• last month
Transcript
00:00From software freezing, to the camera control button causing loads of frustration,
00:05to not being jazzed about the results I was getting.
00:08Oh man, I've been riding the struggle bus with the iPhone 16 Pro.
00:11And after taking well over a thousand photos and videos with this device
00:15on a road trip across New York State, I've learned that this year,
00:18you have to be the change.
00:20And it all starts with editing your photos.
00:22I'm Becca, welcome back to my channel where we take tech outside.
00:25Let's get into it.
00:26The iPhone 16 Pro can capture fine photos from the main sensor straight out the cam.
00:32Hell, they're even a little bit more contrasty,
00:34but maybe not as saturated as photos from the Pixel 9 Pro's main sensor.
00:39But with a little help from Photographic Styles,
00:41you can create something far more compelling.
00:44And to save you the time, don't be like me and hold onto your ideas
00:48about what Photographic Styles was when it first launched with the iPhone 13.
00:52Back then, there was limited customization and the UI wasn't exactly inviting.
00:56But now, there's this touchpad.
00:59So the Y-axis is tonal range,
01:01which is the difference between the lightest and darkest parts of your image or the contrast.
01:05Then the X-axis represents the color or saturation,
01:09which is the intensity of the colors in your photos.
01:11With this touchpad, Photographic Styles is a customizable tool.
01:16But that being said, I'm conflicted about how much Apple is relying on them
01:20to create an experience that feels new.
01:22On one hand, it's what I like to call the Fujifilmification of this camera.
01:27So you have built-in looks that you can slightly customize to make them all your own
01:30to create something that isn't just a boring phone photo.
01:33But on the other hand, I worry about how much Apple is relying on this feature
01:37to make the entire camera system feel new.
01:39It's a play out of Google's book.
01:40Let's give folks a small trick or something they can latch onto
01:44so that they keep talking about this system.
01:46And as a lover of innovation, it just makes me sad.
01:50We've gotten so used to large spec bumps
01:52that give us tech nerds enough reason to buy the new thing every year.
01:57But this year, Photographic Styles is definitely not enough reason to buy this new thing.
02:03And nor is that camera control button.
02:05All of this I could do easy, like really easy if I just touch the screen.
02:10It is very safe to say that most folks who pick up this device
02:13are not going to take the time to learn camera control
02:16and therefore they're just not going to use it.
02:18So for example, if you're using it to scroll through settings,
02:21you're going to constantly scroll and over scroll and under scroll
02:25and then be scrolling back and forth ever so slightly to get to the exact thing you want.
02:29And truthfully, it got to the point where I just feared accidentally starting to scroll
02:34because it was going to be so hard to get back to where I needed to be.
02:37And then there's the double push action to get to more settings.
02:41And that like requires sort of a full push, but not really a full push.
02:45And it's all just really finicky.
02:47And in the Apple ecosystem, where everything is meant to be easy,
02:51you know, setting up your device is easy.
02:52Pairing your AirPods is easy.
02:54AirDrop, for the most part, is easy.
02:56This button just doesn't fit.
02:58It is simply not easy.
03:00And I think that Apple tried to do too much with it too quickly
03:03because I know I want to use it as a way to open the camera and take a photo.
03:07But I fear using it because I don't have great control over everything else it can do.
03:12And much like photographic styles,
03:13it's just one of those things where you have to do the work to get this feature to work for you.
03:18And even after three weeks of trying to get this button to work for me,
03:22I simply have not found it useful.
03:24I use it to open the camera a lot, sure.
03:27Once in a while, I take a photo with it.
03:29I have to like consciously be like, oh, let me use the camera control button.
03:32But I would say I'm still using the volume rockers more to take photos than this button,
03:37which as a lover of technology and especially a lover of buttons,
03:42breaks my little nerdy heart.
03:44Pour one out for the camera control button.
03:46Now, I know I started this video with loads of negatives,
03:49but there is a positive that I think we can all agree on.
