The iPhone vs Pixel Camera Debate: Let Me Clear My Throat

Can I just take a moment to clear the air here? Since my last post (Here: Apple iPhone XS vs Google Pixel 3XL – My Unbiased Search for the Best Phone Camera), I’ve been getting a lot of feedback on my thoughts – some good and well-received comments and some hater, pointing-the-finger comments that made me out to be anti-Apple. I just want to be clear here that I’m not an Android fanboy, I’m not an Apple fanboy and I’m not Anti-Apple either – I’m a consumer and a user looking for the product that does what I need it to do (take pictures) the best.  For heaven’s sake – I used to work at Apple – I don’t have an affinity for a brand, I just want the best. I know I’ve made some trigger posts on Instagram about iPhone vs Pixel shots and those did have truth behind it while I was also just trying to be funny… Diana owns an iPhone so it’s not like I don’t know the pains of having one either hahaha

Between that first post and this post, I even took the leap of faith over to the Huawei P30 Pro – the alleged “King” of cameras on any smartphone. I watched dozens of videos and read tons of comparisons and on paper and (unfortunately, paid YouTubers) the camera looked promising – even against the likes of the Pixel. To me and my mind, prior to pressing that shutter button on the P30 Pro – the Pixel was still King to me – and for me to literally spend $1300 on the P30 Pro meant that I had faith. Long story short – I got my $1300 back within an hour and it was back to the Pixel.

I know this is an iPhone vs Pixel debate but you’re probably wondering why I returned the alleged “King” so fast or why I even considered it. I considered it because 1) Leica hype. 2) ToF (Time of Flight) sensor. 3) Peer pressure from media. I’ll tell you why I returned it: 1) Leica hype is literally just that. Hype. No one on Instagram or Facebook or wherever you post your photos will be able to tell you shot your picture using Leica glass – NO ONE – let alone make your pictures any better than the rest of ours in the oh-so-unfortunate-compressed-image-quality social media world. 2) ToF sensor is still too new. It has an excellent concept but it doesn’t work so well in practice. I could see the depth change but the bokeh was still so artificial that it made me feel like someone just went crazy on the blur tool in photoshop – that is no bueno for me. 3) Peer pressure from the media sucks because you often don’t get the full truth. These guys probably didn’t even pay for their phone so they’ve got nothing to lose. As a consumer, $1300 is a lot to spend on something that doesn’t work like you want it to. It was slow at capturing images – my camera is my “tool” to take pictures of my kids doing everything. Kids move fast and if the camera can’t catch it, then it’s useless to me. That’s it.

Why don’t we get on with why we’re here again… People keep asking me “Jason, why are you such an iPhone hater?” or “Jason, come back to iPhone!”. I’m not an iPhone hater – I love the iPhone – I love the UI and I love how smooth it is. Recall my first post – the iPhone won in almost every aspect except for the camera (which is why we’re here, right?) and I would come back to iPhone – trust me – I really want to love it because I love everything else about it but the camera just ain’t it Chief. I don’t care how much a phone is – the Pixel was $800 and it’s amazing at what I want it to do. The iPhone is $2000 and it sucks at what I want it to do – but if it was amazing at what I want it to do, I’d spend $2000 on it… I’d spend $2100 on it if it makes anyone feel better. Is everyone OK now? No more hurt feelings? I said it – I love iPhone – I just don’t love the camera.

What I decided to do for this post is similar to last time… Except I’ve taken some more real world shots using situations that are more likely to happen. No staging – I didn’t ensure the lighting was good, I found household objects that maybe someone might snap a quick pic of as it were. This included low light, good light, artificial light, sun light, etc. I also left out the SLR (A7ii) comparison – it’s not needed here anymore because we’re not comparing apples to oranges, we’re comparing apples to apples.

Just some things I wanted to note while going through these pics – I took them in the exact same fashion. One phone didn’t get more attention to getting the proper pic than the other – it was aim, touch to focus, steady, shoot. Each phone got one shot at getting the photo and the reason for that is because I wanted to illustrate the importance of getting a good shot the first time. I know – people take multiple shots of everything – but I think it’s also important that your tool is able to get you a good shot most of the time. I would rather have 10 good shots that I can’t decide on rather than 1 good shot out of 10. Feel me? Let’s talk about them…

The order will always be iPhone XS first and then Pixel 3XL after. Both lenses were cleaned. HDR is on for both (for the Pixel only HDR+ is on and not HDR+ enhanced to keep things even). I also didn’t use Pixel’s night sight – that would be unfair. We’ll also start with regular photos first AKA not portrait mode.

iPhone

Pixel

Nothing too crazy here. Both phones do well in relatively well with the low light here. A little bit of noise at the bottom of the remote and then some noise reduction in it as well which explains some of the blurriness there too. Tie here.

