This month, we’re celebrating the camera that’s always with you: the smartphone. As we all know, sometimes the best camera is the one you have with you. Wow us with your best smartphone* photos to show us how small sensors can tell big stories, anywhere, anytime.
Photos can be submitted between Sunday, September 14, and Saturday, September 20 (GMT). The challenge is open to photos captured at any time.
Important: Images MUST include a title and a caption of at least 25 words to be eligible. We need to be able to share the story behind your photo. We will consider both photos and captions when selecting our winners, so make sure to tell us that story!
Visit the challenge page to enter your photo in this month's Editors' photo challenge.
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OM System OM-1 II | OM System 50-200mm F2.8 IS Pro w/ MC-20 2x teleconverter | 400mm | F5.6 | 1/400 sec | ISO 200 Photo: Mitchell Clark
This week, OM System announced its long-awaited telephoto zoom, the 50-200mm F2.8 IS Pro. It's designed to give photographers a fair amount of reach with its standard 100-400mm equiv. focal range, and even more if they pair it with a teleconverter, which it's compatible with.
We were able to test it out both with and without a 2x teleconverter; the images taken with it are labeled as such in the gallery below.
Please do not reproduce any of these images on a website or any newsletter/magazine without prior permission (see our copyright page). We make the originals available for private users to download to their own machines for personal examination or printing; we do so in good faith, so please don't abuse it.
Sample gallery
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Light Lens Lab is working on a new 300mm f/1.9 lens with an APO design. The new lens will be able to cover medium-format sensors. Here is the MTF chart of the upcoming lens:
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Sony a7CR | Sigma 35mm F1.2 DG II Art | F1.2 | 1/125 sec | ISO 100 Photo: Mitchell Clark
Earlier this week, Sigma announced a second-generation version of its full-frame 35mm F1.2 lens, the 35mm F1.2 DG II Art. It promised not only improved optical quality and autofocus performance, but a much smaller and lighter package overall.
We had the chance to use the lens in a variety of conditions to get an idea of how it performs, and you can see our samples in the gallery below.
Please do not reproduce any of these images on a website or any newsletter/magazine without prior permission (see our copyright page). We make the originals available for private users to download to their own machines for personal examination or printing; we do so in good faith, so please don't abuse it.
Sample gallery
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This week, we've seen a slew of video and cinema news, timed alongside the International Broadcasting Conference trade show that's kicking off today. Perhaps two of the most notable were the Nikon ZR, a video-focused camera featuring the same sensor as the Nikon Z6III, and the Canon EOS C50, which uses a new 32MP full-frame sensor.
DPReview editors Dale Baskin, Richard Butler and Mitchell Clark sat down to discuss the cameras and the surprisingly different places they fit into the market. Fear not, photographers; they also discuss some of the new stills-focused lenses from Sigma.
As a wedding photographer and YouTube creator, Benj Haisch has a lot of gear. That's a benefit when he's gearing up to shoot an elopement. But when he's packing for a family trip to Hawaii? Turns out, too much gear can be a liability in that instance.
In the first episode of our new series produced in partnership with MPB, Haisch sets out to simplify his travel kit – without breaking the bank.
As a starting point, Haisch connected with DPReview staffer Mykim Dang to discuss his options. That conversation quickly led him to our Lens Feature Search and Lens Comparison Tool where he was able to quickly whittle the list of potential lenses down to just three.
From there, Haisch jumped over to MPB, the leading platform for buying, selling, and trading camera equipment, to check on pricing and inventory. Because MPB has the largest range of used digital cameras and lenses in the US – over 20,000 items – he was able to quickly find a Sony FE 24-50mm F2.8 G in the right condition and price point for his budget. Plus, he even traded in a macro lens that was collecting dust to further reduce the cost of his upgrade.
Got gear of your own collecting dust on a shelf, or simply looking for something new? Head over to MPB to upgrade your kit today.Buy, Sell, or Trade with MPB
Here is an updated list of what is coming next from Viltrox:
Viltrox is also teasing a new adapter with AI autofocus support called Nexus Focus: “Where Al autofocus meets the art of cinema“. The new adapter will give manual-focus lenses autofocus capability and will support the native phase-detection AF, AI subject recognition, eye + face detection, and more.
The Royal Observatory Greenwich has announced the winners of its ZWO Astronomy Photographer of the Year contest. This annual showcase highlights some of the world's best space photography, with winners, runners-up, and highly commended images selected across ten categories.
This year's overall winning image, Andromeda Core, was captured by Chinese photographers Weitang Liang, Qi Yan, and Chuhong Yu. The winning photograph "focused on revealing the intricate structure of the galaxy's central region and its surrounding stellar population." Additionally, contest organizers recognized NASA astronaut Don Pettit for a time-exposure image he captured from the International Space Station using a homemade sidereal star tracker.
