Are these signs of camera defects with my iPhone 13 Pro Max? I keep getting these lens flares when taking photos and videos with bright sources of light. Happens allot with the sun during day and bright lights during night.
iPhone 13 Pro Max, iOS 15
Yes and they're normal. Before you take the photo, you can easily see the flares on the screen. Alter the angle of the phone relative to the bright lights and you can eliminate the flares.
While these two photos were taken on iPhone 12 Pro Max, you can see what I'm talking about.
This photo show lens flare:
Simply angling the camera differently without moving at all produced this photo:
Lobsterghost1,
I am not sure why so defensive. I own Pixel 4a 5g and Pixel 6 Pro myself, same as iPhone 13 Pro. What I wrote is a pure fact and thousands of photos and videos taken from all three devices, on the exact same lightning conditions and positions of all mobile devices. The true fact is that iPhones are more exposed to the lens flaring and that is due to the optics and materials used by Apple. You can find multiple videos on YouTube using multiple different mobile phones, demonstrating what I am trying to describe. Don't get me wrong, Pixels also generate lens flares (different in a way, like reddish flower flakes), however the 'ghosting' itself is not as severe and present as on iPhones. Vivo X70 Pro Plus on the other hand with ZEISS lens coating is in my personal opinion, the mobile phone where lense flares and ghostings are nearly non-visible. So yes, I am not questioning physics itself as there are no arguments about the light phenomenon itself, but materials used and coating is defo the factoring here on iPhones. Apple could do more to improve this but choice is not to.
That question has been answered multiple times, if you read back: Change the angle of the camera or put the light source behind you…. there are also shrouds you can attach to keep the light angle for hitting the lens directly…
The topic here is pretty lengthily so there’s more detail in the history.
A short read through this forum will show that it is normal and appears on smartphones from
Apple, Google, Samsung and Sony, digital video cameras from Panasonic and Sony, DSLRs from Canon and Nikon with similar lenses and even cinema digital cameras from ARRI, RED and Sony used with lenses from Canon, Cooke and Zeiss.
Yes I agree.
It is a phisical phenomenon due to the light crossing the lenses, nothing to say about this. As engineer I studied it a lot. There are a lot of comparison between iPhone camera and other smartphone or professional camera. Even those systems have flares, green dots etc, but they don’t have mirroring, images of the light sources clearly reproduced in the night sky, for example
I would advise playing with it in store - at least the point source flare is readily inducible by aiming at a typical store fixture if it has a point source - and make sure it's not an issue for you.
Though at this time of year, you also have the extended holiday return period for your device if purchased directly from Apple, which at this point may give you an extra week to decide; a similar policy may be in place for items purchased from an Apple retail store:
Items purchased at the Apple Online Store that are received between November 1, 2021 and December 25, 2021, may be returned through January 8, 2022. Please note that all other terms and conditions provided in the Apple Online Store Sales and Refunds Policy are still applicable with respect to such items purchased. All purchases made after December 25, 2021 are subject to the Standard Return Policy.
Full return policies are noted here:
I saw similar flares with the iPhone 8 and do with the iPhone 13 Pro Max.
You can find an angle that works.
For better or worse, Christmas trees are a worst case scenario as they are lots of pinpoints of intense light that reflect well, but it is possible, I've taken Christmas tree shots every year without them, and can easily induce them should I so choose.
Okay i'll admit the 8 plus do have some flares but not as prominent as on the newer iphones 11 - 12 - 13, might be due to better lenses on the newer phones. I found an older pic I took with my 8 plus of the same kinda tree, a big one at the town square in the city where I live. I zoomed in a little bit and did see some flares but they were much smaller so didnt noticed them the same way as I do now with the better / bigger camera lenses on the newer iphones. But less prominent on the 8 plus for sure. I will still say that you cannot always angle your way out of it, all you can do is try to make the flares align with the lights so you dont notice them so much.
Deerpark243 wrote:
Oh, that's normal they will tell you.
That’s because it IS normal, for any camera ever made, whether it’s an iPhone camera or a $25,000 professional camera→iPhone Camera Lens Flare and Reflections - Apple Community
This is a user-to-user forum; no one posting here works for Apple.
And it is true. If you can’t accept that, and that it will happen with every camera ever made, you will lead an unhappy life as a photographer. Repeating→iPhone Camera Lens Flare and Reflections - Apple Community
Did you view the user tip with a dozen “other” smartphone images, all showing lens flare? Here it is again, just for your convenience.
iPhone Camera Lens Flare and Reflections - Apple Community
and what smartphone did you have in 1982? HINT: There we’re no cell phones, not of any kind, in 1982.
Abryan619 wrote:
These reflection .. are these the new normal ?
No, they are the old normal. Almost as old as photography. Lens flare has been around since the first camera with a compound lens. Early pinhole cameras didn’t have lens flare (no lens).
It has nothing to do with being a “know it all,” it’s just a basic fact and with each new iPhone there are many who state it never happened with older phones despite there being threads here for those older phones of people making the exact same complaint.
The bottom line is it happens with devices from camcorders to $50,000 digital cinema cameras with $10,000 lenses because it’s due to basic optics and physics.
In my view it is a design flaw. The reflections are caused by the covering glass of the lens. Maybe some other non-reflecting material would save the problem. I don't think this is "normal" and if the laws of physics cause the design to not work properly, then maybe the design should be changed. Of course post processing can repair much of this, but that is symptom fighting
Yes, there are hundreds of other examples of lens flare that are exactly the same as seen on iPhones. My associate just chose a few for the tip, but there are even others in the thread. the iPhone 13 camera is no different from any other camera ever made in the past almost 200 years.
Sometimes called “ghosting” they are normal as well; I’ve posted examples in this very thread from a Canon DSLR among others.
Here’s Nikon’s explanation:
iPhone 13 pro lens flare
