I don't think that is surprising. Smartphones of today are better than most compact cameras I have owned. I used to have a Canon G11 for taking pictures while

I don't think that is surprising. Smartphones of today are better than most compact cameras I have owned. I used to have a Canon G11 for taking pictures while travelling, but compared to even my older SLRs it produces mushy shots. It doesn't help to have lots of megapixels when most of those pixels are just noise anyway. The iPhone is good enough for these uses. When I'm taking pictures, and not just shooting random stuff, I still use an SLR because it is just easier (for me) to get what I want from it. It doesn't really matter which SLR you use, they all produce good images, but the glass is important. I do postprocess my images. In fact I usually shoot with postprocessing in mind. But I never spend much time postprocessing. Typically a couple of minutes per image that I want to use. I've tried some of the smaller cameras with decent optics that are on the market now, but they just don't feel right for me. They have all these great specs, but they don't feel like tools. They have the buttons in the wrong places and they weren't designed to be held with my hands. The camera just gets in the way of what I'm trying to do. I don't think it is so much about image quality as it is about the tactile experience, efficiency and habit. (Some of my pictures: http://www.flickr.com/photos/borud/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/borud/)