We share the winning images from each of the contest's ten categories on the following pages. To see the complete collection of awarded images, visit the competition's website.
Winner: Galaxies
The Andromeda Core by Weitang Liang, Qi Yang, Chuhong Yu (China) Overall Competition Winner Winner: Galaxies
This image showcases the core of the Andromeda Galaxy (M31) in exceptional detail, captured using a long focal-length telescope. Taking advantage of the excellent seeing conditions at Nerpio, the photographers focused on revealing the intricate structure of the galaxy’s central region and its surrounding stellar population.
Taken with a PlaneWave Instruments CDK20 telescope, Baader LRGB and Chroma H-alpha filters, PlaneWave Instruments L500 mount, Moravian Instruments C3-61000 Pro camera, 3,450 mm focal length, 500 mm F6.8, multiple 900-second R, G and B exposures, multiple 1,800-second H-alpha exposures, 38 hours total exposure
Location: AstroCamp Observatory, Nerpio, Spain, 31 July, 2, 4–6, 14, 17, 20, 29, 31 August and 1 September 2024
Comet 12P/Pons−Brooks Taking a Final Bow by Dan Bartlett (USA) Winner: Planets, Comets & Asteroids
Comet 12P/Pons−Brooks reacted visibly to the intensified solar winds associated with the current solar maximum, creating a spectacle of tail dynamics and colorful hues expelled by its nuclear coma, the bright cloud of gas around the comet’s centre.
Taken with a Celestron C14Edge HD SCT telescope with HyperStar V4 lens, 10Micron GM 2000 HPS mount, ZWO ASI2600MC Pro camera, 712 mm F2, 25 x 30-second exposures
Location: June Lake, California, USA, 31 March 2024
Encounter Across Light Years by Yurui Gong, Xizhen Ruan (China) Winner: Sir Patrick Moore Prize for Best Newcomer
This photograph captures a serendipitous moment when a brilliant fireball from the Perseid meteor shower appears to graze M31, the Andromeda Galaxy. This photograph captures a serendipitous moment when a brilliant fireball from the Perseid meteor shower appears to graze M31, the Andromeda Galaxy.
Originally, the photographers had only planned to capture a close-up of the M31 galaxy. Retrieving the camera the next morning, they discovered this wonderful surprise.
Taken with a Nikon Z 30 camera, 56 mm F1.7, ISO 800, multiple 30-second exposures
Location: Zhucheng City, Shandong, China, 12 August 2024
The Trace of Refraction by Marcella Giulia Pace (Italy) Winner: Our Moon
This image captures the phenomenon of atmospheric refraction, where moonlight passes through dense layers of Earth’s atmosphere near the horizon, bending in a manner similar to light rays through a prism. Additionally, the redness of the Moon can be explained by a process known as Rayleigh scattering [smaller particles in the atmosphere scatter shorter wavelengths of light, resulting in longer wavelengths, namely red, being more predominant].
Taken with a Nikon D7100 camera, 600 mm F6.3, ISO 100, 1-second exposure
Location: Contrada Sant’Ippolito, Modica, Sicily, Italy, 7 April 2024
The image was taken during the G5 storm, the most extreme level of geomagnetic storm, in May. The reds were a level of intensity the photographer had never experienced.
Taken with a Nikon Z 7 astro-modified camera, Sky-Watcher Star Adventurer Pro 2i mount, Nikkor Z 14-24 mm F2.8S, 16 mm, Sky: F2.8, ISO 800, 5-second exposure; Foreground: F5.6, ISO 3,200, 30-second exposure
Location: Tumbledown Bay, Little River, Banks Peninsula Community, New Zealand, 10 May 2024
Active Region of the Sun's Chromosphere by James Sinclair (USA) Winner: Our Sun
The chromosphere is the most picturesque part of the Sun. Composed of hydrogen and helium plasma, it is manipulated by the intense and tangled magnetic fields of the Sun. The Sun’s chromosphere does not just change day by day; it changes second by second, which is why solar astrophotographers become obsessed with it.
Taken with a Lunt 130 mm telescope with double-stacked Etalons, Lunt Block Filter 3400 (34 mm), Sky-Watcher EQ6 R Pro mount, Player One Astronomy Apollo-M Max camera, 910 mm F28, Gain 310, 10-second exposure
Location: Cedar City, Utah, USA, 30 September 2024
ISS Lunar Flyby by Tom Williams (UK) Winner: People & Space
This image shows the International Space Station making a close pass of our Moon. The event was predicted to be a transit but ended up being a close flyby. However, the result is still dramatic, with the station’s solar arrays backlit by the rising Sun. Notably, the white radiators can also be seen and are illuminated by earthshine rather than direct sunlight.