One thing you’ll notice in a lot of the iPhone pictures is the insane amount of noise reduction going on. Pay particular attention to how sharp each picture is and you’ll see that the iPhone is extremely noisy and rather unpleasant to look at… I don’t know why…

iPhone

Pixel

Same thing here. Low sunset light coming into the room. The iPhone is a bit soft and a little darker however here is where we start to see the iPhone struggle a bit more in low light situations. Lots of softness and noise reduction going on at the bottom right near the desk edge. Not so much on the Pixel. Pixel wins here.

iPhone

Pixel

It’s interesting the difference in how HDR is used in both phones. The iPhone has a very mellow and toned down feeling and the Pixel has a little more pop. This all comes down to personal preference – I prefer the look of the Pixel only because it’s a little more vibrant and shows more detail despite it looking a little overblown in the back. I’d say it’s a tie here depending on your preference.

iPhone

Pixel

Again – a big difference in how HDR is performed in both phones. The iPhone is a little more true to life because it was a relatively dark room with some late evening sun coming through while the Pixel makes it look like it was in the afternoon. Tie here again – neither are terrible or great – just comes down to what type of HDR you like more.

 

Moving onto Portrait mode here. This is primarily where I base my judgements because there’s a lot to portrait mode than people think. To the regular consumer who knows nothing about bokeh or depth of field – both phones do a great job of achieving this effect. If you’re well-versed or have any experience playing with aperture and knowing the depths and value of bokeh, then these might look a little different to you. I’m no pro but I like to think that after shooting for 10+ years, you start to get a feel of how bokeh should look and that’s what I want my phone to achieve as closely as possible.

I mentioned how portrait mode works in my first post as well and I won’t go into it much but the difference between the two phones is that the iPhone is using two images (one from the telephoto lens and one from the wide-angle lens) and then uses software to merge them together to create the artificial blur (bokeh) you see in portrait mode photos. The Pixel takes one photo and then uses software to create the artificial blur (bokeh). Both need to take a guess at your subject, the foreground, the background and apply bokeh as accurately as possible to create the depth effect.

iPhone

Pixel

I think here is where you’ll start to see why I call the Pixel the King. If you look at just the iPhone photo – it’s a great photo, but when you look at the Pixel photo, you’ll see the difference. Still don’t? Look at the blue mat in both the photos – the iPhone has a distinct vertical break between where the bokeh is applied and where it isn’t. Half of the mat is focused and half of it isn’t right at the corner. You now have bokeh travelling vertically and horizontally which isn’t technically wrong but it’s not visually appealing either.

The pixel photo has more of a linear bokeh applied – trace your eyes across the photo from the start of the camera strap on the left. It’s applied just above the edge of the mat and goes right all the way across creating a more even bokeh distribution. The only miss is the black “N” where a little too much blur was applied and is a little more noticeable. The Pixel takes this one.

iPhone

Pixel

I really wanted to illustrate where the iPhone fails on portrait mode – not to shame it – but to really illustrate what turns me off so much and is the reason why (I think) merging two photos together sounds good in practice but doesn’t work well.

I don’t think I have to say much about the iPhone photo – hell, all you iPhone users have probably come across this and wondered why. No edges. The jar edge just doesn’t exist and the spout is blurred. There is bokeh applied to the front of the picture right beside the jar where it shouldn’t be. The picture is essentially incomplete. The Pixel on the other hand has it almost 100% – the small top of the spout was missed but that was it.

iPhone

Pixel

No misses here on either pic. It’s just a matter of HDR preference again. There is obviously more bokeh on the iPhone pic but I’ll leave this to personal preference again. I prefer the colour and contrast in the Pixel.

iPhone

Pixel

I’ll give iPhone another shot but the shot was missed again. No clear separation between bottle and background. Even my wrist was blurred for some reason – I often see that iPhone trips up completely whenever there’s a bottle/glass in the picture. It just gets confused on where to apply bokeh altogether and creates an overall bad pic.

The Pixel pic is still the clear winner here. I will say though that both phones will almost always fail when there is a section that needs to be blurred. Look at the spot between my thumb and bottle. It’s because the software doesn’t know that it’s the background so it doesn’t always blur. The iPhone is more apparent because it’s applying a more aggressive bokeh but the Pixel missed it too.

iPhone

Pixel

Here is another area that the iPhone struggles with – hair. It doesn’t matter the lighting either – good lighting or bad lighting – it almost always misses. The top of the hair is fuzzy but the rest of it is good overall. The Pixel captured almost every strand of hair – another reason why the Pixel wins for me. If your subject has hair, it’s getting chopped off by the iPhone…

iPhone

Pixel

Nothing too terrible here. Both are good – the iPhone missed the loop at the top but most of Peppa is in tact. The bokeh applied is fair and even. The Pixel captured all of Peppa and the bokeh applied is also fair and even. Pixel wins here despite both pictures being very good. At the end of the day, it’s the small details that count…

iPhone

Pixel

Here’s the challenge – low light portrait mode photos. You might all think that I rigged this somehow to make the iPhone photo as terrible as it could be but I really didn’t. I know I said I only took one shot with each phone but I was really wanted this to work so I took 3. Each of them similar but this one being the best because it did at least capture half the car. Not much to say about the Pixel shot when comparing to the iPhone…

