Judy iphones chage so little these days there really wouldnt be any learning curve. I changed my iphone 6 to the 15pro after several years without having to relearn anything. I also bought a Canon r5 and r6 without any sucess at improving my pictures quality from the iphone. If you want better pictures I think learning the tricks on the iphone you have will probably be more effective than buying new cameras.

I have a cheap Olympus Digital Camera model SP-55OUZ which works great for the past 20+ years. It's now sold for $129 used on Amazon. Too lazy to mess around with my iPhone. Below are some pics. taken taken quickly with Olympus Digital camera. It has a "Flower button" to zoom in quickly. Below yellow bloom is Golden Celebration, and lowest pink is Evelyn.

Pink Evelyn blooms last very long in the vase. Today 7/27/26 I picked 15 blooms from my 14th-year-own root Evelyn, versus one deeper color bloom from my Abraham Darby. My version-1993 Evelyn with 20+ canes gives waymore blooms than my Abe. (only 3 canes in my zone 5).

Below dark reds are Munstead Wood, the tiny pink pom-poms branch on upper left is Perfume Breeze.

Below purple bloom is W.S. 2000, lasting 5 days in the vase with intense old rose & violets.

I like Olympus Master since it's fast with "Flower button" so I can capture the prickles on Radio Times below:

Also zoom in well to show the prickles of Munstead Wood below:

I always enjoy seeing your photos Straw, thank you for sharing

Straw,

Lovely photos! Your garden is gorgeous!

@Elestrial 7a

Ian

@judijunebugarizonazn8

Dianela,

Thank you for the feedback.

I agree that Iphones upgrades are pretty much the same phone. Have the switch done in an Apple store & they set it all up. Just an idea. The Iphone 16 & 17 Pro Maxs have more photo options-telephoto lens, color tinting.

@Elestrial 7a

I have 200GB ICLOUD and 9,000+ mainly garden photos on my Iphone 16 Pro Max. With only 200GB in cloud maybe the Canon R6 would store better for me? I am wondering if I will see a difference in photos from Iphone. I love your Autumn Rouge photo, though. May be enough to try it.

Sometimes Iphone doesnt auto focus well-blurs.

Do you find the Canon R6 focuses better & has auto focus?

Kitty, as long as you don't shoot in RAW, 200 gb should be fine for the Canon R6. Yes, both R5 and R6 have auto focus, but I prefer using manual focus for flower shots. I use the auto eye focus for pictures of the kids and family

I don't use the Canon R6 so I'm not sure how the focus compares to a Canon R5. But yes, it would be better than an iPhone

Elestrial 7a I love your pic. above with the butterfly, and I love your pics of Versigny in HMF with the bee in it. Your camera captured the tiniest details (such as a bee) .. just like seeing it in real life.

Kittysrosegarden Thank you for all the close-up of your gorgeous blooms. I appreciate the report you gave on winter hardiness in the other thread too.

What I like about my Olympus Master model SP-55OUZ (bought 20+ years ago, now sold on Amazon at $129 used) is it captures ALL colors correctly. I just hit the Flower button, zoom in, and click. Fast & easy. Some pics. of red and orange roses in my garden. Below are red Munstead Wood:

Olympus Master captured below gaudy red color the Squire in hot temp.

Also the deep red color of intensely fragrant Barcelona:

For orange color, Olympus Master is true to its colors .. below is orange Versigny, along with red Firefighter, and pink Liv Tyler:

More Versigny blooms below with pink Evelyns:

The Squire here iphone 13 pro.

My Olympus Digital Camera model SP-55OUZ (bought 20+ years ago) captures lavender/purple color well. I just hit the Flower button, zoom in, and click. Fast & easy. That camera is now sold on Amazon for $129. Below is Big purple, survived 8 of my zone 5 winters:

Below is Kordes Deep Purple (survived only 1 zone 5 winter).

Below is William Shakespeare 2000, is doing great (bought as own root in 2011):

More purplish W.S. 2000:

Very purple Lavender Crush below:

Below is Twilight Zone (bought as own root in 2015). The camera captures its purplish color well.

More purple Twilight zone, hardy in my zone 5 for the past decade.

