Starting in Photon 5.0, you get full control over how much processing is applied to your photos – anywhere from zero to 100! We call it Process Control.
What is processing?
The cameras in a modern smartphone are a marvel of compromise. To fit in the slim body, they must be extremely small, but as the majority of the world’s population are now using them as their main camera, the photos also need to look really good.
The main compromises required when taking photos with the small image sensors in these cameras are between noise, and shutter speed. When the sensor does not receive enough light, it introduces colored digital noise in the image. To increase the amount of light reaching the sensor, you can slow down the shutter speed, but now your photos will be blurry if the camera is not held extremely still.
In order to work around these compromises, the iPhone uses a mix of algorithms, including AI, to process your photos while taking them.
One common way to allow for faster shutter speeds to avoid blurry photos is to shoot a noisier photo with the faster shutter speed and then process the image, detecting the noise in the image, and smoothing it out. This smoothing is often quite visible in photos – actual photo detail that can be mistaken for camera sensor noise, such as grass or the pores in skin – get smoothed over, looking unnatural.
Noise in your image may also be desirable – the physical film used in cameras before the digital have also always had grain (the analog equivalent of noise), so leaving some noise in your photo gives a more natural, organic feel.
So turn off all that processing!
Photon has supported disabling all the processing since version 1, with a feature we call True RAW (others may call this “Zero Processing” or “Process Zero”). This gives you a file containing the RAW data direct from the sensor, as opposed to the RAW feature in Apple’s Camera which shoots ProRAW photos which contain processing. Read our primer on image formats for more detail.
But sometimes the circumstances are not optimal for a pure RAW image – it may be too dark, or the contrast is too high resulting in blown-out highlights (a white sky) or crushed shadows (black bushes).
What if we had more control?
With Photon’s new Process Control feature, you can choose precisely how much processing to use! You can dial in between 0% to 100% processing, for each photo you have shot.
Take full advantage of Apple’s algorithms to get a photos with vivid colors and blue skies, but dial in just enough of the original image to bring back the detail in those leaves on the tree.
So how do I use it?
First of all, when shooting, use the format picker in the bottom left of the view finder to shoot in Process Control format. This captures all the data required to adjust the processing.
After shooting your photos, tap the preview icon to preview the photos. Now you can tap the button where it says “Process Control” to freely adjust the amount of processing for this photo!
If you don’t want to have to adjust the processing amount for every single photo you shoot, you can set a default amount that is applied automatically. Go into Settings, Capture and scroll down to Process Control to pick your preferred amount of processing, and shoot away!