03:52This year, the iPhone 16 Pro lineup has the same camera system
03:56in both the 6.9 inch Pro Max and the 6.3 inch Pro,
04:00meaning that you don't have to have a massive phone with a larger price tag
04:05to have Apple's latest and greatest camera system.
04:07Oh my God.
04:09It's a huge win for me personally and for small pockets everywhere,
04:13much like the Ridge wallet.
04:14Thank you Ridge for being this channel's first ever sponsor and for sponsoring this video.
04:18Before I started using a Ridge wallet, I thought, okay, a metal wallet, why?
04:23But now that I have one, I get it.
04:25Yes, it is metal and that's cool.
04:27But more importantly, it's the smallest wallet I've ever owned.
04:30Because of that, I can put it in my front pocket
04:32and I also don't have to take it out every time I sit down somewhere.
04:36A huge win for me personally, but for small pockets everywhere.
04:41You can fit up to 12 cards in a Ridge wallet,
04:43it has RFID protections, and all products from Ridge come with a lifetime warranty.
04:47I'll put a link to the one that I've been using down below,
04:50along with a code for 10% off your purchase.
04:52Thank you Ridge for supporting this video, but more importantly,
04:54thank you for thinking about small pockets everywhere.
04:57Now, if only phone manufacturers could get on that, get on that wavelength.
05:06So I've had this lifelong dream and I thought,
05:09what better time to cross it off my list than the iPhone 16 review.
05:14They blow the balloon up with a fan.
05:18Of course they do.
05:20I don't know how I thought that they did it before, but...
05:24Duh.
05:25You see, I already knew that the video quality from this device was going to be incredible,
05:29so why not pick something really beautiful and colorful to show it off with?
05:36But what I didn't know is that being in a hot air balloon
05:39is both the most calming and exhilarating experiences you can have.
05:43So we're just going to brush against these trees up here,
05:45the violin basket to slow us down.
05:47You see, when you're in a hot air balloon,
05:48you're completely reliant on the wind being nice to you, I guess.
05:54And you use anything you can to slow you down if the wind picks up,
05:57which is why we went through the tree
05:59and then threw a rope down to some folks to help slow us down and stop us.
06:04If you ever have the opportunity to take a hot air balloon ride, do it.
06:08It was an incredible experience,
06:10and the iPhone 16 Pro was a great companion to document it with.
06:18I really love using this device to get clean, easy to work with footage.
06:23And having the ability to shoot log footage right at your fingertips is a cherry on top,
06:27so long as you feel like doing some post-processing.
06:30Again, one of those things that you have to do.
06:32But what's new this year is that 4K 120.
06:35So I decided to take it somewhere where they move a little bit quicker than I normally do.
06:40All right, shout out to my cousin who is far more badass than I am.
06:44I spent five hours at her race getting absolutely coated in dust,
06:48but I also shot 444 gigs of 4K 120 log footage,
06:54all on a single battery cycle with the iPhone 16 Pro.
06:58I did notice that the battery life of the iPhone 16 Pro was a little bit shorter,
07:02but I didn't think it was that bad.
07:04So I decided to go with the iPhone 16 Pro,
07:07with the iPhone 16 Pro.
07:09I did notice that the device got a little toasty around back,
07:11but it was never too hot to hold.
07:13And the footage is really smooth.
07:16Do I ever need 120 frames per second footage?
07:19No, but do I want it?
07:20Yeah, why not?
07:21And in perfect light, both log footage and non-log footage,
07:25it's just so crisp and true to life.
07:28Though I do wish Apple could improve low-light performance when shooting video.
07:32Oh, she pedaling, she pedaling.
07:37I find the image can get real grainy real fast when both shooting log or not,
07:41but this is sort of the theme with this camera.
07:44During the day, the camera is perfectly capable,
07:46and you will feel so comfortable taking it on a once-in-a-lifetime adventure,
07:50like a hot air balloon ride.
07:51But at night, it still has a lot of pitfalls that it has had for years,
07:55most notably in the ultra-wide camera.
07:57Who turned the lights off?
