Photomator celebrates iPhone 15 with upcoming HDR photo editing support

Photomator on iPad and iPhone
(Image credit: Pixelmator)

Now that the iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Pro are here people are looking for new ways to make use of their extra features. But rather than it being Apple's best iPhones pushing the envelope, in some cases at least, it's the iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Plus.

That's following the news that Photomator is going to gain a new HDR photo editing feature and it's all thanks to the arrival of the iPhone 15 family of devices.

Pixelmator says that the updated Photomator is on the way and that once it arrives people will be able to edit photos in HDR for the very first time. So long as they have a display capable of showing it, that is.

All the nits

Writing in its announcement blog post, Pixelmator says that it's the iPhone 15 that makes this possible.

"The latest iPhone 15 stands out as the first non-pro device offering a professional-grade display with 1600 nits of peak brightness, perfect for viewing and capturing HDR photos," the blog post explains. "To make the most of this powerful display technology, Photomator will soon offer full HDR support – from import to editing and export."

Unfortunately, the updated Photomator isn't yet ready — but it's on the way. "We’re already in the final stages of HDR development, and we’re excited to share a sneak peek at HDR support with you," Pixelmator says.

The iPhone 15 isn't the only device that will support HDR photo editing of course. The iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 14 Pro lineups are good to go, as are iPads and Macs with XDR displays. The Pro DisplayX DR is also supported.

As for those without fancy high-brightness displays, they'll get limited HDR support. "MacBook Air, iMac, iMac Pro, Studio Display, and MacBook Pro models not equipped with XDR displays provide limited HDR support with peak brightness ranging between 300 and 600 nits," Pixelmator explains.

Pixelmator also confirmed that people will need to update to iOS 17, iPadOS 17, and macOS Sonoma to get the new HDR support, too.

Oliver Haslam
Contributor

Oliver Haslam has written about Apple and the wider technology business for more than a decade with bylines on How-To Geek, PC Mag, iDownloadBlog, and many more. He has also been published in print for Macworld, including cover stories. At iMore, Oliver is involved in daily news coverage and, not being short of opinions, has been known to 'explain' those thoughts in more detail, too. Having grown up using PCs and spending far too much money on graphics card and flashy RAM, Oliver switched to the Mac with a G5 iMac and hasn't looked back. Since then he's seen the growth of the smartphone world, backed by iPhone, and new product categories come and go. Current expertise includes iOS, macOS, streaming services, and pretty much anything that has a battery or plugs into a wall. Oliver also covers mobile gaming for iMore, with Apple Arcade a particular focus. He's been gaming since the Atari 2600 days and still struggles to comprehend the fact he can play console quality titles on his pocket computer.