The biggest issue with the Apple iPhone 12 series, one worthy of getting a gate hashtag (like #Batterygate), are the green flares that show up in some photos taken with a 2020 iPhone model. Photos snapped of brightly lit objects such as overhead lighting, street lights, signs, windows, and other similar subjects are creating the green flares that can be detected in an iPhone 12 photo.
This is a subject matter that has been discussed on Apple’s iPhone discussions website where examples of the green flare have been posted. But there is hope out there for iPhone 12 users. The recent iOS 15 beta 4 release from Apple seems to include a method that will process the green flares and dots out of pictures. Since the heavy lifting is being done after the photo is shot, the flares still appear in the viewfinder.
While it isn’t clear exactly which iPhone models will receive the new photo-processing feature, one Reddit user said that it does work on his iPhone XS. On the other hand, another Reddit post said that the green flares were still viewable on pictures snapped with an iPhone 8 Plus. One possibility is that the green flare fix will be limited to iPhone models powered by the A12 Bionic or later (iPhone XS, iPhone XR and later models).
One Redditor discovered that the new processing system will not eliminate the green flares on photos shot through trees or screens, or photos that include bathroom-style lights. This same iPhone user did add that with the iOS 15 beta, the green flares (which do include little green dots) disappeared from images shot of “grass, sky, and most other textures.” Videos might also suffer from #Flaregate even in iOS 15 since they present a tougher challenge to process than still photos.
Green dots appear in this photograph snapped by an iPhone 12 Pro Max
The iOS 15 update will be rolling out sometime next month so the green flares will hopefully be partially if not fully eradicated.
