Introduction
Apple announced its iPhone 6s in September 2015. Marking an update to the previous version of its popular smartphone, the iPhone 6. Like the 6, it’s available in a standard version and a larger, Plus version.
In our review we will focus on the specifications. Usability and performance of the built-in camera(s) rather. Than commenting too much on its overall usability as a smartphone. But if the usability elements apply to photographers, it can be mentioned very.
iPhone 6s uses an iSight camera, which features 12 megapixels. Apple also says it features a new “state-of-the-art” sensor, a new image signal processor. Improved pixel technology, focus pixels, improved local tone mapping and optical image stabilization.
Another new feature is “Live Photos” – it basically captures a 1.5. Second video of the moments before and after the shot is taken. You can play back the video on the phone or other compatible Apple devices.
One of the biggest new improvements to the iPhone 6s is the ability to record 4K video capture. You can even record in standard 1080p HD if you want. On the front of the camera is a 5 megapixel FaceTime camera. Which allows you to capture self-portraits, as well as for use during video calls.
The iPhone 6s, like all iPhones, does not have expandable memory and is available for buy in 16GB. 64GB and 128GB variants. You can also sign up for storage through iCloud. With a small amount available for free and more with a subscription.
Easy to use
Apple uses iOS for its operating system, which is reasonably different from Android. But if you’ve ever used an iPhone before. You’ll feel naturally at home with the iPhone 6s.
You can access the camera module directly from the locked screen by pressing the home button. Or the lock button and swiping up with your finger from the bottom right corner of the screen. This makes accessing the camera very quick when you want to take a quick shot. You’ll be able to see photos taken in the current camera session in playback. But you’ll need to fully unlock the phone if you want to see any old photos.
Or, if your phone is unlocked, you can use the camera icon to open the camera app. By default, it is found in the upper right corner of the first home screen, but you can move it elsewhere if you want. Apple introduced 3D Touch for the iPhone 6s, and it’s something you can use this time. If you touch the screen more firmly on the camera app icon. You will see that you can directly go to “Take selfie”, “Record video”, “Record slow mo” or “Take photo”. Or you can tap once on the camera app to jump directly into the standard app.
Either way, once you open the app, you won’t have a huge amount of options to work with. Most Android phones give you a lot of control over how your photos look, but iPhones are much simpler to operate.
Camera
At the bottom (or right) of the screen you’ll see a few different options. To quickly switch between the different modes the camera offers. The first option is Time-Lapse, Slow-Mo, Video, Photo, Square and Pano. Swipe left with your finger to choose the mode you want to use. We’ll talk about the different modes through the review.
At the top of the screen, or on the left if you’re holding it in landscape orientation. You’ll see options to turn the flash on or off. Or automatically detect when to use it, options to switch HDR on or off, or back again. , automatically judge when to use it, a timer icon and an icon that switches to use the front camera.
If you use the timer, you can choose from three seconds to ten seconds. With the countdown displayed on the screen. When the timer’s countdown ends, the camera will take a burst image for you to choose from. Which can be especially useful for self-portraits to make sure. Everyone’s smiling, or not blinking.
If you’re using Standard Photo mode, the last icon you’ll see in this row is the LivePhoto icon. It looks a bit like a bullseye and can simply be turned on or off. When you turn it on, it makes no difference how you take photos. But when you come to playback you’ll notice that you’ll be able to watch a short video. You need to press down firmly with your finger on the screen to view the video. If you don’t, it will appear as a normal photo
To take a photo you can either use the volume down button on the left side of the phone handset. Or you can use the virtual button within the camera app itself.
Right next to the shutter release, you’ll see an icon. That looks like three circles overlapping each other. If you tap on it, you’ll see a range of different digital effects that you can use to go with your photo shoot. These include Mono, to Chrome, to Process, to Instant, to Transfer. To switch off using a filter, press the filter icon again and select the middle option, or “none”.
