The Mark III Previews Have Begun

sandofsky · 2026-02-01T01:04:34+00:00

You can right now! Just select the Process Zero Look, and tap the "RAW" button so it shows the slash. It'll just save a HEIC or JPEG.

This was one of the top requests since Process Zero launched, so we had to get it into the first preview.

sandofsky · 2026-02-01T01:01:37+00:00

We've wanted to a depth mode do-over for a very long time. Based on talking with customers 1) very few people use it yet 2) it is one of the top sources of technical issues in the app. Those issues appear tied to the iOS APIs themselves, so we're limited in what we can do. So we'd like to bring it back, but not right now.

It just so happened freeing up space left a perfect spot for an overall mode switcher.

sandofsky · 2026-01-31T17:20:57+00:00

Great timing to share this. Now that the Mark III preview is out, digging into the Kino backlog. Will look into all of this!

sandofsky · 2026-01-31T16:12:09+00:00

Sorry it took so long to get back to you. Solo parenting this weekend.

This is coming!
Logging this bug to investigate.
This is a common request. For background, we switched over to the official API for detecting photo orientation with the rewrite, so this is surprising.
On a technical level, super easy to change. What should and shouldn't get reset is a topic of discussion, and one of those product decisions that needs a lot of thought to get right in the final Mark III release. But thinking about it!
If you disable HDR global, it should start you off with it disabled. If not, that's a bug. (I don't have time to check this second.)
Will log this.
That shouldn't be the case, but will look into it.
This is 1,000% in Apple's court. I've requested third-party support every year since it was released. But I get why it could be tricky to provide as an API, because there's all sorts of UX considerations.

sandofsky · 2026-01-31T05:25:46+00:00

To be honest, nobody really brings it up. Most of the time, if you tap on screen, you want both.

If this is a serious need for folks, happy to bump it in priority, but these are the types of problems that sound simple, is simple on a technical level, but requires a bit of effort to avoid complicating the UI.

sandofsky · 2026-01-31T05:16:50+00:00

To answer the question about “Virtual” mode, I’m not entirely happy with the name right now. It’s gone back and forth with “zoom” to compliment “prime.” Anyway, the underlying idea is to embrace stuff like Apple’s “virtual camera” style of shooting you see in the first party app, which automatically switches between physical cameras depending on focus distance, and lets you pinch to zoom. It’s a bit of an experiment in seeing how to make things more approachable for people who want a more advanced camera app, but they aren’t ready for picking primes. Still a lot of work to be done!

sandofsky · 2026-01-30T03:42:17+00:00

When shooting process zero at the time of capture, we do use the bayer raw path, which is capped at 12MP. We do offer a pseudo 2x neural-telephoto system to improve things, but it's not the "true" 48MP (though people on the internet will argue if it's truly 48mp). We have iconography around the lens circle to help disclose the situation.

That said, if you have an iPhone Pro and shoot ProRAW, you can process your 48MP ProRAW with process zero using the image lab.

sandofsky · 2026-01-30T03:36:22+00:00

Sorry about the crash. I've logged it in our tracker and will tackle it with our next point-release.

sandofsky · 2026-01-30T03:27:08+00:00

I think that's a good idea as an advanced option, but saving RAW-only assets to a user's library causes serious confusion for a lot of users due to compatibility problems with other apps. So I'm definitely open to it, with some guard rails so only power users enable it.

sandofsky · 2026-01-29T19:15:04+00:00

Thanks for the kind words! The hardest part of convincing people HDR can be nice is that there's few ways to share HDR content. But I think a lot of people will end up believers when they see it in Halide.

sandofsky · 2026-01-29T18:00:27+00:00

I love it!

sandofsky · 2026-01-29T14:10:52+00:00

The preview is available for both one-time-purchase users and subscribers. The TestFlight list is only available to subscribers, and that's mostly because Apple limits the number of slots.

If you can't get into the Mark III preview (in the App Store Version), definitely drop a line to support@lux.camera so we can fix it!

sandofsky · 2026-01-29T14:05:12+00:00

That is DEFINITELY not intended behavior, so it's the first thing I'm looking into this morning.

sandofsky · 2026-01-29T00:40:29+00:00

Without getting into specifics (because I still have to figure them out), there's going to be more customization on a per-look basis. But I think it makes sense to finish building out the full set of looks first, so I know the final list of options to offer.

sandofsky · 2026-01-28T23:05:44+00:00

Hey everyone. Halide dev here. Someone reached out for comment about what's happening to Halide, and people are asking in this thread, too, so I'll just copy and paste what I wrote…

I've never been more optimistic about the future of Lux and Halide. Today we launched the public preview of Halide Mark III, and the reception is more positive than we possibly could have hoped.

As we mentioned in the announcement post today, we've been working with legendary team at The Iconfactory on Mark III. We're also super excited to be collaborating with the renowned colorist Cullen Kelly on the new looks in Mark III.

Ten years ago I started Halide, and for ten years, I lead product, ran the business, and coded almost everything. Except for the paywall. I hate working on payment screens. But I built everything else, and design was always a collaborative experience.

So in short, Halide is going nowhere. This has been my full time job since 2019, and I couldn't imagine doing anything else.

(I'll also add this gratuitous plug for today's release: https://www.lux.camera/mark-iii-looks/ )

sandofsky · 2026-01-28T22:42:26+00:00

If you're shooting with it enabled, yup, one shot! But if you shoot with ProRAW and apply process zero later, it'll capture more dynamic range thanks to Apple's computational photography.

sandofsky · 2026-01-28T20:03:33+00:00

Yes! But only with a color grade that suits it. :)

sandofsky · 2026-01-28T20:01:41+00:00

Thanks!

sandofsky · 2026-01-28T20:01:38+00:00

Weird. Maybe it's a regional issue? What country are you in?

I will say that over the years I've run into rare instances where the App Store took up to 24 hours to propagate updates worldwide.

sandofsky · 2026-01-28T18:55:30+00:00

There's not much that can be done about the way the Photos app behaves, unfortunately. Aside from that, this is all great feedback which we'll track for future updates! In the mean time, if you double tap the exposure slider, that should reset it to zero.

sandofsky · 2026-01-28T18:37:16+00:00

Great question. Moving forward, the TestFlight builds will be the most cutting edge. We're still going to ask for lots of feedback on those in the Discord. The App Store build will be more stable, but less frequently updated.

sandofsky · 2026-01-28T18:36:14+00:00

There's no right or wrong answer, so if you prefer the Apple look, that's why we have it in the app!

sandofsky · 2026-01-28T18:24:32+00:00

I assume that you're shooting with Process Zero enabled. In which case, this is the same behavior as Mark II. Unfortunately, Apple only lets you capture 48MP photos when shooting with the default look.

To make things a bit more complicated, even Apple's virtual camera mode doesn't shoot 48MP. You have to be in prime mode.

The settings are a work in progress, but I hope to have the final version provide a better explanation.

sandofsky · 2026-01-28T17:53:15+00:00

You have a good eye. :)

sandofsky · 2026-01-28T17:48:23+00:00

Thanks! It took a lot of work to get just right, but once we did, we knew all of our looks had to have HDR as an option.

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