Apple’s New iPhone 13 Pro and 13 Pro Max Boast Improved Cameras

Apple has announced the new iPhone 13 Pro (6.1″) and Pro Max (6.7″) devices featuring a familiar but improved design over the iPhone 12 Pro and Pro Max.

The new iPhone 13 Pro and Pro Max may look similar to the last generation iPhones but there is a lot updated behind the glass and metal. The front of the phones has been redesigned allowing for a 20 percent smaller top-notch which gives a bit more screen space.

Speaking of the screen, it boasts a super retina XDR display with up to 1,000 nits of outdoor brightness, all protected by the Ceramic Sheild front cover which Apple boasts as being tougher than any smartphone glass. The device is IP68 rated for water and dust resistance as well.

For the first time in an iPhone, Apple has finally implemented a faster refreshing display. The Super Retina XDR display with ProMotion has an adaptive refresh rate that will switch in real-time from 10Hz to 120Hz allowing for fast frame rates when users need it, and saving battery life when they don’t.

The inside of the devices has been completely redesigned to be more efficient and allow for a larger battery which provides 1.5 to 2.5 hours of additional life over the previous generation of smartphones depending on the model. The iPhone 13 Pro and Pro Max are powered by the A15 Bionic chip which provides up to a 50 percent improved performance to the phones speed, graphics display, and touch reactivity and accuracy leveraging a new 5-core GPU and a new 6-core CPU that has two new high-performance cores and four new high-efficiency cores. On top of this, the device boasts a 16-core Neural engine that is capable of handling 15.8 trillion operations per second, allowing for a faster third-party app experience.

The biggest update to the new phone is by far the camera system with pre-build photographic styles, an entirely new set of sensors and lenses all optimized to work smoothly with iOS 15. They are powered by a new image signal processor (ISP) on the A15 Bionic chip for an “improved noise reduction and tone mapping.” Apple says this system is the best camera system ever on iPhone and all the cameras now include Sensor-Shift optical image stabilization (OIS).

The new Ultra Wide camera features a much wider ƒ/1.8 aperture and a new autofocus system, which Apple says brings a 92 percent improvement for low-light environments and produces images that are brighter and sharper. iPhone 13 Pro and iPhone 13 Pro Max also boast a new 77 mm Telephoto camera, allowing users to get closer to their subjects while recording video and achieve even more classically framed portraits, offering 3x optical zoom for a total 6x optical zoom range on the camera system.

Below are a few sample photos captured with the new iPhone 13 Pro:

On top of the improved sensors and a new 77mm telephoto camera, the new Ultra-Wide camera now supports macro capabilities allowing users to capture sharp images with a minimum focus distance of just two centimeters. Below are some sample images that show what can be captured with the macro mode:

Of note, it does not appear as though users will have to go with the larger iPhone 13 Pro Max in order to get the better camera system, as the Pro and Pro Max both share the same cameras and features.

The new iPhone 13 Pro and Pro Max devices bring more to the video side of things also adding ProRes support, Dolby Vision HDR, and a new “cinematic mode” that will apply real-time depth-mapping to the video allowing for precise “focus pulling” even after the video has been shot. This includes being able to shoot 4K video at 30 frames per second right on the device.

More details on what to expect from this mode are explained in PetaPixel’s coverage of the iPhone 13 and 13 mini.

The new iPhone Pro is available in graphite, gold, sierra blue, and silver with 128G, 256G, 512G, and 1TB storage capacities starting at $999 for the 13 Pro and $1099 for the Pro Max. The phones are available for pre-order starting today and will hit store shelves on Friday, September 24.

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