The takeaway from this not that Android is better than iOS or Pixel is better than iPhone. It’s that the Pixel camera is better than the iPhone camera… Dare I say… In almost every aspect. There has not been a situation where the iPhone has done better than the Pixel in any situation that Diana or I shoot in. She admits it herself (why do you think her instagram posts are shot with my phone? ;D). In low light – the iPhone does a pretty horrendous job at taking pictures and for some reason, more so now than it ever did. I don’t even recall my iPhone 6S taking such terrible pictures – there has to be something to do with the settings that Apple is doing for noise reduction that is just messing up the whole algorithm and it’s unfortunate that it can’t be changed. Part of me thinks it’s still linked to the earlier “beauty gate” issue that they had with the over-softening and they never really went back to revisit it properly.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – the day that Apple (or any other brand for that matter) comes up with a camera that can beat the Pixel King is the day I switch over. I’ve tried the S10+, the P20 Pro, the P30 Pro, the One Plus and I’ve seen them all (all of which are no better than the iPhone, if not practically the same at being bad at taking pictures). I hope that kind of clears the air and illustrates my stance on it because I know some people get offended at my posts… I’m not on a bandwagon – I’m just on the bestwagon.

Apple iPhone XS vs Google Pixel 3XL – My Unbiased Search for the Best Phone Camera

I’ve been getting a ton of questions and DM’s lately about the Pixel 3 and how I’ve been liking it since I’ve been posting some pics from it and I thought since I have some time, I’d write up my personal thoughts. This is not meant to be click bait or anything like that – trust me, I’ve watched enough video “reviews” and read enough “articles”to know that they’re either paid to say what they’re saying or they are fanboys of a product that tend to be more biased than you’d like. Two things: 1) I’m not paid to write this even though I wish I was and 2) I’m not a fanboy of any product. I’m a fan of the best product. Most people know I’ve switched between Apple and Android multiple times because each time, one or the other has met my expectations of what I want in a phone.

The Pixel 3XL in this moment in time is what I feel to be the “best” phone right now. I’ll try to lay it out in sections and then provide some sample shots between the Pixel 3XL and iPhone XS. Real world shots taken by me with my own device and Diana’s iPhone. No gimmicks, no trick shots and no photoshop.

Physical Device/Feel/Aesthetics

The Pixel 3XL is not a looker. In fact, the only aesthetically pleasing thing to me is the use of an accented colour power button. In my case, I bought the Clearly White model with the light green power button. Other than that, it’s got a larger chin than it should and the notch is just a notch to me. People call it notch city, I call it extra real estate at the top of my phone – regardless of how big it is. The screen is nice and vibrant, it’s a little cooler in temperature than the iPhone XS but still pleasant to look at.

The iPhone XS in every sense is one of the nicest phones I’ve ever seen and held. It’s like holding a piece of expensive jewelry – the weight and the stainless steel – beautiful. If any phone should aspire to look like something, it should be the iPhone XS. The screen is beautiful – it’s pleasing to look at whether it’s on or off. It feels solid and not plastic-y. It’s nice to have practically no bottom chin, and the notch – well it’s just a notch to me just like the Pixel 3’s. It’d be nice to see a phone without it like a few of the Oppo phones, but still not a deal breaker for me.

Overall – iPhone XS wins this and it’s one of the biggest reasons I wanted to go with the XS. It’s great to hold and use.

OS/UI/Usability/Touchscreen 

The number 1 thing that separates the iOS users from the Android users. Honestly – the Android UI is something even I had to get used to. It was exciting for me though because I loved the idea of customizing my phone exactly how I wanted. I could use icon packs, I could change how my weather is displayed, I could put whatever I wanted on the homescreen. I could get away from the rows of icons and folders that had strapped iOS down so tightly. But at the same time… The simplicity of iOS is what makes it so great. It’s easy to use, you know where your icons all are and everything just “works” in the Apple ecosystem. I could live with both and I’d be content because I love customization but I also favour simplicity.

