[HN Gopher] A Billion Pixels a Second: Inside Apple's iPhone 16 ...
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A Billion Pixels a Second: Inside Apple's iPhone 16 Camera Labs
Author : marban
Score : 101 points
Date : 2024-12-31 10:56 UTC (4 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.cnet.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.cnet.com)
| shrubble wrote:
| This is really a puff piece - for instance, Nokia had a 1 billion
| pixels per second processing pipeline on their 808 PureView
| phone. In 2012.
| dylan604 wrote:
| what on cnet is not a puff piece?
| CharlesW wrote:
| Even so, the "camera first" Nokia 808 PureView took notably
| worse photos (DxOMark Mobile Photo score: 60) than the iPhone 7
| (score: 86) and other flagship phones (Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge
| score: 86) of that time.
| gregoriol wrote:
| Size is not the only metric that matters
| n144q wrote:
| iPhone 7 was released in 2016, 4 years after 808 was
| released.
|
| Can't see what your point is.
| rob_c wrote:
| Unless apple invented it, no they didn't and you're wrong...
|
| The cult of apple kinda says everything wrong about the valley
| to me. This isn't magicians at work with secret spells, this is
| just cutting edge tech that is at the point of being commodity.
| Making something appealing to idiots has drawbacks, less
| repairability, less durability etc and now even apple is slowly
| reverting even this under govt changes...
| scarface_74 wrote:
| If iOS has a majority market share in the US, wouldn't anyone
| who is not using an iPhone be part of the "cult"?
|
| And I bet if I drop my phone, it would be a lot easier to
| drive to one of the five Apple Stores in the metro area to
| get it repaired than it would be for you to get your camera
| repaired.
|
| That's not even considering the fact that it could service a
| drop better than your camera and is water resistant
| n144q wrote:
| > That's not even considering the fact that it could
| service a drop better than your camera and is water
| resistant
|
| Definitely need citations for this.
| scarface_74 wrote:
| https://kenrockwell.com/nikon/18200/18200-drop-test.htm
|
| https://www.imaging-resource.com/news/2013/05/23/camera-
| meet...
|
| Can you imagine any modern phone not surviving a 3 foot
| drop?
| ilrwbwrkhv wrote:
| Yes, it definitely is. Once you notice the signs of PR, you can
| see this was being written because Apple's privacy story fell
| apart.
|
| This is really about hiding their entire SIRI recording your
| conversations without your permission.
| londons_explore wrote:
| Indeed - it can mean simply a 1GHz data bus thats 32 bits wide.
| Pipeline all your image processing so it's 1 cycle per pixel
| and you're done.
| dagmx wrote:
| Your comment is somewhat misleading.
|
| The 808, while a great high resolution sensor, processed stills
| at 5MP after pixel binning, compared to the 48/24/12MP of the
| iPhones. It did have a non-binned mode but again for stills.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_808_PureView
|
| The majority of the post is actually about video and the
| comparison is a lot more dramatic there.
|
| A 4k frame from a modern phone ,like the iPhone 16 pro, is
| ~8MP.
|
| The 808 could "only" do 1080p at 30fps (62M pixels a second).
| Compare that to 4k at 120fps (995M pixels a second). That's a
| far cry from 1Bn per second that you're claiming. Impressive
| for the time though.
|
| There's a significant difference here.
|
| The sensor on the 808 was amazing. The real meat of the tech
| here is the image processing pipeline that can process
| everything off the sensor for further processing.
| JSR_FDED wrote:
| The title doesn't do it justice - everything with images quickly
| adds up.
|
| Doing 120 fps video at 4K so that any chosen frame looks amazing
| without artifacts is really quite an achievement.
|
| The microphones were actually more interesting to me, that you
| can get lavalier performance from the tiny mics in the phone that
| are physically far from the person being recorded is seriously
| clever.
|
| Getting this to work some of the time is already an achievement
| but I think people underestimate how much work goes into making
| it work across all different scenarios.
| jval43 wrote:
| Mirrorless cameras nowadays can push as much as 8k60 (twice the
| amount of data over 4k120), every frame at full quality. All
| that with better optics/sensors and less "perceptual testing",
| thus less of an overprocessed look.
| zuhsetaqi wrote:
| What do they cost and how big are they?
|
| Nobody is claiming a world record from Apple ...
| Almondsetat wrote:
| Heat dissipation
| dylan604 wrote:
| can that mirrorless camera make a phone call, send a text,
| edit the photo it takes, browse the web, upload the picture
| to an app, run other apps, or any of the many many other
| things a phone does that a single function dedicated camera
| cannot?
|
| what trade offs do you accept for that mirrorless camera to
| do all of the same functionality while still taking an above
| decent looking image for the vast majority of its users
| without all of those fancy lenses fixed or interchangeable?
