Apple has launched its RAW photo format called ProRAW with iOS 14.3 for iPhone 12 Pro and 12 Pro Max. The new format offers the traditional benefits of RAW recording, but also includes Apple’s iPhone image processing. Follow on for why and how to use ProRAW on iPhone 12 Pro.
Apple’s ProRAW on iPhone 12 uses the universal DNG file format. If you don’t already know, the file sizes for RAW or in this case ProRAW images are much larger than HEIF / JPG compressed images. Apple says that most ProRAW images taken on the iPhone 12 Pro are about 25MB (about 10x bigger than HEIF / JPG), but they can go up to 40MB.
The big advantage of ProRAW is that you record an uncompressed image and get as much information as possible from the sensor to the stored photo. That means you have a lot more flexibility when it comes to editing. Part of that is 12-bit color support (compared to 8-bit), which doesn’t sound like a big difference, but is actually a jump from 256 RGB shades to a massive 4,096. But along with all that, you still get Apple’s impressive computational photo processing.
Learn more about ProRAW in my colleague Ben Lovejoy’s recent iPhone 12 Diary post and a great comparison comes along with why / how to post from professional photographer Austin Mann.
And for a more in-depth look:
The great thing is that you can use ProRAW with any of the iPhone 12 Pro / Pro Max cameras, as well as with Smart HDR, Deep Fusion and Night mode. And you can include / edit ProRAW images in Apple’s Camera / Photos app and third-party apps such as Halide.
Please note that you cannot use ProRAW with Live Photos, Portrait mode or with videos.
Using ProRAW on iPhone 12 Pro and Pro Max cameras
Enable ProRAW on your iPhone 12 Pro / Pro Max
- Go to Settings
- Swipe down and tap Camera
- Select Formats on the top
- Switch on Apple ProRAW
In the Camera app
- In the default iPhone Camera app, you will now see it
RAWicon in the top right corner (top left in landscape mode) - Crane RAW to enable it for a photo, the diagonal line disappears when it is enabled
- After taking a photo with ProRAW, you will see the RAW label in the top left corner of the Photos app when viewing your images
- You can tap Edit on iPhone to start working with the ProRAW image immediately
- Apple notes that you must use iCloud Photos to get ProRAW photos to sync across your devices
- If you are going to take a lot of ProRAW images, you may need to improve your iCloud storage plan (Settings> Tap your name> iCloud> Manage storage)
How to edit ProRAW
I’ll leave the actual ProRAW editing advice to the pros (like Austin Mann’s great coverage here), just a few details:
- You can edit ProRAW images taken on iPhone 12 Pro and Pro Max on iPhone and iPad with iOS / iPadOS 14.3
- You can edit ProRAW on Mac from macOS Big Sur 11.1
- If you’re ready for more advanced editing, many like to use Adobe’s Lightroom or RAW Power
- And Halide is a top pick for the iPhone for more advanced controls for both ProRAW shooting and editing
If you’re ready to dive deeper, be sure to check out this comprehensive report from professional photographers:
Lake
You can find more tips on using ProRAW in Apple’s support document with details on AirDrop sharing, emailing, and exporting original files here.
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