Below is a cluster of Annie L. McDowell (the camera captures Annie's color well) and Golden Celebration.

Below is the pinkish lavender bloom of Annie L. McDowell. I miss its musk / lilac scent. Survived only a few winters, then died in my zone 5. Mine was own root.

@jim1961 Central Pennsylvania Zone 6a Below are some gaudy colors for you .. my $129 Olympus Master camera captures gaudy colors well for the past 20 years. Upper orange is Lady of Shalott, middle orange is Pat Austin. Deep red is W.S. 2000. Pink is Comte de Chambord.

Very gaudy Sweet Mademoilles and red The Dark Lady.

My camera also captures bush-shot of Dee-lish well (bought in 2015 as own root):

Below is very gaudy Christopher Marlowe. I'm rooting Christopher & W.S. 2000 & other older Austins to donate the proceeds to a Catholic charity with very good rating: St. Vincent de Paul Society. I used to buy used clothes from St. Vincent de Paul thrift shop for my daughter when she's a toddler. She's now 23 & working a large company that matches 100% of her donation, so we are paying back.

I like how the $129 Olympus Master captures the sunlight striking my own root Christopher Marlowe (bought in 2011):

@Elestrial 7a

Do you have an Iphone or other type if phone? Do you ever use your phone for photos? Thanks on the ideas about focus for the Canon R6. I guess I will consider it for Sept-out of house proceeds maybe?? . A belared summer birthday gift.

Straw,

OMG! Your roses are heavenly! I missed seeing your gorgeous roses! How did your roses do last winter? Have you tried out any florist roses? Eisvogel & Miyabi are the most hardy of 50 fkorist rosescI have had. Miyabi is a big giant in her 4th year-she is 5-6ft easy! I prune her back. Your Olympus works well! $129 -WOW! Wish I still had my $900 Canon from 1998-probably equal to the Canon R6 today. LOL!

Your vivid true colors and fine details in rose petals convinced me. I need a new camera. LOL! Thank you!

Thank you, Everyone!

Your ideas on cameras are fabulous! Much to think about! I think I need a new camera now. LOL!

Kitty - No, I don't use a phone for photos

Kittysrosegarden Amazon has many older models of Olympus master for less than $200. Thank you for the tip on the 2 most winter-hardy florist roses .. I don't have any, but a friend nearby is rooting Eisvogel. I trade my rootings with her. I move the info. on my winter survival to the other thread.

Straw - d'oh!!! I totally forgot until you mentioned the flower function that my camera has that too!!! I must try that feature and see if it makes a difference, especially on those difficult to capture colors. I'm so glad you mentioned this. Sheesh. lol SWOOOOOON over your:

"Below purple bloom is W.S. 2000, lasting 5 days in the vase with intense old rose & violets" picture!!!!!!! Stunning!!! Oooh, I love that Evelyn!!

Those are such stellar pictures of Big Purple and Annie L. McDowell.

Sheila - those deep reds are so hard to capture. Gorgeous!!

@rosecanadian The flower button is the best feature of my Olympus Digital Camera model SP-55OUZ (bought 20+ years ago), now sold for $129 on Amazon. The flower button automatically focuses on tiny details and captures the true colors, like deep red in W.S. 2000 in late fall, one can see the tiny imprints on the napkin below (click on below pic. to enlarge):

Below The Dark Lady turned gaudy red with high phosphorus chicken manure one year, so I stopped using chicken manure on my roses:

The Dark Lady's bloom on the right gets larger with biochar (high in potassium). Left red is smaller red W.S. 2000, and middle is Radio Times (smaller bloom since it was cut from a cluster of 4). The Dark Lady doesn't bloom in clusters like other roses, so bloom is large. Note that Olympus Master stays true to all colors, and the tiny wrinkles on the blue sheet is shown. Another person has Olympus Master and her colors are like in real life. The FLOWER BUTTON enables capture of the tiniest details.

I like Olympus Master since it captures every details like real life, such as the sunshine on the leaves of The Squire here. It helps me to post bush shot of roses, which is the key in identifying roses based on their growth habit & thorns. Below is the Squire in my zone 5:

Note the fly on below The Squire's petal:

Elestrial,

Thank you! I have seen your beautiful garden and children photos! I can see why you only use your camera!