| As the saying goes, the best came you have is the one you
| have on you. Only snooty photo/video types care about your
| comment. Most videos used by phone people are only ever
| viewed on that device or other similar devices of others
| viewing it on whatever app they shared it. To even consider
| them comparable is just not an honest take in the slightest.
| I say this as someone with several DSLRs and a couple of
| cinema camera bodies in the next room.
| gazchop wrote:
| This is a silly take. I've got an iPhone 15 Pro and quite
| frankly the camera on it is pretty good. But it has severe
| limitations both on reach and quality which you can't get
| around without actually putting some real glass in front of
| it. A lot of people I speak to when travelling are quite
| disappointed in what comes out of their phones but naively
| assume it's the status quo. And we're talking flagships
| with the best cameras there as well. The digital crutch
| kills a lot of memories.
|
| Show them one shot from a cheap modern mirrorless and the
| smartphone is over for them. You don't even need a high end
| body. And yes you can do a lot on body and yes they
| integrate with the phone as well. So that doesn't kill any
| of those use cases. They augment the situation.
|
| Currently using a Nikon Z50ii + 18-140mm zoom. I don't
| change the lens for ref. I shoot JPEG and edit on my phone.
| Most of the stuff goes on facebook or gets looked at on my
| Mac. I don't use LR or shoot raw. The thing literally
| tethers to my phone.
| vladvasiliu wrote:
| > Show them one shot from a cheap modern mirrorless and
| the smartphone is over for them
|
| IME this only lasts up to the point they have to lug that
| brick with them.
|
| Don't get me wrong, I'm firmly in the "my 8 yo m4/3 kit
| wipes the floor with any phone it's not even funny".
| Which is all the more the case for a modern FF kit. But
| even my tiny Olympus is huge compared to my iPhone. Only
| my winter coat with fat pockets can fit it. It otherwise
| needs an actual bag (might work with some women's purses,
| I don't usually carry anything at all).
|
| Guess which one I have 100% of the time with me? I've
| found that the iPhone in hand while outside takes 100%
| better pictures than the Olympus kit in the drawer at
| home.
|
| It's always a question of compromise. Before my Olympus
| gear, I used to love my FF Canon gear. Built like tanks.
| Until it got old carrying all that junk around, and it
| started gathering dust somewhere. Now I'm happy with m4/3
| when I'm relatively serious about my photography, and I'm
| happy enough with what my iPhone produces when I only
| feel like having a pair of jeans and a shirt on.
|
| Would a new Sony something-or-other wipe the floor with
| the Olympus? Possibly. Enough for me to lug it around? No
| way.
| gazchop wrote:
| No one seems to care about carrying another brick around
| on top of the 11 pairs of shoes.
|
| The new stuff doesn't weigh a lot. It's not FF bricks any
| more. Nikon stuff is mostly magnesium and plastic.
| rscrawfo wrote:
| When you're just running out the door with your kids it's
| hard to pick up the full frame behemoth.
|
| I've been considering a m43 for that reason.
| gazchop wrote:
| Yeah. I've got three kids.
| vladvasiliu wrote:
| I don't get the reference for the 11 pairs of shoes. I
| haven't handled new Nikon stuff (the last body I touched
| was a D80 a long time ago). But I doubt it's smaller and
| lighter than my olympus with a prime [0]. More power to
| you if you're OK carrying your kit, it means this works
| for you, which is absolutely great!
|
| But, be that is it may, take a look around you. How many
| people do you see on any given day taking pictures with
| actual cameras, whatever the format? I live in Paris, a
| city flooded with tourists, whom you'd expect to be more
| likely to put up with carrying a somewhat inconvenient
| camera in exchange for better pictures. I can count on
| the fingers of one hand the people I've seen taking
| pictures with actual cameras in the last few months. And
| I walk or bike to/from work, along one of the most
| picturesque parts of the city. However, you can see
| people taking pictures with their phones all day,
| everyday.
|
| ---
|
| [0] Some of the bodies are actually surprisingly small. A
| sony A7C2 is "only" twice as thick as my Pen-F, the other
| dimensions being similar. But the body itself is useless
| without a lens. And while wide-angle offerings seem
| somewhat similar (though there's no equivalent to the
| 8-25/4), the tele end is much larger, even comparing a
| variable aperture to a fixed f/4 offering from Olympus.
| And primes are an absolute joke if size matters.
| ghaff wrote:
| It's been ages since I've used my FF Canon system which
| is a couple generations old at this point. At some point,
| I'll have to make a call on my APS-C mirrorless Fujifilm
| which I've left at home on a couple trips now where I
| would _always_ have brought a standalone camera in the
| past. Unfortunately they haven 't replaced the exact form
| factor I really like and the camera is getting pretty
| long in the tooth about now.
