IPhone 12 ProMax Auto Focus issue

TidBITS Talk
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I trust TidBits to have more information on emerging topics. Especially problems with Apple products that Apple tries to hide or downplay.

I have an IPhone 12 Pro Max and it has camera auto focus issues as described in numerous online forums.

Apple has been silent on this topic. I see a potential class action lawsuit over this if Apple does not fix this soon. If it is even fixable. It might be the camera hardware itself.

Does the iPhone 13 pro Max exhibit the same camera focus issues as the 12 Pro Max? Has anyone here heard about the issue?

I had a chance to test this: iPhone on the floor, so no possibility of camera shake, front camera (which leads me to believe the problem is software related), on a timer. Aimed at a car ed ceiling in an old Spanish ceiling. About 20 feet above the phone.

At first glance the photo looks nice but zoom in to the details and see it is not sharply in focus.

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image1284×2778 218 KB

Camera original:

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image1920×1440 377 KB

Zoomed in;

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image1284×2778 154 KB

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I have nothing to say about the iPhone itself, but I know from personal experience with many other cameras that subjects like this, involving a lot of reflective surfaces, wreck havoc with auto-focus system.

I’ve always needed to use manual focus or some other kind of fixed-focus (e.g. a “distance” setting that locks the focus at infinity), using a camera that has the support, for images like this.

The most amusing example of this was several years ago when I visited the National Air & Space Museum and tried to take a picture of an F35 fighter. My camera absolutely could not auto-focus on it. I suspect this is a side effect of the plane’s shape being designed for stealth behavior.

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