise the images just look great.

The performance of these smartphone cameras is getting closer and closer to
DSLR's nowadays. However the level of zoomed in detail still can't compete,
but most consumers don't care anyway because most just want to take pics of
their food and post on instagram.

~~~
tel
That seems wrong... Your x100F has an APS-C sensor and is going to benefit
from better dynamic range and low light performance for it. The iPhone can use
its auto HDR magic to recover dynamic range but that's gotta have an impact
with moving subjects. The noise is accounted for by noise reduction and that
will cause mushiness and loss of detail. I haven't seen an analysis, but I'd
also imagine that the x100F is going to have a vastly more performant lens in
terms of things like overall sharpness, microcontrast, and focal plane
performance.

The iPhone 8 is doing some post processor magic to do lighting and bokeh in a
way that is difficult to replicate either physically or in post. This is
really nice! That said, real bokeh will be hard to beat even with AI as it
depends a lot on the three-dimensional information available at the time of
capture. AI will have to re-create that stuff and will always be an
approximation. Of course, your x100F isn't going to be a bokeh monster, but
other cameras at that level compare here.

You're right in that for IG food shots it's never going to matter and that's
great because the iPhone created a golden age of photography, tbh. But it's
silly to say that this hardware can compare to pro hardware. If you're
shooting with pro hardware it's because you're going to push performance in
some way or another and those are the times that an iPhone can't keep up.

That said, these AI improvements _can_ help push performance as they improve
and I'd love to see Apple work with a camera company to incorporate them.

~~~
slantyyz
>> But it's silly to say that this hardware can compare to pro hardware.

Yes, that is true for people who have some knowledge. For most non-
photography-buffs, the comparison goes as far as "hey, that looks as good as
the photo Uncle Joe shot on his DSLR". It's a very superficial comparison, but
for a layperson, perception is reality.

I would liken it to the concept of "virtual surround sound". Of course, it's
not really surround sound, but if the listener's ears and brain are tricked
enough to think it's surround sound, it's surround sound to them.

------
th0br0
Some of these images don't compare :( the scenes / perspectives differ quite a
bit.

~~~
klodolph
Which ones? Are you talking about the fact that the Pixel has a wider angle
lens?

I mean, you could crop those pictures but that wouldn't exactly be fair to the
Pixel.

~~~
tgb
The portrait with the tree and the sun in the background is a clear example.
Whether the sun is shining through the leaves of the tree or not will
overwhelm any inter-phone differences.

~~~
klodolph
I'm not convinced. You can see a little bit of flare in the 8 and 7 Plus
photos, but global contrast doesn't seem to be affected.

------
vwcx
More revolutionary than the camera itself is the new image compression Apple
is introducing. Can take all the photos in the world but we've still need to
store them for all eternity. The effect of the image compression will be felt
decades from now, whereas the marginal optical gain from the 7 Plus to the 8
Plus won't even be noticeable.

~~~
majormajor
> More revolutionary than the camera itself is the new image compression Apple
> is introducing. Can take all the photos in the world but we've still need to
> store them for all eternity. The effect of the image compression will be
> felt decades from now, whereas the marginal optical gain from the 7 Plus to
> the 8 Plus won't even be noticeable.

I think you've got this exactly backwards.

In forty years a slightly better image will still be slightly better, but a
5MB vs a 10MB file will be as meaningless as comparing a 50KB vs a 100KB text
file is today.

------
devmunchies
Apple isn't normally classified as a camera company but they definitely are
and that is one area where they are still able to still _move the goal post_.

~~~
pducks32
Their make some of the world’s best consumer cameras, computer chips, and
watches. And they truly excel at all of those. Kinda crazy

~~~
Tade0
At least up to iPhone 7 the camera sensor wasn't made by Apple:

[https://itstillworks.com/manufactures-apples-iphone-
camera-1...](https://itstillworks.com/manufactures-apples-iphone-
camera-18562.html)

Currently, it seems to be made by Himax Technologies:

[https://www.cultofmac.com/473737/iphone-8-rumors-cause-
share...](https://www.cultofmac.com/473737/iphone-8-rumors-cause-share-prices-
to-soar-for-3d-sensor-maker/)

~~~
_up
They use the same sensors as all the other phones. But I think they are
perceived better because on default they apply lots of (destructive) contrast,
while other Manufacturers use less to keep more Image Information.

~~~
nkristoffersen
Source? Are other manufactures capturing raw? Or are you saying other
manufactures do less DSP?

------
danjoc
Smartphone cameras are so good now, the differences in photo quality are
pretty negligible between flagships. IMO, DxOMark basically makes mountains
out of mole hills.

Given the option, I'd rather have killer new features like 3D scanning [1]
than a bokeh effect which is slightly better to a trained eye.

[1] [https://www.theverge.com/2017/8/31/16232720/sony-xperia-
xz1-...](https://www.theverge.com/2017/8/31/16232720/sony-xperia-
xz1-3d-creator-ifa-2017)

------
brudgers
The interior low light photo of the kitchen is quite impressive. But I'm not
sure it was taken with just an iPhone.

\+ The sink faucet has a shadow that comes from a low light source to the
right.

\+ The rest of the appliances on the counter cast shadows upward and toward
the windows.

------
jmkni
Are they saying it's better than the X, or have they just not tested the X
yet?

~~~
r00fus
The X isn't released, only announced. Hard to test without the gear...

~~~
jmkni
Fair enough!

------
X86BSD
This article here is the reason why Apple is killing others it competes with.
No one else goes to these lengths to perfect some feature. They just don't
care. It's the reason the iPhone 8 is also years ahead of android phones in
speed.

