i've also seen Vray renders that had muddy shadows and burn out like i wouldn't accept in my own work, but their makers claimed they were "photoreal."  lots of highend software users' claims of photorealism (actually, most) make me chuckle, too. 

imho, the camera isn't that big of a deal, nor are the lights, per se.  light emitting materials, caustics, blurred reflections, accurate Fresnel, quality and more realistically blurred shadows, accurate refraction, true SSS, true translucence, and more accurate diffuse and specular models are all more important to me personally.  but that doesn't do squat for you if you don't use linear workflow.

it's all about using what you have to do the best you can.