iPhone 11’s Night Mode Was Used to Shoot During Polar Night in Russia & the Results Are Amazing

If you thought that you had seen the best results that can come out of iPhone 11 Pro’s Night Mode, these new photos from PetaPixel will blow your mind away. Captured in Murmansk, a city in Northern Russia, these photos were captured during a polar night – a long night that lasts between December and January.

Murmansk seems to be the perfect city to test iPhone 11 Pro’s Night Mode. It is the largest city in the Arctic Circle and stays in the dark from December 2 to January 11. This is due to polar night, a phenomenon in some parts of the world where the night lasts for more than a few days.

Amos Chapple of PetaPixel used the city’s unique attributes to his advantage and created a photo essay titled “Forty Days of Darkness”. He used iPhone’s Night Mode, which he calls the ‘witchiest camera technology’, to capture almost all his photos during his stay in the city. Due to Murmansk’s almost 5 week polar night, the iPhone would automatically switch to Night Mode in most situations. Amos was able to capture long exposures without any blurry movements thanks to Apple’s camera tech. The photos he was able to capture are nothing less than stunning.

The iPhone’s Night Mode is the witchiest camera technology I’ve ever used. I still don’t understand it. I was shooting three second exposures made handheld, yet I never saw any movement blur. All of the shots I made were tack sharp.

Even more strange is that, whenever there was movement in the frame, like a person walking, or snow falling, the camera somehow froze, or only slightly blurred that movement, *while* it was soaking up light for a long exposure.

Before you sharpen your pitchforks and claim that an iPhone 11 Pro has nothing on a “proper camera”, Amos used an M43 camera too during his stay but he loved being able to get photos right without the need for any editing. Of course, iPhone photos don’t have enough data for post-editing and improvement, compared to detailed RAW files from DSLRs and mirrorless cameras.

Night Mode was not always perfect for Amos. It would not always fire up when needed which is something Apple should fix in a future update. Currently, Apple automatically enables it when it’s dark enough but users cannot manually turn it on. It also does not work with the ultra-wide lens on iPhone 11 Pro, which can be limiting in certain situations. Lastly, Amos shared his complaint regarding a green lens flare that appears in certain situations.

2019 has been a great year for smartphone camera users. Google is credited for starting the trend for computational photography with its Pixel smartphones. This year, companies like Apple, Samsung and Huawei left Google’s Pixel 4 in the dust by offering better cameras, at both photo and video capture. This competition has only benefitted users as smartphone camera continue to improve across different price ranges.

Samsung phones will get the iPhone 11’s cheesiest feature in new update

Samsung’s recently announced One UI 2 beta program has given us a glimpse into its future version of Android 10. Because of this, we know Digital Wellbeing will support Focus Mode on devices like the Galaxy Note 10, and we can expect more apps to support dark mode. But Samsung will also deliver one feature we didn’t expect to see: Samsung’s version of the iPhone 11’s new Slofie (slow-motion selfie videos) functionality.

Apple’s latest selfie camera gimmick is not exactly something customers have been begging for. Yet, because of Apple’s market presence, we expect many Android OEMs will include this feature moving forward.

According to SamMobile, users won’t get any pre-shot customization options with the new slow-motion selfie videos, just like on the rear shooters. But after recording, users will be able to edit the shots for even slower playback speed.

The performance and quality don’t seem to be on par with Apple’s offering quite yet. As of right now, Samsung’s slow-motion selfies have a slight jitter, but we hope it will sort that out before its official Android 10 release.

It also looks like this will only support standard slow-mo video recording and not super slow-mo. This is not too big of a deal since super slow-mo video is finicky anyway.

We aren’t sure if Samsung will have a fancy name for its slow-motion selfie feature when it launches. What we do know is Samsung won’t call it Slofie since Apple is trying to trademark that name.

Forget Apple’s iPhone 11, This Is The Smartphone To Buy

Apple deserves a lot of credit because its impressive core upgrades to the iPhone 11 (guide), iPhone 11 Pro (guide) and iPhone 11 Pro Max (guide) make them much better smartphones than their ageing designs suggest. But now we know Apple has something much more exciting lined up. 

Last month, a major Bloomberg exclusive revealed Apple is bringing Touch ID back with the 2020 iPhone. Now Patently Apple has discovered how Apple plans to make this work, and it blows away anything we have seen before. 

Breaking it down in new patents, Apple explains that its next-gen Touch ID sensor will sit under the display. But the big news is – unlike similar systems from rivals – the sensor area will fill a large section of the display (making it easy to hit) and read gestures. The latter part is fascinating because Face ID already requires a confirmatory swipe, so Apple could build dual biometric authentication into the new iPhone without users requiring another step. The result would be by far the most secure smartphone ever made. 

Moreover, Apple hasn’t been subtle about its intentions. Before today, the company had already filed five in-display Touch ID patents since December (1,2,3,4,5) and this is the sixth. At this point, it’s an open secret. 

Apple has also given away why it would require such game-changing security after it filed patents showing how iPhones could replace your passport. The integration of dual biometrics would enable the company to pull this off. After all, Samsung’s embarrassing Galaxy S10 fingerprint reader debacle this week would never have happened were there a second confirmatory biometric system. 

And this is just the start. Acclaimed Apple-insider Ming Chi-Kuo has confirmed Apple will bring an “all-new form factor design” to the iPhone in 2020 as well as 5G for every model. Also making the cut are long-range 3D cameras, new screen sizes, 120Hz ProMotion displays and the long-awaited switch to USB-C. 

So yes, Apple kept the iPhone ticking along in 2019. But in 2020 we’re set for a game-changer.