Google’s phones uses simple and bloatware-free versions of Android. There isn’t a bunch of apps installed that you’ll never use. It’s just the basics and it’s fast and effective. It’s very difference experience than a phone like the S8 (which was my daily driver previous to the Pixel). It’s fast and snappy – it does what you want and when you want it. There were a few RAM management issues that have just been addressed otherwise, it’s nice. The gesture system isn’t nearly as refined as Apple’s iOS although I wish it were. I just want to be clear though – this does not translate to a phone that is clunky or terrible in any way. Everything works as it should – gestures and motions just aren’t as fluid as iOS – but if you’ve never used iOS you wouldn’t notice any issues at all and even after migrating away from iOS – everything begins to feel right.

iOS’s button-free gestures are so perfectly designed that it feels like the your thumb and the images/icons/pages beneath it are one and you wonder why Apple didn’t do this sooner. The UI is the same familiar UI you’ve been familiar with ever since the iPhone 3G with a few additions here and there but why fix what ain’t broke, right? The one thing Apple lacks – and has always lacked – is the ability to customize the phone to your liking. It stays how it is out of the box until the day you decide to part ways with it.

This section is 49/51 for me. Both use such a different way of navigating and operating. The 51 going to Apple because of how refined the UI is and just how nice it is to use. Bravo, Apple.

Apps/Integration

This section is important to me and I don’t see many people talking about it – not even the big tech guys. The first step to deciding you like a phone is whether you like how it looks (covered), the next is how does the phone feel when you use it (covered), and the most overlooked part is how well do the apps you use work on the device you chose.

The app selection between both OS’s (for my use and most of the public’s general use) is pretty much identical. You want instagram and facebook? You got it. You want home automation? You got it. You want an assistant? Siri and Google Assistant are there (albeit, Google assistant is a lot more versatile than Siri). Getting the apps themselves is not typically the problem – it’s how well do those apps work with the OS and while you might not think it’s a big issue, it actually is. This is one of the main reasons I was very close to getting an iPhone XS and we’ll talk about why I didn’t soon.

For a social media junky like myself and many others – the social media apps I use should work exactly as intended. Instagram – one of my main social media apps does not work the same on Android versus iOS – change my mind. Instagram has been refined and optimized for iOS and works flawlessly. From things like story highlights, to the way you get and see notifications.

For example, Instagram stories on iOS will show everything at perfect ratios – but on Android, the stories have a slightly larger aspect ratio resulting in stories to be cut off on the outer edges. Did someone put text right to the edge of their story? Sorry, Android – you’re not going to be able to read it all. The upload processing of Android versus iOS is also different – upload one picture from iOS and most of the quality is retained as long as it isn’t an incredibly high resolution picture. Upload that same picture from Android and the results are clear – there is degradation in the photo quality and I’m not entirely sure why after many tests between my previous S8+ and Diana’s iPhone XS. Important to note: the issue does not seem to exist when uploading from the Pixel so it seems to maybe be device specific or even Android version specific?

Most other apps work as intended – Facebook, Twitter – simple platforms such as those show no difference in performance to me. My personal biggest gripe was the “lack of performance and refinement” in Instagram and it might not be yours but it’s worth noting.

The issue with stories still exists – ratios are off – and this is confirmed on the S8+, the Pixel, and the new Mate 20 Pro so I’m concluding it’s an Android thing. Is it a deal breaker? It could be for some – was it for me? Almost… But we’ll talk about why it wasn’t in the next section.

Camera

Maybe the most important section for some – it certainly is for me – and maybe the least important for others. Surely you all know by now that I like to take pictures and my camera – whether it be my SLR or my phone or any other medium that I’m using – has to be able to provide better than average results. It needs to have 3 things:

  1. Clarity
  2. Sharpness
  3. Good/Great Autofocus

Now before you go on and start talking about DxO scores and ratings of every cellphone camera, I don’t care. The tried and true method of determining whether a picture “looks good” is my eye. DxO score of 90 vs 110 doesn’t mean anything to any regular person so we’ll use our eyes instead. I’m sure you’ve heard it before but there’s a reason the Pixel has had the best camera year after year since the original Pixel came out and it’s hard to believe how good it is until you see it because up until now – DxO has marked the iPhone almost consistently at the top until the P20 pro and Mate 20 pro came out. It’s also something that we’ve been conditioned to believe – the iPhone in all it’s glory and somehow justified high price and dual camera system is the best in the business. I mean, you’d think that’s true based on my whole novel up above – Apple (the iPhone) creates an important sense of pride in both the product and the brand. It’s great to hold, it’s nice to use, it combines everything so perfectly.

Prior to seeing Pixel-quality photos in person, I, too believed that the iPhone captured great photos. It still does but they aren’t amazing. I like to think that “they are great for photos captured on a phone”. If you look at an iPhone photo, you know it’s from a phone. Something is just missing. Let’s talk about portrait mode – the mode that seems to be taking the world by storm. Really quick – if you don’t already know – portrait mode aims to focus on  a subject while creating blur (bokeh) behind the subject to create a visually pleasing separation between the two. Often seen in pictures where there’s a large aperture (f1.4, f1.8).

