{"id":64175,"date":"2023-05-02T22:11:54","date_gmt":"2023-05-03T02:11:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.b-vong.com\/journal\/?p=64175"},"modified":"2026-01-16T13:50:39","modified_gmt":"2026-01-16T18:50:39","slug":"iphone-3gs-revisited-lovely-nostalgic-vintage-aesthetic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.b-vong.com\/journal\/iphone-3gs-revisited-lovely-nostalgic-vintage-aesthetic\/","title":{"rendered":"iPhone 3GS Camera Revisited: Lovely Nostalgic Vintage Aesthetic"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Will the iPhone 3GS give lo fi vibes? Let’s see!<\/h1>\n
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“Ancient” iPhone 3GS has entered the chat!! \ud83d\ude42<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS shot with a Nikon V1<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS shot with a Nikon V1<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Heavily Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

Behold, here are some amazing lo-fi aesthetic photos from the iPhone 3GS! Again thanks to Phalatda for letting me take a trip down memory lane with this lovely image making device. I’m being very serious here, this phone renders some images like a disposable film camera.  The newer cameras and phones are super great for what they do, but many times you don’t need things to have that much clarity.  Memories and dreams often aren’t that perfect.<\/p>\n

Blown out highlights, crushed blacks, and questionable white balance wouldn’t even be looked at by your typical technical photographer, but to an artist, man this 3GS produces photos and videos that come pretty close to my other vintage aesthetic cameras–the legendary Digital Harinezumi and plastic lens Holga.  It definitely has the “vibe” stat maxed out!<\/p>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Heavily Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Straight from Camera<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Straight from Camera<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Straight from Camera<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Straight from Camera<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Straight from Camera<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Straight from Camera, This shot to my eye really looks close to a plastic lens disposable film camera. The smearing on the periphery is something you’d never get on modern iPhone or mirrorless camera with newer lenses.  I’ve seen this look with the plastic Holga lens on m4\/3 but for some reason I think this looks better.<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected | This looks like a scan of a 3×5 photo print from back in the day.<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected | Same thing here, the plastic lens aesthetic recalls a time period much earlier than 2009.  Remember we had technically superior DSLR’s since 2000-2003, and those images would take a lot of filtering to get it to look this bad\/good.<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected | The grain pattern on the 3GS files is actually pretty unique.  It’s like a scan of a print from a laser printer, a few steps removed from real life unlike modern image sensors.  It has a certain image signature, and most artists and cinematographers go at great lengths to find lenses that dull the image to complement their vision.  It’s like the iPhone 3GS really is stuck in 2009 listening to M83! (I still do…)<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Slightly Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Straight from Camera<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Heavily Edited and Color Corrected<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Straight from Camera | The 3GS recalls Fujifilm Instax shots too.<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Straight from Camera<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Straight from Camera<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Straight from Camera | When the contrast is too much it looks like this.  I do like the sun reflections in the lens though!<\/p><\/div>\n

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iPhone 3GS | Straight from Camera | Diffused Scrim to tame the highlights. This little iPhone is capable of producing nice technical shots too!<\/p><\/div>\n

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bts shots from our X100 adventure, when I brought out the real mvp of the day…<\/p>\n

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iPhone 3GS with maxed out vintage vibes! \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

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Thanks to Sean for taking the above footage and the bts shots from last Sat! Here’s what I cut today to show the awesome vintage aesthetic of this ancient, but very usable iPhone 3GS. Time to take things back to 2009, when things were much simpler.  Maybe that’s just the old man in me talking aloud.  Anyways, enjoy!<\/p>\n