iPhone 13 vs Digicam
Here is a close-up photo of a flower taken using an iPhone 13:
The smudginess in the out-of-focus areas—especially the stem and the base of the flower—is very jarring to look at.
Recently, whenever I’ve tried to take an image with even a modest digital zoom of 1.5x-2x—whether it’s of a bird, natural scenery, or a concert where I’m some distance from the stage—I see a similar heavily post-processed, smudged-out mess of pixels. And this isn’t just Apple; it’s true across similar mid-range Android phones as well (I’ve tried Google and OnePlus).
For contrast, here is a similar photo taken using a relatively cheap digicam (Kodak PixPro FZ45) that is still available to buy in the market:
The realness/rawness of this image is very apparent (to me, at least) compared to the mess you see in the first image.
The market for digicams has been very quiet for the last 5–10 years, except for a few models like this Kodak that are targeted towards Gen-Z TikTok trends glorifying 2000s “retro” aesthetics (I am admittedly Gen-Z too). And this is by no means a good digital camera. I remember using much better ones a decade ago that cost a similar amount.
I was never into photography as a hobby. I take a bare minimum number of pictures while travelling, just to serve as a checkpoint that “hey, I was here once.” Sadly, given the absolute garbage that a mid-range (~₹30k–50k) smartphone captures today, I’m considering carrying a dedicated digicam for my next trip.
Congrats, we’ve come full circle. There are no small-sized (4–5 inch) phones available that have the bare minimum features needed to navigate the world in 2025—things like a 4G/5G connection and a basic smartphone OS to support apps for maps, UPI/banking, cab hailing, and countless other tasks that make a smartphone mandatory (like a constantly changing QR code for a concert ticket).
Anything that should last you more than a year is a big ~6-7 inch slab that barely fits in your pocket and costs north of ₹30k. And it can’t even take a decent picture. So you must carry a second device for that, just like in the old days.
Anyway, apologies for the rant. I’ll go back to my day job… which, ironically, involves writing Linux drivers for cameras.