The iPhone uses two lenses to create the effect. One lens to capture your subject and another to capture the rest of the scenery and then AI/processing to put the two together and make a best computational guess at the edges on where to create the separation. The Pixel on the other hand has only one lens to rely on and the rest is handed over to AI/processing to determine where the edges start and where separation begins. One would think that capturing two images and merging them would be the best option and I think where the iPhone fails is the lack of proper processing. Queue the entrance of the Pixel – where it is literally the opposite. Google’s AI/processing is superior to the iPhone in every way as far as my eyes can tell and pictures don’t lie. 9 times out of 10, the Pixel’s edge detection and separation beats the iPhone and not by a smidgen – by a lot and for every portrait mode photo that Diana’s iPhone XS takes, my heart breaks a little more and my faith dwindles into a darker hole than before.

Now, I want to be clear – I’m only talking about portrait mode because as I said – I want something in my pocket that can attempt to recreate the same photos I take using my Sony A7II as much as possible and many of those photos are done with a larger aperture AKA portrait mode. For regular pictures – between the iPhone and Pixel – I can hardly tell the difference besides some saturation and highlight/shadow differences and that’s only if I’m looking at them side by side. Anyway, I’ve said enough – we can let the pictures do the talking. Please note – I did my very best to ensure that both phones were capturing the best image that they could. Using manual press-to-focus on the subject and taking the best of the bunch. I’m not butchering one phone in favour of the other – if the Pixel fails, it fails and if the iPhone fails, it fails. As a bonus, I’ll also take the same photo with my A7II and 35mm f1.4 – you’ll have 3 comparisons to make your judgement.

First Example – Pixel/iPhone/A7II (non-edited, RAW, no HDR, 35mm F1.4) Note – the 1.4 aperture is probably gonna be a little unfair here and it’s also going to produce a very different type of bokeh but I still just want to include it for comparison.

PIXEL 3 – I really wanted to just take pictures where edge detection was important for overall quality comparison. The Pixel does a pretty good job and only missed in 3 spots overall. The left leaf is mistaken for the background, and the two leaves on the right near the bottom. These two are easier to forget about but the left leaf –  not so much. It almost did a good job in between the botton middle leaves and the chair behind it. Sharpness is a little high and more evident on the very top of the plant, but not terrible.

It does a good job of using HDR to keep detail in both the leaves and the light behind it.

iPhone XS – A little better on the edge detection here – still kind of blew out the left leaf but not noticeably as much. The two right leaves were captured properly too. It did about the same thing to the chairs behind it between the leaves at the bottom – a bit too much but still minor.

I’m not sure why the iPhone failed me here – it kind of blew out exposure even though exposure point was on the middle of the green for all photos. It just looks a bit fuzzy and soft –  not enough sharpness here.

A7II – I’m not sure if there’s much to say for the A7II because it’s in its own league. But just here for comparison.

PIXEL 3 – lots of detail here – the important spots to look at are the right edge of the Christmas tree trailing down and to see where did edge detection fail. I’m surprised because this was extremely sharp. I could be nit picky about the bottom part of the bristles but pretty good.

iPhone XS – Sorry – slightly different spot but I’m still just looking for edge detection here. Again, I could be nitpicky about the area by the bottom right rose gold ornament but still good. A little soft again compared to the Pixel.

A7II.

PIXEL 3 – Easier edge detection but I wanted to try and meld dark foreground with a dark background (so the top of the black hat). You’ll see it faded it together here – noticeable if you’re looking for it. Overall edge detection though is pretty clean – especially to the left of the black hat and the separation with the scissors. Again, good HDR work here.

iPhone XS – again, I just feel the XS is softening and neutralizing the pictures. Side note – I did notice that the “beauty gate” issue is still slightly apparent. It was Apple’s take on trying to decrease noise – but when you apply too much noise reduction it textures start to look airbrushed. The separation is not bad but not sharp either – it still works because it creates a very soft edging and convince most people.

A7II.

PIXEL 3 – more textures around fuzzy-type objects – another enemy to portrait mode. The Pixel 3 nailed it here – all the way around lucky cat. Note the quality of the bokeh here – a very smooth and well spread bokeh.

iPhone XS – Not terrible but not better either. Edge detection failed a bit on the right ear at the top causing almost a halo effect because of the colour of the cat. AGAIN, it’s just too soft for me and it creates this artificial fuzziness around the cat – most notably on the left of the cat. Note the bokeh in this one now – a little less smoothness but still passable.

A7II.

PIXEL 3 – Probably the worst nightmare for portrait mode is hair – more specifically – single strands of hair. More often than not, the Pixel 3 is able to capture a great amount of detail in the strands of hair in portrait pictures. This is a good example because I would say almost 95% of this photo has accurate edge separation between strands of hairs.

iPhone XS – this is where I find that the iPhone fails me the most. This is not the most extreme example but it does show where it almost creates holes in the picture and blurry gobs on the edges of the hair.

No A7II here.