So now go through some of the camera modes. Time-lapse will take a photo at specified intervals. And combine them into one time-lapse video. This is done quickly in camera and is a great fun tool for creating videos of sunsets. Lots of people/traffic, etc. In theory this would also be good for something. That’s exposed over a long period of time. But that seems unlikely unless you want your phone to just record a time-lapse.
The slo-mo mode is again pretty self-explanatory. This is a video mode that shoots at a very fast frame rate to capture a slow motion effect. You just press record and slow motion video will be recorded. By default, when you playback the video, it will play at normal speed for the first second or so. Then the video will slow down, then back to normal speed at the end of the video. But you can change the category to fast or slow depending on your preference. Again, this is a nifty feature that has some fun applications.
Video allows you to record video. The iPhone 6s can record 4K, but if you want to do that. You’ll need to change the settings from the main iPhone settings menu. By default, the camera will shoot in full 1080p HD. You should probably remember to change the settings to 1080p. After recording something in 4K to save space on your phone. Note that there is no possibility to expand the phone’s internal storage.
Photo mode takes shots in the native 4:3 aspect ratio. With the ability to use all the settings we mentioned earlier. Square mode takes photos at a 1:1 ratio, making them ready for Instagram-like cropping. Panorama means you can sweep your phone across a scene. To capture an ultra-wide perspective. It is integrated into the camera to give you your panoramic shot.
While there’s not much manual editing to do with the iPhone 6s. You can adjust brightness by swiping your finger up. And down the screen to add positive or negative exposure compensation. Changing the autofocus point is achieved by tapping your finger on the point you need. This will also change the metering as it will stop the meter where you are focusing. If a photo is under or overexposed due to high contrast, you can “trick” the iPhone into exposing. It differently by focusing on a slightly different part of the screen to meter. out highlights, shadows. Or whatever you need.
It’s possible to download apps from the App Store that give you some more manual control. Like Manual – that will allow you to set your own ISO if you want. Of course they are different. Each of these will be used separately.
While in the Camera app, you can select the icon in the bottom left corner of the screen to view your photos. Or you can select “Photos” from the iPhone’s main navigation. If you select the latter, you’ll notice that you have several different folders to choose from. The phone divides images into selfies, videos, panoramas, time-lapse, slow-mo. Bursts and folders you create yourself. There’s also Camera Roll, which is all the photos you’ve taken with your camera in one place.
Once you are viewing a particular photo, you can do some editing. And you can adjust “lighting” (exposure, highlights. Shadows, brightness, contrast, black point). “Color” (saturation, contrast and. color cast) and “black and white” (intensity, neutral, tone, grain).
The great thing about making these edits is that you can go back to the original shot. At any time by clicking the red “Return” text – even if you edited the photo days, weeks, months, or a specific time ago. You can press a magic wand icon to let the phone decide what the best edits should be – this will work well sometimes. But not others.
One final thing about viewing photos in playback is that you can press a heart icon to add it to a folder of your choice. This means that when you’re looking back through your photos. You can jump to a group of favorite images instead of scrolling through potentially thousands of other images.
Focusing is generally very fast and in good light, quite accurate. If the light is too dark, the camera may have trouble focusing. In which case you may consider turning on the flash to help the camera focus. Thanks to a new A9 processor with 64-bit architecture, operational speed is very fast. This means that the phone is not only very fast in general operations. But also when you’re flicking images. zooming in on photos or using imaging-based apps, such as Instagram.
The retina screen on the iPhone 6s is fantastic and really makes images pop and look detailed. And vibrant Viewing your photos (and others) while using it is great. And the size increase from the iPhone 5S is a welcome one. If you prefer, you can step up to the larger iPhone 6s Plus, which is great for viewing photos but a bit more unwieldy to use.
Image Quality
All sample images in this review were taken using the 12 megapixel JPEG setting. Giving an average image size of around 2.5Mb.
