Good example of iPhone 13 lens flare

jiceman wrote:

Also, an example of the photo being rotated for no obvious reason. Took the photo vertically.

Great question — this is one of those “my photo turned sideways and embarrassed me in the Social Media Apps” mysteries.

Here’s why it happens:

1. iPhone doesn’t rotate the pixels
   1. When you take a photo (Portrait or Landscape Mode), the iPhone usually saves the image in its default orientation (landscape) by design.
   2. Instead of rotating the actual image data, the iPhone just adds an EXIF orientation tag — metadata that says, “Hey, this was shot in portrait, show it rotated 90°.” On an iPhone, it will show up correctly as you had shot.
2. Not every app/browser respects EXIF orientation
   1. WhatsApp, some websites, or older image uploaders may ignore or strip out that orientation tag.
   2. Result? The raw landscape pixels show up → your portrait photo suddenly looks rotated 90°.
   3. You’d think Apple’s own Community forum would play nice with EXIF, since it’s their baby. But here’s the catch:
      1. Apple Support Communities (ASC) strips metadata. When you upload a photo there, the forum software removes or compresses EXIF data for privacy/security and to reduce file size. That means the orientation tag vanishes.
      2. What’s left is the “raw pixels.”: Since iPhones store most photos in landscape with an EXIF rotation flag, once that flag is gone, the server shows it sideways.
      3. It’s not a bug in your phone — it’s the way ASC handles uploads. This is the same reason timestamps, location info, and camera details don’t show up in forum uploads: Apple doesn’t want users’ private metadata floating around.
3. Triggers for this issue
   1. Uploading to websites that compress/remove EXIF data (common in forums, CMS, or some social media).
   2. Sharing via apps that don’t process orientation metadata properly.
   3. Exporting through tools that “flatten” the image, but forget the rotation.

Workarounds

• Open the photo in the iPhone Photos app, rotate it manually 360° (rotate left, then back), and then save — this forces iOS to rewrite the image with actual rotated pixels, not just EXIF data.
• If editing on Mac/PC, use Preview, Photoshop, or even Paint to re-save the image (flattening orientation).
• Some apps, like WhatsApp, update frequently, so keeping them updated reduces the chances of metadata misread.

Note: The iPhone assumes everyone respects its “orientation tag,” but some apps/websites act like rebels and ignore it — that’s when you get the 90° surprise.

jiceman wrote:

I remember learning about the problems with lens flare when I bought my 13 mini. Hadn’t had much trouble recently. But this is a very strong example. Could not get the angle I wanted without the blue squares. Is there a better agreed-upon name for this phenomenon?

Does this Blue Dot appear on every photo in the same spot same size? If not, read the Wiki article below.

Lens flare refers to a phenomenon wherein light is scattered or flared in a lens system, often in response to a bright light, producing a sometimes undesirable artifact within the image. This happens through light scattered by the imaging mechanism itself, for example, through internal reflection and scattering from material imperfections in the lens. Lenses with large numbers of elements such as zooms tend to exhibit greater lens flare, as they contain a relatively large number of interfaces at which internal scattering may occur. These mechanisms differ from the focused image generation mechanism, which depends on rays from the refraction of light from the subject itself.