Eastern Sierra Fall Color 2025

iPhone 17 Pro Max HDR

EXPERIMENTAL

This glows in HDR on my iPhone 17 Pro Max's Safari browser, and looks the same as the other images almost everywhere else. Those of us with iPhones can see the future of images on the web below!

I'm assuming the iPhone camera is adding a gain map to its JPG files for HDR display, and its been doing that for years even if we had few ways to see the HDR version displayed. The gain map is retained even after editing in the iPhone's Photos app.

My 2021 copy of Photoshop is ignoring and not saving the gain maps. If I can figure how to edit and retain Apple's gain maps inside of Photoshop, I'm set. The images below all came from my iPhone Camera and often edited in the Photos app on iOS.

HDR display means these highlights glow and shine brilliantly if you have a display capable of displaying HDR and an image that excites the HDR display properly and software capable of reading it, like Safari in iOS 26 and newer on an iPhone with an HDR display, which are most or all of the recent models with OLED screens.

This will probably look amazing on an iPhone in Safari, but look ordinary on most computers.

What's weird is that the first time you look at these images on iPhone they probably will jump right off the screen with brightness, but subsequent views may or may not display in HDR. This image seems to be evergreen, always looking awesome — but it's a 48MP JPG!

HDR display today is in the same state of flux as color management was in the year 2000, where different software would interpret images differently. It wasn't until Photoshop 5.5 (not CS 5.5 of 2011; I'm talking about the 1990s version 5.5) that Photoshop got it all set properly by default for most people. Today it's the same for HDR display as the 1990s was for color: you never quite know what will display in HDR because the conventions are still being standardized, but apparently this image works on iOS if you have a display capable of HDR display, like recent OLED iPhones.

HDR capture is something totally different. In olden days it required all sorts multiple exposures and stacking later in software, while today iPhones create this magic by default.

1,408 px, 1.8 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5180-crowley-lake-hdr.jpeg

1,408 px, 1.4 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5182-crowley-lake-hdr-3.jpeg

1,880 px, 1.7 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5197-power-plant-hdr-2.jpeg

2,142 px, 1.9 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5202-virginia-creek-hdr.jpeg

1,512 px, 1 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5231-milky-way-hdr-4.jpeg

2,856 px, 2.9 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5254-clouds-redwood-hdr-2.jpeg

4,032 px, 3.5 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5268-pol-house-sunrise-hdr.jpeg

1,619 px, 866 kB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5297-road-to-buckeye-springs-hdr.jpeg

3,239 px, 2 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5297-crop.jpeg

3,501 px, 5.6 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5313-orange-buckeye-hdr.jpeg

5,712 px, 2.8 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5341.jpeg

4,032 px, 2.3 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5374-ranch-hdr.jpeg

2,589 px, 1.8 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5390-burger-barn-hdr.jpeg

2,766 px, 2.5 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5450-stools-rhinos-hdr.jpeg

1,924 px, 689 kB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5469-redwood-motel-pre-dawn.jpeg

2,016 px, 463 kB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5488-sunrise-conway-summit-hdr.jpeg

2,856 px, 2.5 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5492-sunrise-conway-hdr.jpeg

1,938 px, 2.5 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5495-red-maple-hdr.jpeg

Red Maple, Whoa Nellie Deli, Lee Vining, California, California, 7:47 AM. iPhone 17 Pro Max 1.5× camera (35mm eq.) at f/1.8 at ¹/_1,192 at Auto ISO 80 (LV 12.2), as shot. bigger or fit-to-screen.

4,032 px, 8.1 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5526-poole-power-plant-road-hdr.jpeg

2,856 px, 3.6 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5527-gold-and-snow.jpeg

Snow Atop Mount Dana with Brilliant Aspens, Inyo National Forest, Lee Vining, California, 11:06 AM. iPhone 17 Pro Max 4× camera (16.9mm actual or 100mm eq.) at f/1.8 at ¹/_2,915 at Auto ISO 64 (LV 13.8), as shot. bigger or as-shot 24 MP © 8.6 MB JPG file:

1,512 px, 2 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5553-vacan-hdr-2.jpeg

4,032 px, 9.2 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5728-email-large-nov-03.jpeg

While this traditonal web page uses JPG images created for web use and thus they look the same as other web images, the camera-created 48 MP © 25 MB JPG file is displaying in glorious HDR as seen on my iPhone:

2,142 px, 3.7 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5791-silver-lake.jpeg

1,904 px, 3 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5793-email-large-drag.jpeg

3,024 px, 4 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_5855-courthouse-hdr.jpeg

3,024 px, 3.5 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_6020-elevation-hdr.jpeg

3,024 px, 2.4 MB /trips/2025-10-395/hdr/IMG_6026-sporting-goods-hdr.jpeg

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