Overview
- Apple announced the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max Wednesday at its "Surprise and Shine" event, confirming a mechanical variable aperture on the 48MP main camera.
- The aperture uses six laser-cut polymer blades and supports four stops — f/1.48, f/1.8, f/2.8, and f/4.0 — to let the lens admit more light in low light or close down for brighter scenes.
- Apple pairs the hardware with creator-focused software that lets users change shutter speed for video, apply Cinematic-style effects after recording, and record at 60 fps for smooth half-speed playback.
- The company also unveiled Apple Reference Image, a provenance feature that uses a pixel-level signature and Private Cloud Compute to verify an image came from an iPhone and attach a Reference badge.
- Reviewers note the variable aperture is rare in phones and will give photographers and filmmakers finer control, but on small sensors it complements rather than replaces Apple’s computational photography for most users.