| freehorse wrote:
| > A lot of people I speak to when traveling are quite
| disappointed in what comes out of their phones but
| naively assume it's the status quo.
|
| Is that the case? I think it takes one to be a
| photography enthusiast/nerd to care enough to carry a
| camera with them. Most people I meet just want a phone
| "with a good camera". Phone cameras in this sense do not
| compete with real cameras, it is pretty obvious one can
| get a better camera if you remove the constraints that a
| smartphone's physical body brings. I think it is pretty
| illogical for one to think that smartphones have as good
| cameras as a good real camera, having all these space
| constrains and whatnot, so I doubt people really believe
| that the phone cameras are the status quo. Some people
| may be "disappointed" by their smartphone's photos
| (because they are able to objectively determine it) when
| they travel but most won't get a real camera because
| essentially they do not care that much as to buy/carry an
| additional object (or they do not have the money).
|
| For me, I am just happy that my phone now takes photos
| "that look good" even if I have no idea or skill on how
| to take good photos really, though I can appreciate if
| there is somebody with me with a real camera who does.
| And even if I had a real camera, I doubt I have the skill
| to take something better than the software-modified one I
| get from my phone.
| gazchop wrote:
| I don't disagree with most of this. The thoughts around
| it only come from that one day you will inevitably have
| where you take a really good photo on your phone. Then
| you get home and realise that it's actually trash.
|
| This was my one https://imgur.com/a/rPCJwcR (thanks
| Google!)
|
| Lots of people have this day and decide they'll keep that
| phone a couple more years and buy a camera with the
| upgrade cycle money. I think when I am travelling around
| 25% of people have mirrorless or DLSRs now compared to 5%
| a couple of years ago. A 10+ year old Nikon D3100 with
| kit lens is still a better camera then a 2024 iPhone Pro
| and doesn't cost a lot of money.
|
| Across Europe at least people have a lot of distrust of
| their phones as well. I suspect some of that is driving
| adoption. I even see film cameras regularly now as well
| (!).
| freehorse wrote:
| > This was my one https://imgur.com/a/rPCJwcR (thanks
| Google!)
|
| Wow this is really bad. Was it zoomed? If this is the
| case, it is interesting that it is still 4k resolution
| and companies prioritize "4k" even with horrible
| processing or whatever artifacts are these, rather than
| reducing resolution eg when zooming. Similar with low
| light, where binning the pixels could increase light
| sensitivity.
|
| If it is not zoomed in, it is much worse.
| gazchop wrote:
| It's 2:1 zoom on a 64MP main camera on a Google Pixel 7A.
| It absolutely destroyed it. Wasn't low light either.
| foldr wrote:
| If that's really only 2x zoom then I don't know how you
| can possibly have gotten a result that bad. I don't have
| a Pixel 7A, but it's certainly not representative of what
| 2x zoom looks like in daylight on a recent iPhone Pro.
| (My Pixel 3a used to do a better job of 2x zoom than
| that, FWIW.)
| kccqzy wrote:
| > Then you get home and realise that it's actually trash.
|
| Most people take pictures on their phone and look at
| pictures on their phone only. They won't return home to
| realize the picture is trash because their viewing medium
| is only capable of displaying a little more than a
| million pixels.
| closewith wrote:
| No offence, but this is nonsense.
|
| The average person isn't at all worried about photo
| quality and is happy with their 3-4 year old phone.
|
| At best, they're smiling and enduring your diatribes
| about camera quality and then going back to their iPhone
| Instagram snaps.
| likeabatterycar wrote:
| I'm more concerned that I own an iPhone whose vibrate
| function - something mastered over 30 years ago in pagers
| - is now so pathetic I've missed phone calls with the
| phone literally right next to me. Older models you could
| hear from rooms away.
| foldr wrote:
| >without actually putting some real glass in front of it
|
| What is not 'real' about an iPhone camera's lens? They're
| very sophisticated. (See e.g. here
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30557578)
| Foobar8568 wrote:
| And they cost at least double, and rarely all the time with
| you. I am a bit annoyed by the "AI/processing" part of
| cellphones, I would love to get back to camera but I can't
| justify it anymore.
| ghaff wrote:
| We really are getting to a crossover point for a lot of
| things. I'll keep and sometimes use my increasingly old
| standalone cameras for some purposes but I rarely take them
| on trips these days.
|
| I was talking to a friend who is a very good photographer
| last fall who used to always have a camera on him and he
| says that, like myself, he only uses his cameras for
| specific purposes these days. Mostly his smartphone is
| fine.
| alistairSH wrote:
| _I would love to get back to camera but I can 't justify it
| anymore._
|
| I started using iPhone Pros a few generations ago for the
| better camera, and it's been great for random snapshots.
| The adage about the best camera is the one in your pocket
| is true.
