Camera versus Phone Pictures. What’s the difference?

When it comes to quality the picture from a camera is better than that from a phone. Don’t misunderstand me. There’s a saying that the best camera is the one you have with you and most of us have our phones with us pretty much all of the time. I use my phone camera regularly for record shots.

And phone cameras are getting better all the time, with more apps allowing a higher degree of manual control and more creativity. It’s also very easy to share pictures from your phone compared with a camera.

But… (you knew that was coming didn’t you)…

The biggest downside to phone cameras is the lower quality of the picture. This is because  

• Phone cameras have much smaller sensors. This means lower resolution, less detail and, in low light conditions, more image degradation. For pictures viewed on a phone this may not seem an issue (because the screen is so small) but if you want to enlarge and/or print the picture then quality is a real problem
• Most phones save images at 72 ppi (pixels per inch) but the standard to ensure print quality is 300dpi (dots per inch)   
• It’s very easy to overuse apps (for example to sharpen a picture or to saturate colours), and whilst it may look good on your phone, at higher magnifications the effects on quality become obvious    
• The lenses on phone cameras are really small. These can’t compete with the quality of larger lenses (especially those made of glass rather than plastic)
• Phone cameras rely on algorithms to produce the final picture. Cameras (with a dedicated lens such as a macro for insect shots or telephoto for wildlife photography for example) produce the final image optically

For both the camera picture and the phone picture below, I ensured that all settings were the same (as far as possible given that my phone has relatively few manual settings). The results shown are straight out of camera and phone with no alterations in software.

In the camera picture the colours, tones and brightness of the scene were as I saw them. (My monitor is colour calibrated for accuracy).  My phone has rendered the colours, tones and brightness differently through the algorithms it uses.

The upshot of this is that a camera and knowledge of how to use it will help you to take control of your photography and get the picture that’s in your head in digital and/or print form.

This is where I can help you through photography training.

There are more details here

Antony