PIXEL 3 – Perfect separation especially on the points of the leaves. Good HDR between the monitor and the dark plant.

iPhone XS – ALMOST perfect separation except on the points of the left blades. HDR not so great here, and a bit soft but no comparison here to the Pixel 3.

No A7II here.

PIXEL 3 – The final test. Multiple edges on different subjects with a pretty neutral but complicated background with conflicting horizontal lines to the plants. I would say that this is a good example of near perfect edge separation with the only fault being in-between the twigs of the middle plant. No edge separation between the plant and the chair as it is assuming the chair is part of the plant.

iPhone XS – Poor edge separation here throughout the whole picture. Most notably on the middle plant tips, the chair behind it and on the right plant tips and the string on the stick. Even the separation of the plant pots from the table is a little poor to me. This would be a deal breaker for me at this point.

A7II.

At the end of the day – here’s what I’ve concluded: the iPhone overall is the better phone. Aesthetics, feel, UI, dual camera system – it is the well-rounded phone you’re looking for and it’s damn beautiful. I love holding and using Diana’s and I wish that I could somehow merge the iPhone and Pixel together to create the ultimate phone for myself. The Pixel is also a great phone but falls short on all aspects listed above. Androids in particular have some work to do on the aesthetics and feel of their phones but maybe that’s why the cost is significantly less (besides the point). However, for someone like me that has “camera” at the top of their list, the Pixel 3 wins – by a long shot. I can handle non-apple smoothness – Android Pie is not terrible either – it’s great. It’s not a fancy stainless steel in gold, but I can live. Do I want a dual camera? Yes because why not? But at the end of the day – the Pixel 3 captures exactly what I need it to capture every single time and brilliantly at that. When Apple and Google decide to combine two of their best products into one – then I’ll pay $2,000 for it. Until then, I don’t think I can move away from the Pixel until Apple or any other Android device can top it.

What do you think?

Canon to Sony: The Leap of Faith – A Tragic Love Story

A question that I’ve been asked for a while now is “why did you switch?”, or “do you like it?”. I thought I’d answer that here. Note that I decided to answer it in form of a story. Far too many of the reviews/blogs that I’ve read about making the switch are too technical, and not helpful. You’re basically giving me the spec sheet in paragraph form. I’m the type of person that needs something more tangible and relatable. Hopefully this helps those of you looking for another opinion. I won’t put any pictures here as I don’t want to clog the reading space… So read on if you’re interested.

For those of you that don’t know – one of the biggest decisions I made over the winter was to finally make the jump from Canon to Sony. For the last 12 years, I’ve been a loyal and happy fan of the Canon brand and that’s the brand that I’ve worked with to learn all of what I know now. I certainly don’t dislike Canon but the spark between us has dwindled and it was time to move on. It felt like I was ending a relationship that I had originally thought would last forever – I didn’t see this day coming, but when it did – I couldn’t think of anything besides moving on. This must be what destiny feels like.

My love for photography started at the same time my love for cars did 12 years ago. I remember the days of browsing car forums and seeing amazing pictures of amazing cars and amazing pictures of not-so-amazing cars. I remember wondering what kind of magic this kind of art was and how game changing it was for me. A decade ago, photography was not a huge thing like it is today… There were a few well-known blogs with great photography, but for the most part – just standard point and shoot pictures are all that you would see on forums. I would say at that time, the rise of automotive photography was on the horizon. Legends like Easton Chang and his rig shots were the epitome of what automotive photography could and should be. Nowadays, everyone is a photographer as long as they meet 3 criteria:

  1. They just bought DSLR
  2. They write “Automotive Photography” in their instagram profile
  3. They put a watermark on their photo

It’s almost like that’s the path to becoming a real photographer – you need to front your game before you actually have game. It’s a bit frustrating to see because these same guys are asking for paid photoshoots, and some poor soul out there will pay because they don’t know any better. I’m not trying to discredit the guys that put time into learning the art – it truly does take time. Just because you can take a picture of a flower at an open aperture to create bokeh doesn’t make you a professional. It means you can read instructions. /rant.

Anyway that’s not why you’re reading this, is it? You’ve come here to see why I decided to make the jump from Canon to Sony. As I was saying, over the last 12 years, I’ve been disgustingly loyal to Canon – almost to the point of where I would not even acknowledge other brands because I felt Canon was superior. It’s not a good attitude to have, by the way. I’ll be honest though, there was that small 1% of me that was a little curious about what other brands could do. Over the last year, my loyalty to Canon has dwindled and my inspiration to shoot has faded. I’m going to be go out on a limb here and risk saying it – but I just felt like my Canon 7D was not performing the way I wanted it to anymore. “Jason, it’s not the equipment”, you say… “It’s the user” – and it may very well be the case. It wasn’t producing sharp pictures, it was always missing, it failed me during ‘once in a lifetime’ moments and thus, my trust and love towards my once trusted Canon camera just started disappearing. I didn’t want to pick it up anymore, my S8+ was more reliable than it, and despite numerous attempts at calibrations, cleaning and google searches – there just seemed to be no light at the end of the tunnel. Now you must be saying – “well Jason, my Canon is perfect” – and I don’t doubt that it is. But my story of ending my relationship with it happened to be because of imperfection – perhaps I expected too much, or it just wasn’t meant to be. This really starts to sound like a romance novel, but I assure you that it’s just a story between me and my camera.

