We have been testing the iPhone 18 Pro since launch, and this week Kuala Lumpur gave us a different kind of test: a flat, grey skyline with none of the usual golden-hour drama. Instead of waiting for clearer skies, we pointed the 18 Pro at the haze and used the Camera app's Photographic Styles to see what it could still pull out of a washed-out scene. Our video below is that test, shot and edited by us.
It is a 20-second clip, filmed handheld from a high floor overlooking one of Kuala Lumpur's busiest highways: no stock footage, and the shot you see is the first take.
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From flat haze to a styled shot
Photographic Styles apply the moment you shoot rather than as a filter afterward, so what we saw updating live in the viewfinder as we scrolled through the style options is what came out the other end, straight off the sensor.
That is the actual test: a scene with almost no colour or contrast to work with, turned into something that reads as a deliberate, moody frame rather than a bad-weather excuse.
The aperture reading underneath
We tested that variable aperture system on its own, outside a haze test, in our iPhone 18 Pro camera review.
What it costs to try this yourself
The 18 Pro that shot this clip is the same phone we priced across six markets: the 256GB model lists at RM5,499 in Malaysia, Apple's own store price as of 21 October, which makes it one of the cheaper major markets for this phone worldwide.
If working a scene with no cooperative light or weather is a problem you would rather solve on purpose than avoid, our own Pocket Cinematic course covers reading a scene like this before you shoot, not just fixing it after.
