When the iPhone 4S was introduced in October 2011, people were looking at a device that on the outside was essentially identical to the iPhone 4. Same size, same design, same materials. But Phil Schiller delivered a good presentation explaining how, under the bonnet, the iPhone 4S was a completely different beast than its predecessor. And one of the key differences was in the camera system. 

If we take a step back and look at the evolution of the camera and optics in iPhones, this is when the biggest jump forward took place. From the 5‑megapixel camera found in the iPhone 4, the 4S got equipped with an 8‑megapixel camera. Other important highlights, taken from the 2011 introduction, were:

• An 8‑megapixel sensor, taking photos at 3264×2448, also meant 60% more pixels than on the iPhone 4.
• The sensor featured backside illumination, allowing the iPhone to gather 73% more light per pixel than the iPhone 4 sensor, and provide better low-light performance.
• It was also 33% faster at taking pictures.
• The camera system also featured a Hybrid IR filter, for better colour accuracy and more uniform colours across the picture.
• The optics consisted of a five-element lens (the iPhone 4 had four), allowing 30% more sharpness.
• The lens provided an ƒ/2.4 aperture versus the ƒ/2.8 of the iPhone 4.
• Inside the A5 chip there was an Apple-designed ISP (Image Signal Processor), which allowed for features like face detection, a 26% better white balance, and the ability to capture photos at faster speeds (according to the graph shown by Phil Schiller, the iPhone 4S’s ‘time to first photo’ was only 1.1 seconds, and the ‘shot to shot’ time was even shorter — 0.5 seconds).

I remember at the time how a lot of iPhone 4S owners were really amazed at the results taken with the camera. I also remember, when the iPhone 5 came out, how some people even said that the iPhone 4S’s camera was better than the one in the iPhone 5 (which still had an 8‑megapixel sensor). So, when I finally acquired my ‘new’ iPhone 4S a month ago, I was curious to test these claims. 

Before proceeding with my (informal) observations, though, I wanted to know exactly how the iPhone 5 camera was different from the one in the iPhone 4S. After rewatching the iPhone 5 introduction from September 2012, here is a brief summary of what was added and changed in the camera of the iPhone 5:

• The base specifications are the same as the iPhone 4S’s camera, but the system is 25% smaller. (The iPhone 5 is 7.6 mm thin versus the 9.3 mm of the iPhone 4S).
• New dynamic low-light mode. Schiller: “When you’re in low-light situations, the ISP senses that and is able to combine multiple pixels together to give you up to two f‑stops greater performance in those scenarios. You really see the difference in your low-light pictures.”
• Precision lens alignment.
• Sapphire crystal cover protecting the lens.
• Next-generation ISP, allowing enhancements such as:
• Spatial noise reduction. Schiller: “It removes the noisy particles especially in low-light images; by looking at surrounding pixels we can determine where the noise is and help remove that.”
• Smart filter: “It looks at the image before the ISP does its noise reduction and can figure out where there are areas that should be uniform colour like a blue sky, and other areas with textures you shouldn’t be doing noise reduction on.”
• Better low-light performance.
• Faster photo capture: 40% faster than the iPhone 4S.

iPhone 4S vs iPhone 5: comparing cameras

Of course, in broad daylight and in generally favourable lighting conditions, both phones have given me very nice results. Night photos are an interesting story, though. 

I want to emphasise that I’m not a professional photographer, but as a long-time enthusiast shooting both film and digital cameras/devices, I have enough experience to make certain assessments. Still, my aim here is to keep things casual, present a few captures and add a bit of informal commentary. 

Night photos, I was saying. Everyone has their way of evaluating camera performance when it comes to actually using it and forgetting about tech specs and benchmarks. For me, taking photos of the city at night is a good initial test to see how a camera or smartphone behaves. You can see how the camera system handles dark areas, highly contrasted areas (bright city lights against the night sky and next to dark corners), white balance, etc.

Here are three pictures I snapped a few nights ago with the iPhone 4S and the iPhone 5. I have attempted to keep the scenes framed as similarly as possible. Each photo was taken first with the iPhone 4S, then with the iPhone 5. For each photo I’ve kept my hands steady, let the phone focus, then took the photo. Of course, I used the built-in Camera app for both iPhones, with the exact same settings (Flash and HDR off), and of course in both cases there was no filter, no effects, no post-processing applied of any sort. 