Taken with a Sky-Watcher 400P GoTo Dobsonian telescope, Player Astronomy Uranus-C (IMX585) camera, 300 mm F15.5, 1.5-millisecond exposure
Location: Trowbridge, Wiltshire, England, 27 October 2024
The Ridge by Tom Rae (New Zealand) Winner: Skyscapes
This is the largest panorama Tom Rae has ever captured, with the full resolution image containing over a billion pixels from 62 images stitched together. The photograph captures the twin glacial rivers with the Milky Way core off to the left of the image, as well as the famous Southern Cross and other pointers high in the centre sky.
Taken with a Nikon Z 6a and Z 7 cameras, iOptron SkyGuider Pro mount, Sky: Nikon Z 6a camera, 40 mm F1.8, ISO 1,600, 49 x 30-second exposures; Foreground: Nikon Z 7 camera, 24 mm F10, ISO 125, 13 x 20-second exposures
Location: Aoraki/Mount Cook National Park, Mackenzie District, New Zealand, 8 April 2024
M13: An Ultra-Deep Exposure of the Popular Cluster by Distant Luminosity; Julian Zoller, Jan Beckmann, Lukas Eisert, Wolfgang Hummel (all Germany) Winner: Stars and Nebula
M13, or the Great Hercules Cluster, is one of the most prominent and well-studied globular clusters in the northern sky. Discovered by Edmond Halley in 1714, it is located in the constellation Hercules and lies about 22,200 light years from Earth. With an apparent magnitude (a measure of brightness) of 5.8, M13 is visible to the naked eye under dark skies and can be easily observed through binoculars or a small telescope. Our goal was to get the deepest possible image of the cluster, in which, to our surprise, even integrated flux nebula (IFN) clouds appeared.
At approximately 145 light years in diameter, M13 is one of the larger globular clusters associated with the Milky Way – a tightly packed sphere of hundreds of thousands of stars. At its core, some stars are as close as 0.05 light years apart, about one-tenth the distance between the Sun and its nearest stellar neighbour. Although M13 is one of the most photographed astronomical objects, there are only a few deep images that show the numerous small background galaxies in the field.
Taken with a TS-Optics 200 mm/8 ONTC F4 Newtonian telescope, iOptron CEM70G mount, ZWO ASI2600MM Pro camera, 800 mm F4, 300-second exposures, 29.25 hours total exposure
Winner: ZWO Young Astronomy Photographer of the Year
Orion, the Horsehead and the Flame in H-alpha by Daniele Borsari (Italy) Winner: ZWO Young Astronomy Photographer of the Year
This image was captured with an H-alpha filter to make a monochrome image highlighting the emission nebula. This image was captured with an H-alpha filter to make a monochrome image highlighting the emission nebula.
On the lower left lies the Horsehead Nebula, also known as Barnard 33. This dense dark cloud of gases hides the light coming from the emission nebula IC 434 and creates the apparent shape of a horse’s head.
A little to the left, we find the Flame Nebula, NGC 2024. The star responsible for the illumination of this nebula, IRS2, is located behind dust and gases and is therefore not visible in the optical spectrum.
And finally, in the upper-right of the image, is M42, famously known as the Orion Nebula. This nebula is a huge cloud of dust and gas where a lot of new stars are born. The energy released by the four central stars (the Trapezium Cluster) shapes the nebula, ionising the gas components.
Taken with a Player One Astronomy Ares-M Pro camera, Sky-Watcher HEQ5 Pro mount, Samyang 135 mm F2.0 lens, 135 mm F2.8, 45 x 60-second exposures and 262 x 300-second exposures, 22 hours and 35 minutes total exposure
Earth From Orbit by Don Pettit (USA) Special feature
While the ZWO Astronomy Photographer of the Year competition showcases the best of Earth-bound astrophotography, this image demonstrates the immense potential of space-based imagery, revealing the cosmos in ways that would be impossible from the ground.
Captured between October 2024 and March 2025, during ISS Expedition 72
This is one of a number of star-field time exposures captured from the International Space Station (ISS) using a homemade sidereal star tracker. Rotating once every 90 minutes, the tracker counteracts the attitude motion of the orbiting ISS, allowing distant stars to be photographed as fixed pinpoints while the Earth continues to rotate below, previously an impossibility in orbital photography.
Taken with a Nikon Z9 camera, Sigma 14 mm F1.4 lens, F1.4, ISO 6400, with homemade orbital sidereal drive to compensate for orbital pitch rate (4 degrees/min), 15-second exposure.
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Sony a7CR | Sigma 20-200mm F3.5-6.3 DG Contemporary | 76mm | F7.1 | 1/250 sec | ISO 100 Photo: Mitchell Clark
Earlier this week, Sigma announced the 20-200mm F3.5-6.3 DG Contemporary, a full-frame lens that the company says is the first to have a 10x zoom ratio. We were able to test the lens out in a variety of scenarios to get an idea of how it performs throughout its wide range of focal lengths and at different apertures.