Straw,

Beautiful WS2000. Does she have many thorns? Beautiful red roses! Lovely ideas on your Olympus. The flower button, sunshine on leaves, tiniest details, true reds sounds fabulous! Does the Olympus for $200 have those features? Does it blur background if you wish? Have videos? I’m looking at a few more features…. telephoto lens, auto focus, action shots. And storage for my Iphone is only 200 GB. i will look at the Olympus line of cameras. Thank you.

Al says….. just thinking…..

I am wondering the difference between this less expensive Olympus $699 which AI recommended (LOL) on Amazon & the Canon R6. $2000 Amazon I have researched?

I had 2 Canon cameras. My dad gave me my first Canon as a highschool graduation present. I bought the $900 Canon in 1995 about, but it vanished in 1998 about. It was a fabulous camera. I am most comfortable w/ Canons.

Kittysrosegarden About Olympus Digital Camera model SP-55OUZ (bought 20+ years ago), now sold for $129 on Amazon: It has a video feature but I never use it. After about 100 to 200 pics. taken, I put in 4 double-A batteries. The batteries run out faster when the camera is too full (at the end of its 20-years of storage). The camera stores A LOT of pics. for the past 20+ years, and I load the pics. I like onto my computer.

Only this year 2026 that the camera said its memory card is full, and I had to delete ALL the pics. inside my camera for the past 20+ years .. in order to take new pictures. Took only a few minutes for the camera to wipe out old pics so it can store new pics. It doesn't matter since I already stored the ones I like inside my PC.

Copilot will answer all your questions above when you search for my particular model: Olympus SP‑550UZ does have a video recording feature ... includes a movie recording function.

W.S. 2000 is low thorn so rabbits eat it. I have to leave water out for rabbits and they stop eating my W.S. 2000. I use those empty plastic Mesclun salad or spinach container, double them up and leave on the ground for rabbits to drink. Rabbits stop eating my short roses ever since. I have at least 6 containers of water on the ground for rabbits to drink from.

Straw - thanks for that reminder to use the flower setting. I still feel like a doofus for forgetting that, lol. I've always loved your The Dark Lady!! Oh my!! Clever about leaving water out for the rabbits. They were just wanting the moisture from the canes, and actual water is better, so they leave the roses alone. Clever!

Straw, sounds like you have a nice, easy to use camera. I would want one that I can plug in to recharge: I don’t
like using single use batteries!

@judijunebugarizonazn8 Mine is a cheap 20+ years old Olympus model (only $129). The newer ones ($429) have plug in to recharge. Web info.:

"Certain Olympus mirrorless cameras and compact models come equipped with USB charging functionality, including:

• Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark III
• Olympus PEN E-PL10

These models often have a USB Type-C port that allows you to charge the camera’s battery directly using a USB cable. "

I googled "best digital camera for true colors", and found the below 2025 link:

Best Digital Camera True Colors [Updated:July 2026]

The above link stated: " Only 15% of digital cameras truly deliver on accurate, natural colors, which is why I was thrilled to test the 58MP 4K Digital Camera: UHD Autofocus with 16X."

below links have discussion on which camera has the best true colors as real life:

How different are Panasonic colors vs Olympus colors and which one do you prefer the most? : r/M43

Olympus has the best colors... | DPReview Forums

Here are more images from my Samsung S25 phone.

And more.

And more.

And more.

Why did that post 3 times lol. Sorry

Ian,

I still think your Samsung phone is perfect. Very clear photos!

Straw,

The storage on your z Olympus is amazing!

i will need to do more thinking about model features before I decide. ThankNK you for your amaxing recommendation with Olympus cameras. Wow! you discoveted rabbits needed water and now you feed a ton of rabbits water so they don’t eat your roses! Sweet!

Ian - lovely, lovely pics. :)

Thank you, both!

Late to the party, but I use a Canon Rebel D7. I bought it in 2021 after someone on this forum (Sheila?) said it was what she uses. I bought that camera for rose photography, bsically--it's too heavy yo take on any vacation except road trips.