Comparison 1

As a general impression, what I’ve noticed in all the photos I took that night, is that the automatic white balance in both iPhones does a decent job at rendering the different colour temperatures of the various light sources. Another thing that will perhaps be more obvious in the following comparisons (here the scene is rather well-lit, so it’s less noticeable at first sight) is that the iPhone 5 tends to deliver ‘moodier’, more contrasty results, especially in darker areas of the photo; while the iPhone 4S returns a lighter result in those same areas, often preserving a little bit more detail. 

Taking the image as a whole, there isn’t a clear ‘winner’, because on the one hand, the iPhone 4S captures the scene more faithfully from a lighting perspective; on the other hand, the iPhone 5 processes the scene in a way that tends to give more pleasing results. Certain parts of the image have more contrast and appear sharper on the iPhone 5, and I presume it has to do with the way the iPhone 5 handles noise reduction.

But let’s look at a 100% crop of this photo:

If we examine the area inside the ‘a’ frame, we’ll see that it’s lighter and slightly noisier on the iPhone 4S, but also less muddled. The ornamental railings are a bit more defined, as is the architectural element on the left, whereas the whole area is darker on the iPhone 5, and slightly more blotted due to the noise reduction process. So I’ll say that I prefer the iPhone 4S version for this area. 

Now, the area inside the ‘b’ frame is intriguing, because we can notice how the iPhone 5 does a better job at delivering the fine details of the cornice — you can see its various layers — while the iPhone 4S’s camera returns a less defined, less sharp area. Note, however, how the two iPhones deliver essentially the same result for the illuminated parts of the tower between the clock and the upper part of the ‘b’ frame. 

Comparison 2

Here it’s more apparent how the iPhone 5 camera returns darker shadows and gives the photo a more contrasty look. This is especially noticeable in the stark shadows under some of the windows, and in the horizontal lines in the lower part of the building. Again, by looking at how the whole scene was rendered, I’d say that the iPhone 5 version looks slightly ‘prettier’, at least to my eyes. The restaurant signs (‘VIENA’ and ‘¡Hola Valencia!’) are sharper on the iPhone 5 version, as are the backlit ads on the newsstand on the right.

But this 100% crop is interesting as well:

It turns out that when you examine the scene more closely, the iPhone 4S camera is hands down the better at preserving detail. If you compare the area inside the ‘a’ frame, you can clearly see more details in the capital’s ornaments in the iPhone 4S photo, while the iPhone 5 renders the capital’s details with less accuracy (again, I assume due to the noise reduction filter). The area is simply darker and a lot gets lost in the shadows.

The window inside the ‘b’ frame shows again how things are a little bit clearer and defined in the iPhone 4S crop, while the iPhone 5 crop is darker and harder to make out (especially the area surrounding the window pane on the right). The ornamentation just above the window is also blurrier in the iPhone 5 crop.

Comparison 3

Something peculiar happened with this capture: in the previous two examples, and in several other night shots I took in the same session, the iPhone 4S would on average be slower than the iPhone 5 both at focussing and at taking the picture. In this case the opposite happened. The iPhone 4S captured the scene right away, while the iPhone 5 struggled with the focus. The one on the right is the third and better shot I managed to get with the iPhone 5, and if you look at the right dome of the building in the background, you’ll see it’s still out of focus.

This is another picture where the iPhone 4S did a noticeably better job than the iPhone 5 at capturing the scene. Superficially, the iPhone 5 photo just looks moodier and more contrasty, but the loss of detail is visible in various spots in the foreground. Let’s have a look at a 100% crop of part of the first scooter and bike on the left:

The first thing you see is just how the iPhone 5 failed at focussing properly^[1]. Just look at the area inside the frame, at how blurry the rear of the bike, the trunk luggage box, and the licence plate are compared to the iPhone 4S crop, where you’re able to actually read the licence plate. 

The scooter in the foreground isn’t much better, either. The suspension spring is clearly more detailed in the iPhone 4S crop; the chrome parts are better defined and shinier; the shadow under the scooter is just a dark stain in the iPhone 5 crop, while in the iPhone 4S crop you can still make out some of the veins of the marble floor. In general, the darker areas in the photo (and in this crop) have better detail in the image captured by the iPhone 4S than the one captured by the iPhone 5.