The sample gallery contains a few sequences with images taken at 20mm and 200mm, to help illustrate the range it provides.
Please do not reproduce any of these images on a website or any newsletter/magazine without prior permission (see our copyright page). We make the originals available for private users to download to their own machines for personal examination or printing; we do so in good faith, so please don't abuse it.
As I was covering the iPhone announcement earlier this week, there was a moment in Apple's presentation that made me double-take. Describing the new iPhone Air, the company said: "What might appear to be a single camera is actually our new, powerful, 48 megapixel fusion camera system, which works like multiple advanced cameras in one." It continued on to mention the phone's "2x telephoto," later calling it an "optical quality lens."
Reader: the iPhone Air has one camera. (And it's not new, by the way; it's the same main camera from the standard iPhone 16 and 17). The camera app may present you with a 2x option, but it will be using the exact same optics. It "might appear to be a single camera" because it literally just is.
The Air's "2x telephoto" is really just a crop. Image: Apple
The company pulls the same trick for the regular iPhone 17, calling its main lens "two cameras in one," and takes it even further with the iPhone 17 Pro. That phone has three cameras – a 13mm equiv. "0.5x" ultra-wide, 24mm equiv. "1x" main and 100mm equiv. "4x" telephoto which is an impressive amount to fit in such a small device. Yet Apple claims the phone is capable of "up to 8x optical-quality zoom," and that carrying it is "like having 8 pro lenses in your pocket."*
The iPhone 17 Pro's eight camera modes (produced by its three cameras). Image: Apple
It isn't, and these additional options are not "optical quality," an essentially meaningless phrase meant to evoke the idea of a lens capable of actually zooming in. In reality, it's a crop. Your phone is punching in on the pixels in the center of the sensor, only using a quarter of its resolution to capture the scene.
The phone may be processing it differently than it would a straight digital zoom, but at the heart of it, that is all these "optical zoom" modes are. It's also worth noting that, because of the sensor's Quad Bayer design, that center crop won't necessarily have the detail you might expect from a 12MP image taken on a standard Bayer sensor.
The "optical zoom" phrasing is all over Apple's website, including in the tool that lets you compare between models, which doesn't distinguish between the actual lenses and the crops.
Also, while I'm griping, this comparison tool may be one of the most obnoxious pieces of web design I've come across in a while.
This isn't a new trick by any means; Apple has been pretending that cropping is the same as optics for a while now, but that doesn't really make it better. People are still getting confused by it, likely in part because the tech press routinely parrots the "optical quality" phrasing without explaining what's actually happening under the hood.
While Apple's presentation was particularly egregious, it's far from the only phone manufacturer participating in this marketing sleight of hand. Describing the Pixel 10 Pro's capabilities, Google writes that the phone has "optical quality at 0.5x, 1x, 2x, 5x, 10x," despite it physically only having three cameras (the 2x and 10x modes are center crops).
Another example of "optical quality."
Samsung similarly boasts that the S25 has a 50MP wide-angle camera with "2x optical quality zoom," though it at least includes a footnote saying "Optical quality zoom is enabled by the Adaptive Pixel sensor. 3x distance is optical zoom. 2x distance is optical quality zoom." That could tip off attentive readers that there are some liberties being taken, but telling the truth in the footnotes isn't the same as being honest.
While these companies are (generally) careful to modify "optical" with "quality," I'd argue this is still misleading, though I'm sure they all have some convoluted reasoning as to why they call the crop modes that**. While consumers probably aren't buying phones thinking they have more cameras than they actually do, Apple & co's. marketing may trick them into thinking they're not giving up by pressing the button to punch in.
You are giving up something for that extra reach, no matter how hard manufacturers try to make you believe otherwise
But, to put it plainly: they are. All the computational tricks in the world won't make an image taken using a quarter of the sensor the same quality as one taken with the entirety of that same sensor. You are giving up something for that extra reach, no matter how hard the phone companies try to make you believe otherwise.
In all honesty, I don't expect the phone companies to stop using this kind of language, especially if thin phones with fewer cameras continue to be en vogue. What I can hope is that photography enthusiasts and the tech press will stop regurgitating their misleading labels, and instead start educating people on how the different modes actually work.
* - Apple's math: three real, physical lenses (ultra-wide, wide, telephoto), plus two main camera crops to emulate a 28 or 35mm focal length, the "2x" center crop of the main camera and "8x" center crop of the telephoto camera and the ultra-wide's macro mode equals eight options.
** - In its presentation, Apple says the crop modes have their own "dedicated image pipelines." This is almost certainly technically correct, the most annoying kind of correct
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