Apologies for grbled and truncated posts. I blame Zzuoh.

I think the Canon takes excellent pictures, but too often on the Auto setting it will overexpose. I have to tinker with my photos quite a lot, I find. Anyone else have similar rxperiences?
Nothing took pictures like my 1984 Minolta. Long gone, but still sorely musssed.

And missed too!

Not me, Sylvia. I'm on an iphone.

Judi, my camera is an old Fujifilm, and I still use it. And I still like the way it handles reds and purples. My photographer granddaughter says Fujifilm cameras have a patented way that the camera processes the reds. I'll ask her again about that. Remember, my camera is old so things may have changed a bit. But, it's digital not a film camera. I used a Minolta film camera for many years way back.

Ian Stewart, your photos are superb. Diane

Thank you, Diane. Do you know which model of Fujifilm camera you have? I don’t mind old things: sometimes old is better.

I’ve been learning on YouTube how to better use my camera on my phone, since that’s all the camera I have presently. There are features I didn’t know existed and certainly didn’t know how to use. Here’s a few I took this morning in the early light. First two are Lavender Crush, then Twilight Princess and last is Love Song.

Lady Emma Hamilton, Bring Me Sunshine, The Dark Lady and Clothilde Soupert

Judi,

Your photos look excellent in details.

So far I inly see the more exiensive cametas can blur background. Otherwise, Iphones take excellent detail photos!

@Diane Brakefield

Could you share any of your Fuji camera red rose photos if convenient? Capturing the precise deep wine color is amazing if possible on any camera? Lately , on my iPhone 16 Pro Max , I almost had perfect color on wines with Munstead Wood. However, even when full sky cloudy, iphone flash turns rose slightly lighter-but really almost on target color!

Elestrial has an Autumn Rouge rose photo of a purplish-wine bloom that has faded background, precise detail of the rose-, look higher up on this thread… I’d like that finished result now with a good camera.

However, if I use a good camera, I won’t be able to hold the leash w/ one hand as Anastasia walks in garden & take photos with the other hand. LOL! For now, sometimes she pulls on leash & ruins my photos. She’s not the best photography partner. Ha Ha!

All of the photos on this thread look great. I would be happy to claim any one of them.

Judi, my camera was first of all my granddaughter's camera about 15 years ago. She used it a short while and abandoned it when she got her first phone. So I asked her if I could have it, and I've used the thing continuously since 2012. I am a Luddite, so my daughter says, and I hate technology. I use the same setting for everything. For me, the important thing is taking photos at the right time of day (The Golden Hour), always being aware of the sun and what the sky is doing. I am very picky about framing the subject properly and shooting from the right angle. I take lots of photos of the same subject, knowing I'll throw most of them out...... My ancient camera is a Finepix S model, and I know it didn't cost a lot. Diane

Thank you for that info, Diane.

Diane,

Yes! Wonderful ideas! The morning is a good time for photos!

Judi, when you get the time, I'm sure a lot of us iPhone users would love to read what you learned about suggestions for improving our rose pics on it!

Kitty, thank you. But being a late riser, I prefer the very late afternoon, which is my Golden Hour, up through well into the evening. Just don't try noonish pics or early afternoon, unless you want your reds to glare and turn into shapeless blobs, while your own shadow (also a shapeless blob--ha) overlooks what you're trying to capture in a photograph. Diane

Diane,

Hysterical! Yes! Blob shadows & glaring blurred blob red roses in photos in the afternoon. LOL! Eveni g is great fir ohotos, too! Sometimes, best!

Photos taken on default settings of Lycoris squamigera. Samsung Galaxy S25

Photos taken on default settings of Lycoris squamigera. Samsung Galaxy S25

Photos taken on default settings of Lycoris squamigera. Samsung Galaxy S25

Ian - utterly gorgeous!!

Thank you. Honestly this is one of the more beautiful plants I've seen. The colors are soo soft

The iPhone camera has come a long way in ten years. It cannot do all the nuanced things a DSLR can do (larger sensor + aperture control = superior results every time) but most days, it can make a perfectly reasonable image.

'The Prince'

Photographed in RAW mode and editied to a JPEG.

Beautiful.

Paul - utterly divine!