[https://www.macrumors.com/2017/09/22/how-apple-perfected-
por...](https://www.macrumors.com/2017/09/22/how-apple-perfected-portrait-
lighting/)

~~~
cromwellian
It's not perfect though, there are examples in some reviews of the feature
screwing up and clipping fairs or giving odd shading.

~~~
X86BSD
Of course not. I was not making the claim it was perfect. Merely that only
Apple goes to the lengths they do to _try_ to make perfect things. You think
samsung and google are running around studying paintings to try and understand
the nuances of various styles and lighting? Hell no. They just through a
common image processor in their phone and write some software to use it and
call it a day. That's all I was saying. Apple goes really deep into things to
understand how to make something better. I don't know any corporation other
than Apple that dives that deep into details.

~~~
cromwellian
Actually, the camera teams at Google does camera studies. Apple is just much
better at hyping and marketing what they do. I mean, Google runs the Google
Cultural Institute and has photographed more artwork and paintings and
sculptures than Apple has, and has constructed special cameras just for
photographing such work, and special software focused on art preservation.
([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dOrJesw5ET8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dOrJesw5ET8))

If Google just ships common stuff, then why did the Pixel score industry
leading numbers on camera, beating the iPhone 7? And doesn't Apple ship Sony
image censors, Qualcomm modems, and Samsung OLED displays? Or their "GPU"
which is in fact, a licensed PowerVR IP.

You're buying into marketing hype. Apple's last keynote marketed 4K HDR as if
they had invented it, they're marketing HEVC motion compensation as if they
did something no one else had done, they sell "True Tone" displays, which
aren't a feature of the display at all, but just adjusting color temperature
based on ambient light sensor, which is something Samsung phones have been
shipping for years.

Google and Android vendors do a piss poor job of calling attention to details
they've obsessed over, while Apple deploys Johnny Ive to talk about chamfered
edges. All this creates a mythos that Apple is the only company that cares
about details.

------
arrty88
The X is better yet right? Will it best the pixel 2?

------
0xbear
It’s also apparently well over twice as fast as the latest Android phones.
Essentially the latest Android phones are about as fast as iPhone 6s on
realistic workloads. iPhone 6s is two years old. That’s what happens when you
derive revenue from selling hardware and not ads.

------
headcanon
as good as these cameras are, I feel like its a real missed opportunity not to
partner with Canon or Nikon to get deep integration with their lens systems
and essentially turn this into a DSLR that happens to use the iPhone as a
sensor. I realize there are lens attachments in the wild but they're mostly
trash, and its nowhere close to what it could be.

~~~
Haul4ss
Smartphones have already killed off the casual camera market. I don't think
Canon or Nikon would be willing to help Apple kill off the high-end camera
market, too.

~~~
Fifer82
Is it possible where cameras simply become so good on devices, that the next
hollywood blockbuster is filmed on an iphone?

I know that is ridiculous, but I remember a "1mp" camera was advertised
everywhere as a thing for a phone to have. It wasn't that long ago really.

Let's say your 2040 Iphone captures 4000mp of the entire visible scene. Then
you have some special software that unicorns everything into amazing sauce.

I know this is all pretty whimsical, but none the less, I feel that the path
we are going down is one that Nikon and Canon can't finish.

~~~
zimpenfish
> Is it possible [...] that the next hollywood blockbuster is filmed on an
> iphone?

Yes.

"How one of the best films at Sundance was shot using an iPhone 5S"
[https://www.theverge.com/2015/1/28/7925023/sundance-film-
fes...](https://www.theverge.com/2015/1/28/7925023/sundance-film-
festival-2015-tangerine-iphone-5s)

Or if you want something a bit more Hollywood, Gondry is experimenting with
it.

"Michel Gondry debuts film shot entirely on Apple's iPhone 7"
[http://mashable.com/2017/07/01/michel-gondry-
iphone-7-film/#...](http://mashable.com/2017/07/01/michel-gondry-
iphone-7-film/#9bgz2lJPokqu)

------
jasonmaydie
I'm skeptical. They've been saying this about iphones for years and my
immediate family members who use iphones thing it has a crappy camera

------
SurrealSoul
[https://www.dxomark.com/google-pixel-camera-review-
retested-...](https://www.dxomark.com/google-pixel-camera-review-retested-new-
dxomark-mobile-protocols/) should we really be praising a 4 point increase
from a camera that has been out for two years and cost $150 less on launch?

Don't get me wrong, the iPhone 8 has a good camera, and it is marginally
better than the pixel's, but is this really enough to celebrate?

~~~
janekm
The big improvements are somewhat lost in the overall, average score. If you
look at some of the specific advancements it’s clear that some really
impressive enhancements have been achieved. And if you look at a two or three
year horizon, the difference is massive.

~~~
SurrealSoul
I'm not a camera prosumer in any means but what I saw was 'similar' to the
pixel's. In the article I can see where is surpasses the pixel in these
marginal aspects, but there would be no way I could pass a blind test of
pictures taken from which phone

~~~
janekm
I did used to be a semi-pro portrait photographer so no doubt the differences
jump out to me more than to the average person. One thing that should be quite
easy to see is that the Pixel is losing a lot of detail in skin tones, both
through overexposure and poor choice of color balance. Some of the Pixel
images also have a lot of contrast applied (a matter of taste, up to a point,
but it is often used to hide poor noise performance in low light portions of
the image by rendering them black, and reduces editing options with the image
after capture). But of course it’s not without reason that the Pixel got
glowing reviews for its camera system when it came out, and it still puts in a
decent showing.

