ProRaw: See How Apple’s New iOS 14.3 Trick Transformed My iPhone 12 Photos

With the iOS 14.3 released, iPhone 12 Pro and 12 Pro Max get the new one from apple raw photo format called ProRaw. The new file lets you customize a raw file built on top of the iPhone’s computational intelligence. Over the past few weeks I have been testing the new feature and am impressed with how ProRaw has transformed my phone’s photography. ProRaw is such a big camera addition as the faster aperture lens that Apple has added to the main cameras in the iPhone 12 family and the new sensor-based stabilization found on the iPhone 12 Pro Max.

Read more: iOS 14.3: These Are 16 iPhone Features You’ll Use Every Day

ProRaw works on all four iPhone 12 Pro and 12 Pro Max cameras. It uses the widely supported Adobe Digital Negative, or DNG, file format, and contains 12-bit color information and support for 14 dynamic range values. The approach Apple has taken with ProRaw is similar to how Google records raw files created from HDR Plus on Pixel phones. ProRaw files are created from multiple picture frames and contain the data of the best parts of those photos. Deep Fusion analyzes these images pixel by pixel to create a deep photo file. The A14 Bionic performs all of these analyzes in real time without causing a shutter delay.

There are several notable differences between taking a raw photo on an iPhone and a ProRaw photo. The first is that you can only take raw photos using a third party app like Halide or Moment. ProRaw photos can be taken using the default Camera app. Then the ProRaw files are large. For example, I took a photo of the same subject using each file format on the iPhone 12 Pro Max. The HEIC file was 5.2 megabytes, the JPEG was 6.8MB, the raw photo (taken with the Moment app) was 16.5MB, and the ProRaw photo was 34.7MB.

ProRaw’s larger file size contains much more image data than a standard raw file. A ProRaw file is built based on the computer photography of Smart HDR, Deep Fusion, and Night Mode, which can result in an image with much less image noise, better dynamic range, and sharper details and textures.

Below are two JPEG files I created, one from a ProRaw photo and the other from a raw file taken with the Moment app. On both of them, I only adjusted the white balance, highlights, and shadows. If you look at the photo made from the raw version, you can see a lot of color image noise on the building bricks and more prominently in the dark night sky. The photo taken from the ProRaw version has virtually no image noise due to the iPhone 12 Pro Max’s night mode processing when I took the photo.

Here is another comparison of JPEG files. Again, one is from a ProRaw file and the other is from a raw file taken with the Moment app. I adjusted the exposure, white balance, highlights, and shadows on both. The biggest difference between the two is dynamic range and image noise. Take a look at the sky in the ProRaw version. There was enough information in the file to bring the reflections of white back into a blue sky. There is much less image noise in the shadows compared to the raw version and there is increased sharpness in details like bricks on the top left and rocks on the bottom left.

All of the ProRaw photos I took weren’t that much different from the standard raw version. But overall, having access to all this computer data was good. And that’s just the start of ProRaw. In future updates to ProRaw, third-party apps will be able to use even more data from Smart HDR. Adobe Lightroom, for example, will be able to access layer map data from Smart HDR so you can isolate different aspects of your photo (like faces, people, or the sky) while editing.

I also like the way Apple implemented ProRaw in the native Camera app. By default, ProRaw is disabled. And that’s smart because not all owners of a 12 Pro or 12 Pro Max will want to use it. But if you want to activate it, go to Settings > Camera > Formats and under a new Capture photos section there is a toggle to turn Apple ProRaw on and off. Then open the default Camera app and in the top right corner you will see a new Gross to quickly switch between ProRaw photos and JPEG (or HEIC) photos.

The majority of the photos I take on the iPhone 12 Pro Max are still in the JPEG format. But for photos that are more deliberate or where I need every drop of image information to edit them, ProRaw is just a tap of the Gross button away.

During my testing, I used the native Photos app to edit ProRaw photos as well as third-party apps like Halide, Moment, VSCO, and Lightroom for iOS. Basically, any application that can edit a raw DNG file can edit a ProRaw DNG file. I am delighted to see third-party applications supporting ProRaw more fully in the future.

“We work closely with Apple and are delighted with the opportunities ProRaw can offer our mutual customers,” said an Adobe representative. “We have no details that we can share at this time.”

ProRaw won’t be for everyone, hence the reason it’s not on the iPhone 12 and 12 Mini. But this is the first time that Apple has distinguished its camera software on its iPhone Pro models with a feature truly aimed at professionals. And I would say that even if you are not a pro but someone who likes to edit your photos before posting them on Instagram or Snapchat, this ProRaw is definitely worth a try.

Below are some more photos that I edited from ProRaw files taken with the iPhone 12 Pro Max.