The magic of user-tailored ads on social media can be amazing. You search one thing and it bombards you with deals and the magic of that product for weeks on end – forcing the little devil in the back of your mind to say “just do it. This is a sign”. And no matter how much you convince yourself that this is just showing because you googled “Sony DSLR’s” once, you start to fall into the obvious trap. It was like I was willing to step right into the bear trap even though I acknowledged and saw it and that’s where my Sony journey begins.

So I finally convinced myself that Sony was the next match that I was going to swipe right on. In order to give myself the push, I put my Canon 7D up for sale and within hours, it was sold. That did exactly what I was dreading but had hoped for – it solidified the fact that I was no longer a Canon user. That same day, I went out and bought the Sony A7II. Sony’s entry-level full frame camera – I wasn’t shooting weddings, I wasn’t shooting events that were going to pay me thousands of dollars. I was shooting my daughter, cars, and that was it. I just know that down the road, I’ll convince myself again that I need an upgrade, but for now – I had to ease into this new relationship slowly. Perhaps, we’ll take it to the next base in a few years.

As I said above, it’s been about a year since I’ve been thinking about Sony, so you can imagine that my expectations of its capability had grown exponentially over that time period. I was truly convinced that my Canon was done for and that Sony was going to be my savior. I won’t keep you in suspense – it was indeed everything that I had hoped for. You know when you leave a dull relationship where things weren’t terrible, but they weren’t great either? Then you find one where sparks fly every time you meet? That was how I felt. Taking pictures with my Sony was – trying not to sound cornier than I already do – magical. Pictures were sharp, they were clear and vibrant. It didn’t “miss” shots like my Canon did. When Aria smiled, Sony got them. Where Canon failed when Aria was jumping, Sony soared. That one particular spot of carbon weave in my Voltex wing that I wanted in focus was actually in focus. Suddenly, taking pictures felt like how it used to 12 years ago – I wanted to take more, I wanted to have free reign over my shots without worrying about something being out of focus when it got on the computer. Sony, Sony, Sony… You have revived my love for shooting again that I haven’t felt in a long time, and it makes me wonder where you’ve been all my life.

Dear Canon, I don’t hate you. I just think things between us weren’t working out the way they used to. You’ve done all that you could do and honestly, it’s just me. I don’t miss you either, but I’m thankful for all that you’ve taught me and I think it’s better this way. I hope you’re in the hands of another that will treat you with the same respect as I did. Perhaps you will inspire another to become a professional photographer – either for real or just by way of writing it in their instagram profile.

For those of you that want a little more technical and less drama, here’s a version that’s not so heart breaking. My Canon 7D was my trusty sidekick for the last 3 or 4 years. I had originally upgraded from a Canon 40D, and before that – the long forgotten Canon XT. As you can see, my history of SLR’s began with Canon and unfortunately does not end with Canon. The 7D was great at first and I admittedly bought it for its video capabilities which I never used. Still – it provided me with many of the successful photos and photoshoots that you see on the blog today. Over time, I just found that it was slowly declining in performance and it was the same for my two previous bodies as well. Those performance issues translated into (as mentioned above) out of focus shots, images that were once sharp were no longer sharp at all, and generally just lack luster photos. I did ensure that my lenses were calibrated and performing as well as they should have been and came to the conclusion that it was the body – right or wrong.

Upon choosing the Sony A7II, I honestly didn’t know what I was getting myself into. It was going to be my first full-frame body, and my first mirrorless body, AND I was also switching brands at the same time – so there was lots of change happening all at once. I paired it up with a Sony 35mm F1.4 – a very stellar and highly recommended lens. Again – right or wrong – the Sony just outperformed in almost every aspect when shooting the exact same subjects – most notably, Aria. One could say it’s because it’s a brand new body, others would say that it’s all in my head. Whatever it is, it’s now sparked my inspiration to shoot again and I love it. The tracking auto-focus is amazing when I’m following Aria around and taking snaps. It’s ISO noise control is superb, and separation between foreground/background is just so sharp and distinct. One of my favourite features of this mirrorless route is the ability to not only live view the picture you’re taking, but to see exactly what it’ll look like before pressing the shutter button. In other words – you’ll see exactly what your bokeh will look like, where your focus is, what your shadows and highlights look like and it ultimately gives a real (or as real as it gets) representation of what your final outcome will be. You’ll not only know what the picture will look like, but also WHEN to take the picture. I say “when” because timing is everything in photography, so when I know what the picture will look like and how it changes based on the subjects movement in conjunction with the surrounding light and all other factors within the frame – then I have a MUCH better idea of when to take the photo, if that makes any sense.