Apple stuck with an 8 million pixel sensor for quite some time. Before upgrading to 12 million pixels for the iPhone 6s. This could be a move to compete with Android phones. That typically have higher resolution sensors
The extra pixels don’t seem to have made much of a noticeable difference between the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6s. You’d probably struggle to tell a noticeable difference. And happily the extra pixels don’t seem. To have caused any reduction in low-light performance.
In good light, the 6s’ images are fantastic and more than the competition for a compact camera. It’s no wonder compact camera sales suffer when you can get such great image quality on a phone.
The colors are bright and punchy, but if something is a little too much – it gives them a pleasant look. But sometimes they are not completely correct. You can switch to a different filter mode if you prefer something a little flatter. Or you can edit the photo after you shoot. But it would be nice if you could choose different saturation levels before you shoot. That said, this camera is designed to appeal to every male user who doesn’t want to edit. So erring on the side of over-saturation can lead to more mass appeal than slightly more muted colors.
Detail is also rendered well when viewing images at the size you’re using them – be it the size of a mobile phone screen. Or perhaps A4 or below on a computer screen. There’s a slight loss of detail and some blur if you zoom to 100%, but it’s not too bad at the lower end of the ISO run.
If we move through the ISO range, image quality is good up to ISO 800, dropping off a bit after ISO 1600. The camera lens has a wide greatest aperture of f/2.7. So you probably won’t need to venture That high is all that often though. Images are usable in general print and sharing form, but if you test at 100%. There’s a bit more detail loss than we’d like and some noise from ISO 800.
There is no optical zoom for the iPhone, but you can use a digital zoom instead.
This is essentially a crop of the image, and is useful if you’re desperate. But is best avoided as the resulting image is slightly lacking in quality – even at small print and web sizes.
There’s no way to set the shutter speed. So taking long exposures isn’t really possible in the native camera app. But then again, this is a camera designed for everyday shots. And not really for more manual creative photography.
That said, it’s fun to check out the results you get from some of the iPhone 6s mods. Slow-mo and time-lapse are particularly interesting for videographers. While Live Photos are fun to use for events, parties, etc. – though you might want to turn them off for more mundane shots.
The front camera has been upgraded to a 5 million pixel device. And while it’s obviously not as high quality as the rear camera. It’s great for selfies and produces some beautifully exposed, detailed and colorful images.
Conclusion
That’s not to say that Apple’s popular iPhone units don’t have a problem moving, but if you’re a photographer whose primary concern when buying a new phone is the camera, you may be better served by other options on the market.
Image quality in bright light is excellent, and you’re unlikely. To be disappointed with the overall performance of the Apple iPhone 6s. Low light performance can be good though, so you may want to avoid using it in very dark conditions. Colors are also a bit oversaturated, which looks pleasing in some situations. But takes them away from reality.
What might be more frustrating for photographers is the lack of manual controls. Or the ability to shoot in raw format. Something that most current Android phones offer you. Although you can download apps to give you a bit more control, it would be nice if Apple allowed you to do this locally.
Another issue that continues to be a bugbear for iPhone users is storage. Most Android phones allow you to insert a microSD card to give you extra capacity when you need it. Not so with the iPhone. Your choice is to buy a larger capacity iPhone in the first place (at extra cost), or delete things as you go. Anyone who plans to take more than a couple of photos a year. And certainly anyone who installs lots of apps. And shoots video (especially 4K) really shouldn’t bother with the 16GB iPhone 6s. You’ll curse it for running out of memory as soon as you buy it. .
These issues aside, the Apple iPhone 6s camera is easy to use, with an interface that’s easy to understand. There are also plenty of fun and creative uses for things like time-lapse and slo-mo. And of course, with the power of Apple behind it. The huge number of apps available in the App Store means you can customize the iPhone’s camera. Many different ways.
It’s with the hope that Apple will one day give photographers more control, but. This is the most popular camera in use right now – they’re probably thinking that if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
