ProRAW 48 broken on iPhone 15 Pro Max

I am a photographer that recently upgraded from iPhone 14 Pro Max to 15 Pro Max. I immediately noticed issues using the ProRAW 48 format on my new device. Images are blurry and considerably worse in detail comparing to ProRAW 48 on my 14 Pro Max.



This is a comparison between ProRAW 48 in the regular camera app (first image from the left), ProRAW 48 using the third party app "ProCamera" (middle image) and lastly HEIC 24MP from the regular camera app (last one to the right).


It seems ProCamera manages a little better than the built-in camera app, but they both lack so much detail comparing to HEIC 24MP. ProRAWs have a super compressed look with almost no detail or texture at all.


Another example (images in the same order):



Of course I know that the ProRAWs must be edited and processed (as HEIC is already automatically processed by the camera software). I have shot over 10000 ProRAWs with my 14 Pro Max and I know very well how it performs. This is not even close. There is not a chance that I can achieve the same level of detail with ProRAW 48 as HEIC 24MP or even ProRAW 48 from iPhone 14 Pro Max.


Surely something must be bugged here, and before I try to get my phone replaced, I was curious to hear if anyone had the same issue and found some solution.


I have done the regular checks like resetting the phone to factory defaults and then setting it up without restoring an iCloud backup - absolutely no difference. I am running 17.0.3.


It must either be defective hardware or a software bug. I guess a software bug as HEIC 24MP looks pretty ok (but still far from the detail level that ProRAW 48 could achieve on 14 Pro Max).


Thanks for your time

Jacob

iPhone 15 Pro Max, iOS 17

Posted on Oct 10, 2023 09:23 AM

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4 replies

Dec 1, 2023 10:39 AM in response to jajo.j

Hi, I am not professional photographer but taking photos is my hobby and I am detailed oriented person for sure. I tested iPhone 14 Pro Max and 15 Pro Max, mainly in ProRaw (dng) setup. I am dissapointed what I could achieve with iPhone 15 Pro Max. The previous one model has much better performance in that matter.


Here is photo comparison (cropped block wall, the same light, very similar shutter speed, same iso). iP14PM on the left, iP15PM on the right.


Dec 14, 2023 12:24 AM in response to michael_miarka_from_poland

Same here! Looks like the raw from the main camera is not a raw, but hugely overprocessed thing with a ton of aggressive noise reduction and compression. The trees in yhe shadows just look plain awful. My iPhone 11 is much better in keeping detail in same areas even with it's 12MP!


I thought maybe a third party camera app would take "pure raw" images, but according to the original post above - I shouldn't waste time checking.


Seriously disappointed 😔

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ProRAW 48 broken on iPhone 15 Pro Max

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