IPad Pro 12.9 M1 For Street Photography - 6 Months Later

It is now coming up to 6 months since I got the 12.9 M1 iPad Pro as my main photo editing device. This iPad has been a daily driver and it comes with me everywhere I go. Since then a few very notable things have happened such as improvements in Lightroom, Capture One on the horizon and improvements in iOS 15. Furthermore for the last week or so I have also been using the 14 inch MacBook Pro and there will be a future video that compares the two. For now however I am gonna give you my honest feedback having used this device extensively.

The Good 

Let’s start with performance. This is crazy fast. Scrolling through my Lightroom library feels very fluid, opening up raw photos is instant, editing is smooth and to be honest the whole experience is outstanding. Tasks such as copying edits from one and batch pasting them is also very quick. Importing is a little quicker thanks to the thunderbolt port and if you’re using a UHS2 card and UHS2 card reader, then importing is even faster. Exporting files is a breeze too. So in terms of speed it is there, honestly even for pro workflows thing deice is more than powerful enough for most people. If performance was your main concern, it is simply not a concern here. If you opt for the 16gb of ram option, then you can have even more open apps and background tasks. Next up is the screen. For photo editing it is amazing. If you are doing any editing outside then in most situations it is bright enough to do some basic stuff. Although for more precise colour grading it is best done not in bright or direct light. Colours like with all apple displays are spot on. This XDR display also makes editing high contrast scenes easier and there is definitely an added benefit to having a HDR panel and being able to see all the detail across a bigger tonal range. Blooming is a thing but honestly it is not as crazy bad as some people were suggesting. You will notice it in extreme scenarios but for the most part not an issue. I did briefly use last years iPad without this screen and the difference was noticeable. Next up is user experience and versatility. This is honestly where this device shines. It is so nice to edit photos with the pen and so nice to hold the photo in your hand as if it was a physical print you were editing. If you want a more traditional laptop experience, attaching it to the magic keyboard will give you that as well as open up the world of keyboard shortcuts.If you are working in a tight space or just want to go light weight, then throw the Smart Cover on instead and you have a very light set up. Overall this device is definitely more versatile than a traditional laptop and can be adapted to whichever way you want to edit. Finally we have software. So iOS15 has addressed some issues and closed a few bugs. Multi tasking although still the same is easier to access and use. The files app is a tiny bit better and you can see progress when copying files. However for the most part for photo editors there hasn’t been any noteworthy upgrade. Lightroom on the other hand has picked up a few cool new features such as advanced masking and amore layer based approach. However this is across the board on every device and not really specific to the iPad. 

The Bad 

It’s not all great though and during 6 months of daily use I have noticed a few things. Although the performance is incredible, the apple iOS just doesn’t make the most of it. Despite my praises earlier, if you are working on the previous iPad Pro from 2020 which is what I had before this, the performance differences are not jaw droopingly big. For example although there is a thunderbolt port, transfer speeds are still significantly lower than on a laptop. Next issue was the battery life when using it with the magic keyboard. It just drains. For example, I was using the magic keyboard to script out a few videos and after 2 hours or so of simply writing in the notes app, I was down about 35%. Of course if you use it as a tablet without the keyboard it lasts longer. One thing to note is that battery life does vary sometimes and has changed between various small iOS updates. I know some tech YouTubers have complained about battery drain in recent iOS updates so this could just be a bug. Sticking with the magic keyboard, as amazing as it is, by the time you added it on, you are at the same sort of weight as a MacBook Air and not far off the 14 MacBook Pro. Again, I know it has to be that heavy to stop it from toppling over but sometimes it makes you question if this is really any more convenient than a small MacBook. Finally the biggest frustration is just how limited iOS15 is. There are still some things which I genuinely can’t understand and which are a pain. For example, not being able to see how much space you have on an external SSD without downloading an app. Or not being able to see the size of a folder. You can see individual photos but just not the whole folder. Not being able to batch rename photos or not being able to rename or format an external drive. Furthermore if you store your final images in the photos app, there is not way to export a compressed version without creating shortcuts or going through a 3rd party app like Lightroom or Affinity Photo. The frustrating thing is that for photography this is almost there. If only some of these basic workflow issues can be addressed, then it would make life so much easier. My final gripe with this is the cost. If you are a photographer then you need 1tb or more. Especially if you travel a lot and edit on the go. In the UK, if you buy the 1TB iPad, the magic keyboard, the pen and let’s say the Smart Cover for days when you don’t want to lug the keyboard around, you have just spent around £2200. I will be honest…. Given that for the same money you can buy the new 14 MacBook Pro with the same display, more power, more ports, a graphics tablet and a 1tb external ssd…. I don’t know….. it pains me to say it but this is a hard sell.

Who Is It For 

So to conclude who is this for and do I still recommend it after 6 months of daily use, after using the new 14 inch MacBook and given all the price differences. Well let’s start with this. If you own a desktop or the 16 inch MacBook Pro and need something powerful and very portable for travel or as a second device, and you can afford it then yeah this is amazing. If you love editing with the pen and this is the biggest priority for you, again this is amazing. If you do only photography and a whole laptop is overkill, iPad is the way to go. For me, right now I am not sure. Not only do I do photography but I also make these YouTube videos and run a business and that is where the iPad starts to fall down for me. If I had a day job and did photography around it and didn’t make YouTube videos or anything like that…. I would probably still be fully on the iPad. I am still gonna use it for another month or so side by side with the 14 inch MacBook and see how it goes but honestly with these new MacBooks …. The iPad is definitely a much harder sell… at least for my needs.