Notes

I admit I was the first to be blown away by the iPhone 4S results, especially because in certain situations it seemed that the 4S had more trouble locking focus than the iPhone 5, and I had to be more patient if I wanted to take a good shot. When the photo walk was over, I came away with this first impression about the two cameras — that the iPhone 5 camera was ‘quick & dirty’, while the iPhone 4S’s was ‘slow & accurate’.

In case you were wondering: no, these aren’t just three cherry-picked accidents; I took more than 20 photos with each phone during my walk, and the results I have not included here were pretty much similar, so for brevity’s sake I selected the examples that I felt stood out the most. Yes, I didn’t just shoot once and included a photo. Especially in the third case, I shot the scene a few times until I decided I couldn’t get a better capture than the one I have presented here.

Overall, the iPhone 5 was a faster performer — quicker at focussing, quicker at taking a shot after another. Its CPU gives it an undeniable speed advantage over the 4S, so that when it comes to take a quick shot of something I’d otherwise miss, my choice would be the iPhone 5, no doubt. But when there’s no rush and I just want to capture a nice night city scene? There’s no question I’d choose the iPhone 4S any day. With photos taken in daylight, both phones are equally good choices, and in this case it becomes a matter of personal taste: the iPhone 5 tends to deliver more contrasty looks and saturated colours, so if you prefer vibrant results out of the box, you’ll want the iPhone 5. 

One last fun comparison

How about an indoor capture, with plenty of artificial light, different surfaces with different colours and textures? The following day I was at the university library, and I also had with me the iPhone 4 and the fourth-generation iPod touch. So here’s the same scene captured with all four devices:

The very first thing you notice is how the iPhone 4S and iPhone 5 return warmer colours when compared with the iPhone 4 and the iPod touch 4. The iPhone 5 is the best at picking up certain details in selected areas of the image, but you really have to squint, because the iPhone 4S is a strong contender here. As for colour accuracy, the iPhone 4S is the best at rendering the ceiling. The other devices all deliver darker results that don’t really correspond to the real thing. 

But here’s the kicker: the iPhone 4 is the best at rendering the colour of the floor. Both the 4S and 5 give too warm results, while the iPod touch 4 paints the floor with too cold a hue. And the iPhone 4 is again the best at rendering the white of the semi-transparent glass separators of the table on the left and the white of the table surface. The same elements in the iPhone 4S and iPhone 5 captures are too warm. The iPod touch 4, like the iPhone 4, gets this particular white right, but since its camera is only 0.7 megapixels, there’s loss of detail in the highlights.

Speaking of the iPod touch 4: I added it to the mix just for fun, but given how limited its camera is^[2], I honestly expected far worse results compared to the other three iPhones. Sure, once you look closer you can’t miss the general softness and lack of fine detail (look at the books in the three shelves visible on the right, for example), but again, I’ve seen far worse photos taken by older smartphones and feature phones with 1- or even 2‑megapixel cameras. And colours are decent, all in all.

Conclusion

I know, I’ve currently written more than 2,500 words to talk about a camera comparison between two iPhones — the 4S and 5 — that are now more than 7 and 6 years old, respectively. But my casual, informal tests could be of use to someone who maybe wants a still usable smartphone with acceptable specs, and has next to no budget for it. If you’re that someone, I’d recommend the iPhone 5 because it’s generally more capable than the 4S, it runs iOS 10.3.3 much better than how the iPhone 4S runs iOS 9.3.5. But if what you’re looking for is a vintage, bare-bones solution for a few basic tasks yet with a respectable camera, the iPhone 4S is a nice device for the very little money you’ll pay for it today.

Another thing I wanted to demonstrate with this article is that just because these iPhones don’t have ‘bionic’ processors providing ‘computational photography’, that doesn’t mean they can’t take good photos. My examples above are taken in difficult, complex lighting conditions, so they may not be really striking at first glance, but when there’s plenty of natural light, both the iPhone 4S and iPhone 5 deliver stunning results for their age and technical specifications.

And last but not least: to those who told me the iPhone 4S’s camera was generally better than the iPhone 5’s — you were right, and I’m sorry for my initial scepticism.

 

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