07:59Although the ultra-wide sensor was the only real spec bump
08:02that came to the back camera array,
08:03it's a 48-megapixel sensor up from a 12-megapixel on the 15 Pro,
08:07I don't see a huge improvement to image quality with it,
08:10either in photo or video.
08:11And I find it to be very slow, leading to blurry images.
08:15And here's a picture of my cat that I took with the main lens,
08:18but I was close enough to her that it switched into macro mode
08:21and therefore started using the wide-angle lens.
08:23And you can see that instantly the photo is blurry and grainier.
08:26Petapixel wrote a great article about the sensor
08:29and how more megapixels doesn't always mean a better image,
08:32like kind of about the trade-offs.
08:34But the TLDR is that the ultra-wide sensor in the 16 Pro
08:37is the same size as the ultra-wide sensor on the 15 Pro,
08:40though it has many more smaller pixels,
08:43which means that in optimal lighting,
08:44those small pixels will gather more detail.
08:47But in low light, they will start to generate a great deal of noise.
08:50The most frustrating problem with this lens, though,
08:52is that it is still so dark.
08:55And at night, when you switch from the main lens to the ultra-wide,
08:58it really feels like someone just turned off the lights.
09:01And the disappointments in low-light shooting
09:02extend to the telephoto lens as well.
09:05There's still the problem of Apple cropping the main sensor
09:08in order to gather more light
09:09instead of using the telephoto lens in low light,
09:12which results in a grainy image that is so clearly just a cropped shot.
09:16I just wish I could override this choice.
09:19Before I wrap up this review,
09:20there's one last thing we need to do that I haven't done in a while.
09:24It's time for a mic test.
09:25And of course, the first player is the wired Apple earbud.
09:29I mean, this is a tried-and-true great mic.
09:32Reliable beyond belief.
09:33Gold standard.
09:35How does it hold up against the second-gen AirPod Pros?
09:38A few years ago, I was like,
09:39yeah, Bluetooth is definitely gonna catch up
09:41to those wired headphones eventually.
09:42And it still hasn't happened.
09:43And you know what?
09:44I'm not sure it's gonna happen anytime soon either.
09:47But how does it compare to the mics in the iPhone 16 Pro?
09:52Folks have been raving about the new mics in here.
09:54And yeah, I think you can hear it.
09:56They're pretty good.
09:57And you might say,
09:58well, you're holding it really close to your face.
09:59So, okay, we'll move it a little bit further away.
10:02How does it sound now?
10:03And wait, let's do the same with the wired ones.
10:06Okay, here are the wired ones that far away.
10:08How does it sound?
10:09Check one, two, check, check.
10:11It's a pretty damn good mics in here.
10:13And it feels like they're having that M1 moment.
10:15Like I remember when the MacBook Pros came out with the M1 chip,
10:18they had new speakers and mics that sounded,
10:20I don't know, worlds better than what came before them.
10:22The real news with these mics though,
10:24is that there are built-in features within the camera app
10:27that reduce noise.
10:28So let's go back to the hot air balloon festival.
10:30So within the photos app,
10:31you can now edit the audio from video
10:33to take out unwanted background noise.
10:35There's a few modes,
10:37but in frame is by far the most impressive.
10:39There's a rainstorm that just popped up right by us.
10:44Pilot Rich though is,
10:46I trust him.
10:47I trust him.
10:48I believe that he knows what's best.
10:50Last year, we saw Google bring a similar feature to this,
10:53to the pixel lineup.
10:54So it's great to see Apple following suit
10:56with something that's really helpful.
10:58And with that,
10:59that's everything big I wanna talk about with the iPhone 16 Pro.
11:03Like I said at the beginning,
11:04this year is all about you.
11:06It's about you taking the device and making it your own.
11:08It kind of reminds me of Android in a way,
11:11where you really gotta like get in
11:13and customize your device to your needs and your likings.
11:17It's gonna be interesting to see
11:18if Apple folks are into that sort of thing,
11:22you could say.
11:23Anyway, I'm Becca.
11:24I appreciate you so much.
11:26If you're not subscribed,
11:27you mean the world to me
11:28and I'll see you in the next one.