I’ve found that over the last month of shooting with Sony that I’ve just been much more satisfied with almost 95% of the photos I take prior to post-processing. With my Canon, my success rate was near 50% and that’s a very bad thing when it comes to taking pictures of people or “once in a lifetime” moments. If 50% of my photos turned out to be garbage, then that means I only have good pictures 50% of the time – this is assuming composition, lighting and everything else was ideal. I found myself taking multiple photos like a mad man, hoping that of the 10 I took, at least 1 turns out. I like to review my photos all prior to post-processing and determine whether they’re even worth processing in the first place. More often than not – I’ve been keeping all the shots coming from the Sony A7II and this time, only one shot is needed instead of ten.

Overall – am I satisfied with the leap of faith? Yes, absolutely. If I had a few words (and not a whole novel like above) to explain my reasoning: The Sony A7II has proved to create exceptional photos with outstanding colours, clarity and sharpness that I have not seen in a long time. Despite the critical reviews about “slow AF” or it’s bigger brothers (A7R**, A7S**) better performance – this is a perfect balance for someone like myself that wants awesome performance and quality at a price that won’t break the bank. I think you’ll see the quality translated over into my photos this summer and I hope that you notice the difference. A few of my recent posts are pictures from the A7II as well. Whether it’s the equipment or the user – when you feel inspired to take photos, you almost always take great photos.

Hope that helps!

#lifewithjson – Year in Review Part 4/4

The season finale! Part 4 is more of a “Jason gets a schwack load of car parts”… But it’s still worth it 🙂

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Jackie was able to help me out and I bought a set of TE37SL’s off of Ben at AJR. I also bought the Voltex wing on my STI off of Ben because of Jackie… Good times.

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9.5 +40 for you “specs?” dudes.

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I decided to make the trip up to Edmonton to shoot Scott’s car.

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No I didn’t – that’s a lie. I was up there for work and instead of roam Deadmonton (no offense to my fellow Edmontonians – I love West Ed), I decided to reach out and shoot while I was there.

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Scott came out with his S2000 and it was a good shoot indeed…

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Ass so fat you can see her back from the front.

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T’was a sunny fall afternoon…

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Off to the next shoot!

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We went all the way out to the boonies for this one…

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Arif and his EK.

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#PumpkinSpiceLatte was the hashtag of the day for this one…

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This shoot was a seriously last minute shoot… And it turned out incredible. It’s funny how things work out… There have been shoots that we’ve been planning for months and when we finally get to do it, I’m just not feelin’ it. I don’t know what it is, but there are certain cars that just beg to be shot and work for the camera. Then there are other cars that are like “I want a photoshoot” but get all shy and cover their tits because they don’t feel comfortable… That’s how I would compare my bad photoshoots to my good photoshoots LOL. Almond’s car worked the camera hard that night if you know what I mean…

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This is also going to sound super weird but during Almond’s shoot, I felt like I had a “level up!” moment. What I mean by that is there have been moments during my time as a photographic being where I felt I took on a new approach and saw things differently than I usually did. I was inspired, I had new angles, I thought of new ideas and looked at the car differently through the lens.

You’ll probably be able to see a significant difference from all of the photoshoots I’ve done during these “Year in Reviews” to Almond’s photoshoot. I changed my style and edit, I changed practically everything about how I shot this car.

I know it’s sounding nerdy, but I just thought I’d put my two cents in while I could. Anyway – LEVEL UP

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M3nacing.

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This shot was so perfect. The colors, the car, the everything. PERFECT.

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Look, JC has also leveled up and is multi-tasking with his cellphone and a lens.

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Loved this one too. So artsy fartsy.

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Also tried on the TE’s one day just to see what it would look like…

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I was also convinced that day that I hated red and was looking for new colors for weeks. I have now come to the conclusion that I might like it. I’m very indecisive… We’ll see how it pans out when it’s all put together and on the ground.

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Mike’s Karmann Ghia was definitely one of the most unique shoots I’ve ever done and I loved it. It’s not everyday you see one of these…

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Another shot where the light just worked so perfectly for us.

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Gas station hang outs…

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Who rocked the Cholo pattern better? Just kidding.

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December is the month for new parts!

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A sigh of relief fell over me as I took the stock junk ball off.

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Another big purchase was coils. I can’t wait to get these bad boys on.

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And finally – a nice gift from my good friends JC, Punit, and Gopesh, my sister Julee and of course my wiferz Diana. Also can’t wait to slap this bad boy on…

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Done! And that’s a wrap for 2014!! Happy New Year!!