Two weeks touring Scotland. Two weeks of touring magical lands that until now have only been visions in my dreams. Two weeks living out of a suitcase. Two weeks of lugging gear from the tour bus to hotel rooms day after day. All of this boils down to one thing ... PACK LIGHT! Being a photographer, taking a second bag of cameras, lenses, batteries, chargers, etc. is normal. This trip would be different. I vowed to spend 14 days taking pictures and videos using only my iPhone 7+. After all, I upgraded several months ago so I'd have enough storage on my phone for lots more photos!
The journey began in Tennessee and took us to Edinburgh by way of Newark airport. A few of us went over a few days early to acclimate to the time change. Jet lag hits me the worst when I fly East. The first full day of the trip was spent learning the lay of the land in Edinburgh. The next few days were spend running amok in all the typical tourists spots, shopping, riding the busses to see sites we couldn't reach on foot, and visiting a local cemetery or two. (I'm a volunteer for Find-A-Grave, so it's only natural I do some memorializing while I'm here, right?)
I'm not going to go into great detail talking about the specs of the iPhone 7+ as you can find that stuff everywhere. What I am going to write about is how wonderful and user friendly the cameras of the iPhone 7+ are! I say cameras because there are two ... One for standard shooting and the second for portrait mode. Three, if you count the selfie camera!
The dual lens in the iPhone 7+ sit side by side on the back side of the phone. They are both 12mp with one being wide angle with f/1.8 aperture and the other is a 2X telephoto lens with f/2.8 aperture. The camera has an optical zoom of 2X with a digital zoom of 5X, with up to 10X total when utilizing both.
The 2X feature will allow the user to shoot much higher quality photos.
This image is 1X ...
1X Cropped ...
2X ...
2X Cropped ...
The 5X digital zoom creates a less-than-great quality photos due to the fact that the software is creating is "filling in the gaps".
When you want a closer look at the subject simply take the photo you want in 1X or 2X and crop it!
Optical image stabilization - While traveling through the Highlands and the Lowlands of Scotland I was able to capture fabulous images even while in a moving bus or on a ferry crossing between islands.
- Six‑element lens - It's not all smoke and mirrors, folks. The use of multiple convex lenses helps to eliminate the possibility of optical aberrations (distortions and abnormalities) when shooting a variety of different types of photos. Even with good glass, aberrations and abnormalities happen. I'd really like to think the interesting Scottish cross in the photo below is a message from above, but in all honesty, it's most likely a sunbeam crossed with a lens flare. You be the judge ...
- Quad-LED True Tone flash
- Panorama (up to 63 megapixels) - There were PLENTY of opportunities to use the Panorama mode! With all the ferry rides and tours of castles, cathedrals, medieval towns and even the Abbey on Iona, I ended up taking literally thousands of photos ... Many in Panorama mode.
Did you know you can shoot panorama shots vertically as well as horizontally? Yep! Skyscapes are amazing in Panorama mode!
- Sapphire crystal lens cover - The Sapphire Crystal material used to make the lens cover is an extremely hard man-made material. It's much harder to scratch with everyday objects ... It's almost as hard as diamonds! I wondered about this, so I watched a video of a camera guy testing the lens cover with a diamond tester ... The outside of the glass tested positive for sapphire while the underside tested much lower. Actual sapphires test 9 in hardness. The majority of the lens is sapphire, but it's not all sapphire ... It's laminated with glass.
- Backside illumination sensor
- I'm not going to go into great detail here, but basically what this means is that by arranging the imaging elements a certain way the low light performance is greatly improved because more light is captured. Simply put, your photos are better in low light conditions.
- Hybrid IR filter - Apple introduced the "hybrid IR filter" with the iPhone 4S, so this isn't new technology, but tried and true. It's located between the lens and the CMOS sensor. This helps to create more accurate colors and sharpness as it "blocks" the infrared light that CMOS sensors are often sensitive to. What does this mean for iPhone photographers? Those dreamy photos you try to capture are more accurate! Ambient light can be tricky, but the hybrid IR filter helps make your phone's camera capture better images!
- Live Photos with stabilization - I use this feature 90% of the time. I love live photos because you can go back into the frames and select a better image, if the primary image isn't ideal. The camera somehow starts capturing images before you shoot, and for a brief time afterwards.
- There are some fun ways to edit live photos. Select a photo in your photo album, then swipe up on the image. Effects will be directly under the image, allowing you to switch from Live to Loop to Bounce to Long Exposure. Long exposure is great for moving water such as waterfalls. Be sure to take the picture from further away because it will be cropped in the final version.
- Wide color capture for photos and Live Photos - The colors captured with the iPhone 7+ are outstanding. Vivid, true to life colors. Seriously, true colors make everything better ...
- Especially flowers ...
Architecture ...
- Food ...
- And animals ...
Improved local tone mapping - This means that contrast is increased by applying unsharp masking to a wide range to make the colors of a photo pop. It's a little like high dynamic range without the use of multiple images used to create one. This is a photo I shot using portrait mode. Adds an interesting effect, doesn't it?
- I went out on the proverbial limb by only taking my iPhone 7+ as my only recording devise on a once in a lifetime two week trip to Scotland. Honestly, I'm glad I did. I was able to really put my phone's camera to the test and it certainly passed with flying colors. All in all I captures 2,556 images and videos during my trip to Scotland.
- The Apple iPhone 7+ has a great camera with a lot of useful, easy to operate features. Even a few decades ago we would never have dreamed we'd be able to do so much with such a small device!
Autofocus with Focus Pixels- Tap to focus with Focus Pixels
- Body and face detection -
- Exposure control -
- Noise reduction -
- Auto HDR for photos -
- Auto image stabilization -
- Burst mode -
- Timer mode -
- Photo geotagging -
SPECS:
Video Recording
Video Recording
- 4K video recording at 30 fps
- 1080p HD video recording at 30 fps or 60 fps
- 720p HD video recording at 30 fps
- Optical image stabilization for video
- Optical zoom at 2x; 6x digital zoom (iPhone 7 Plus only)
- Quad-LED True Tone flash
- Slo‑mo video support for 1080p at 120 fps and 720p at 240 fps
- Time‑lapse video with stabilization
- Cinematic video stabilization (1080p and 720p)
- Continuous autofocus video
- Body and face detection
- Noise reduction
- Take 8-megapixel still photos while recording 4K video
- Playback zoom
- Video geotagging
FaceTime HD Camera
- 7-megapixel photos
- 1080p HD video recording
- Retina Flash
- ƒ/2.2 aperture
- Wide color capture for photos and Live Photos
- Auto HDR
- Backside illumination sensor
- Body and face detection
- Auto image stabilization
- Burst mode
- Exposure control
- Timer mode
Touch ID
