Everything You Need to Know to Shoot, Edit, and Process ProRaw Photos from Apple's Latest iPhone Devices
You may not know, but your iPhone can shoot raw images like a traditional DSLR camera. First introduced with the iPhone 6S in 2015, capturing RAW photos allows you to edit your images in post-production further, considerably increasing the potential of your iPhone photographs!
What is RAW? First, RAW isn't a file system but a way to describe the untouched information captured by a camera sensor. When you press the shutter button on the default camera app, a powerful engine transforms raw pixels into a picture format (JPEG or HEIC.) This is what you see in your camera roll. The iPhone determined the best exposure, colors, and more. The default auto camera app is the most convenient and fast way to capture fleeting moments and everyday life, from your kid's first steps to the restaurant receipt. All you have to do is point and shoot.
However, sometimes, you may want to edit some images further. Maybe you wish to adjust the white balance or retain highlight details in that fantastic sunset photo. And while you can edit JPEG or HEIC images, you may have noticed that you can only push those sliders narrowly before ruining your image.
This is because all the raw information from the sensor has already been interpreted (edited) and baked inside the image by the iPhone. So, you are applying more edits to a finished image.
But what if you could fully control how the final image will look by bypassing the iPhone processing engine? That's where RAW enters the game. By editing a RAW image directly, you can edit it however you like. From the temperature, brightness, and even selective colors in your photo (for example, changing the color of a sweater in your portrait.)
That is one of the many reasons why most photographers capture in RAW. Camera manufacturers such as Canon, Nikon, and Sony all have proprietary RAW file formats (CR2, CR3, NEF, etc.)
Apple chose the highly compatible Adobe DNG (Digital Negative Image) to process RAW images on their iPhone, which allows most photo editors to process iPhone RAW DNG.