I travel a lot this year and have an iPhone in my pocket all the time. Until the iPhone 14 series came out, I wasn't too interested in Apple's camera system, and recently I've started to pay more attention to some settings and features.
With the launch of the iPhone 15 Pro, Apple has added more flexibility and variety to its triple-camera system. It changed the way I took pictures – or at least changed the final result. I'm not a photographer and I'm just a beginner myself, so this is not a guide for professionals. This is helpful for beginners who can take better photos with just a few seconds of adjustment and a few settings.
Here are seven iPhone camera settings you should know to get the most out of your camera system.
Over the years, the iPhone has maintained a certain warm tone, but that changed a few years ago. Now, Apple allows you to choose from four styles that allow you to adjust the vibrancy, contrast, and overall tone of your photos.
It's called "Photography Style" and I started using it when I recently went to Kashmir. I noticed that the green wasn't vivid enough in normal mode, so I switched to the "high contrast" style so my photos looked much better. I also like the "vivid" style because it has bright and vivid colors – very useful when photographing flowers or murals. When photographing nature, I generally use "high contrast" to get deeper shadows and better contrast, but not every photo fits this style. For example, for darker skin tones, the "standard" style will make you look better compared to "high contrast".
As you can see from the gallery above, each style has its own unique look and feel. The standard photography style is generally good, but sometimes when shooting on the beach, I prefer to use a vivid cool style to get a better blue effect of the sea. But if you don't want extra vividness, you can opt for the cool photography style.
I suggest you try these styles and find the one you like. To configure the photography style, swipe up above the shutter button and tap the fourth icon that pops up from the left, which looks like three frames superimposed on top of each other. After that, you can swipe horizontally to choose the style you like.
Live Photos is a feature that allows you to record 1.5 seconds of content before and after hitting the shutter button. You must understand whether your usage scenario requires capturing Live Photos.
For example, if you have limited storage space and only want to post photos on social media, it's a good idea to turn off the Live Photos feature, as Live Photos can take up a lot of space once it accumulates. Most Live Photos are twice the size of regular photos. However, if you're a TikTok or Reels video, Live Photos can be an excellent way to capture unexpected real-world moments. These photos can add a flavor to your video that is not usually possible with still shots.
I am glad that on my recent trip to Vienna, most of my photos were taken in live mode. This allowed me to add these clips to my first trip Reel on Instagram. As you can notice from the video below, portraits in Reel don't feel the same as dynamic footage. When you're producing content on social media, these short videos can make a big difference.
Motion Photos also have other setting options, including looping, bouncing, and long exposures, or exporting them as short videos that can make you more creative in your creations. These features can add some perspective to your photos that normal photos cannot. I mostly use it to capture footage of walking shots to get that perfect, realistic click that doesn't look like it's being deliberately posed, but actually walking.
Gridlines can be a great way to frame a picture. I often take photos of buildings and sunsets, and if you're anything like me, you'll probably want to turn on grid lines on your camera screen. Although these lines help follow the rule of thirds – something I learned from friends who love photography – I mainly use gridlines for three main reasons.
First of all, these features help me keep the horizon level when photographing sunsets. Second, they allow me to keep the lines straight in my architectural photos. Third, I was able to take symmetrical photos, which is usually impossible without grid lines. You can turn on this feature by going to Settings > Camera > grid > toggle it on.
The iPhone camera app is notorious for not saving settings option. For example, if you select the rich contrast photography style in the app and turn it off, when you open the app again, you will be set to the standard style by default. However, Apple allows you to save settings like camera mode, motion photos, lights, filters, etc. from last time so that the default settings are not restored the next time you open the camera app.
This is one of the first settings I change before every vacation, especially when I need to turn on Live Photos in a short video. After all, I don't want to turn on this feature every time I take a picture because random moments may have been missed. You can turn it on as your preferred setting by going to Settings > camera > Leave Settings.
I hadn't turned on geolocation before, but after traveling a lot this year, I found it to be one of my best decisions. This feature embeds your location data in photos, making it perfect for all travelers.
Personally, it helps me organize my photos according to places so that I can back up thousands of pictures into folders by naming places. This was very helpful when I took over 1000 photos over a few days of travel. To enable this feature, go to Settings> Privacy & Security> Location Services> Camera> When Using Apps.
Apple added more focal length to the iPhone 15 Pro's camera app. With a few taps on the 1x lens, you can now switch between the primary camera's standard 24mm lens and 28mm (1.2x) and 35mm (1.5x). Although Apple claims that "it's like having seven professional lenses in your pocket," in reality these are not optical zooms, but digital crops. However, since these images are output at 24MP resolution, you can still retain most of the detail you get in 24mm (1x) shooting.
Maybe you'll be wondering what these new focal lengths are for. They can be used when photographers need a narrower focal length to change the composition of their photos. Plus, with the new iPhone 15's AutoPortrait feature, these new settings give you more flexibility for your portrait shooting.
If you prefer one or the other, you can choose one of the three of your favorite focal lengths on the main camera as the default. To do this, you need to go to Settings > Camera > Main Camera > select the focal length you want as the default (28mm or 35mm if the standard is 1x).
You can display gridlines on the preview interface, but you still can't take straight photos. This happened to me and I had to adjust the image in editing. However, with iOS 17, you can now enable the level feature, which displays a horizontal line to help you take straight photos.
When you hold your iPhone in landscape or portrait orientation, a white line appears in the middle of the viewfinder that rotates as you calibrate the horizontal position of your iPhone. When the device is horizontal, the white line turns yellow. It is also suitable for video shooting. This helps you compose the shot when shooting. Its purpose is to help you capture horizontal, upright images. For example, when photographing a building, you can use it to frame an image that matches the lines of the building, so that the final image remains on the same axis.
On iPhones running iOS 17, the camera app automatically enables the horizontal setting. But if it is not enabled on your iPhone, you can go to Settings > camera > level (under the composition section).
These are some of the camera settings that have helped me take pictures recently. You don't need to be a professional photographer to take beautiful social media photos on your iPhone. Just adjusting a few switches can go a long way in making you stand out.
As Apple keeps introducing more features to help you better frame your shots, there's never been a better time to explore your iPhone camera settings.