Evaluation of Mobile and Digital Single-Lens Reflex Photography for Facial Surgical Analysis

High-quality perioperative photography is imperative to good surgical planning in facial reconstructive and aesthetic surgery. We explore the utility of an add-on smartphone telephoto lens to avoid the distortions noted in prior studies using smartphone cameras.

Standard perioperative photographs of the same subject were taken with three distinct cameras using a dual-ring light setup. The three camera setups iPhone 11 alone, iPhone 11 with the 58 Moment telephoto lens attachment, and a D3300 Nikon DSLR APS-C sensor camera with a 60 mm NIKKOR F2.8G ED macro lens were compared using a 47-question online survey consisting of demographic and image-specific questions sent to plastic surgeons.

Forty-nine facial plastic surgeons completed the survey. The iPhone 11 alone was identified as having the lowest quality for central/peripheral distortion (83%), columella/caudal septum/alar anatomy (58.3%), and skin quality (38.3%). With the addition of the telephoto lens, the ability to assess all categories was significantly improved. 53.1% (n = 26) of respondents found the iPhone 11 + 58 mm telephoto lens setup to be the most useful for perioperative surgical planning.

Smartphone photography with the addition of a telephoto lens can offer a comparable option to the DSLR with regard to photo quality and detail.

A telephoto add-on lens is an effective solution to overcome the central distortion seen in images taken by the iPhone for perioperative photography. This photo quality was found to be comparable to that of traditional DSLR cameras in our survey study.

3 Laryngoscope, 133:2590-2596, 2023.