|
| But, I still have a mirrorless (Olympus) and some vintage
| 35mm cameras. The mirrorless is great for photos that I
| want to look very good (portraits, landscapes, mixed
| lighting, etc). The film cameras are a pleasure to use, but
| I'll freely admit that using them is a bit like preferring
| a nice Seiko to a smart watch or basic digital Casio.
|
| Anyways, with the prices of used cameras being so low, you
| can get a really nice, compact mirrorless setup for $500 or
| less. And fixed lens 35mm rangefinders from the 70s can be
| had for $200 or so. I won't claim it's a cheap hobby, but
| it's no worse than golf or cycling.
| harrall wrote:
| I like pocketable non-interchangeable lens mirrorless
| cameras.
|
| I rarely carry it because my cellphone is usually good
| enough but it's good for travel and for lower light areas
| where cellphones struggle. It won't fit in my pants pocket
| but it fits in my jacket fine.
|
| When I first got it, I didn't know when I should carry it
| and when I shouldn't but now I know and don't even bat an
| eye about it.
| astrange wrote:
| There is plenty of perceptual testing involved in the color
| science for a standalone camera. And more in the lenses.
| ls612 wrote:
| iPhones have been able to shoot in RAW/ProRes for a while now
| if you really want that.
| chgs wrote:
| 25 and 50 don't go into 120
| mannyv wrote:
| Two unanswered question: why not put the camera in the middle of
| the phone? And why do the cameras keep moving around?
| kaonwarb wrote:
| The space in the middle is dominated by a big battery in any
| smartphone I've seen. I suspect it would be less efficient to
| break that up.
| makeitdouble wrote:
| FWIW Xiaomi has flagships with split batteries for faster
| charge.
|
| e.g.: https://www.mi.com/global/product/xiaomi-11t-pro-120w-x
| iaomi...
| klipt wrote:
| I think I'd accidentally stick my thumb/finger in front of a
| central camera even more often than I already do with corner
| cameras!
| snowwrestler wrote:
| > why not put the camera in the middle of the phone?
|
| This is one of those things that doesn't seem like it should
| matter, but it does. If the lens is mounted in the exact center
| of the body, the images come out looking unbalanced. To produce
| balanced images, you have to offset the lens. Even very
| expensive pro mirrorless bodies are offset; that is, if you
| look directly down the center of the lens, you'll notice there
| is more camera body sticking out on one side than the other.
|
| This is called the chirality of the optical path and it is
| surprisingly difficult to predict analytically. Companies will
| typically design the optical path, prototype it, and mount it
| on a jig to precisely measure the chirality. From this, they
| design the body with the proper offset.
|
| Chirality is more noticeable the smaller the sensor and the
| shorter the lens. So on smart phones, which put tiny sensors
| behind wide-angle lenses, they have to get the offset just
| right. This explains why the lenses are in slightly different
| places on the body every time Apple updates their cameras.
| nakedrobot2 wrote:
| What on earth did I just read? Is this ai slop that I just
| read? None of this is correct or true.
| jval43 wrote:
| Your comment makes no sense.
|
| Every mirrorless body has a center marking for the middle of
| the sensor, so the camera can be mounted exactly centered on
| a tripod. It's actually important for photos to be exactly on
| axis if you want to do panoramas or stitching.
|
| The only reason the body is not exactly symmetrical is
| engineering and ergonomics. Many point and shoots of the past
| in fact had the lens exactly in the center.
|
| And "chirality of the optical path" is not anything related
| to this, in fact the term is not usable in this context at
| all.
| Toutouxc wrote:
| I vouched for this comment just so I could reply to it. The
| entire thing is so fascinatingly, unbelievably, OBVIOUSLY,
| violently incorrect in every single way, yet it doesn't feel
| like straight GPT output.
|
| It was also posted by a person with a huge karma. I want to
| understand what happened.
| snowwrestler wrote:
| Thanks for vouching. I guess I figured people would realize
| I was joking based on how ridiculous it was.
| Toutouxc wrote:
| That... didn't occur to me at all. Nowadays stuff like
| this usually a LLM running amok. :( Sorry about that.
| snowwrestler wrote:
| An LLM running amok is probably not a bad description of
| me after a couple of drinks, actually.
| brookst wrote:
| It was a good joke, but sadly our world has gotten so
| strange that it fits right in with many 100% earnest
| comments. Either that or the world is mired in full of
| jokers than I realized.
| rob_c wrote:
| What the actual f*(c)k?
| ipv6ipv4 wrote:
| If we are playing with phone camera form factors, I vote for
| thinking outside the phone. Remove the camera entirely from the
| phone, and put it in a separate cylindrical device; a smaller
| incarnation of Apple's ancient iSight webcam. Stuff in better
| optics, put controls on the cylinder, and allow viewing the
| image from my watch when taking a photo/video. So I can leave
| the phone at home...
| Someone wrote:
| I think that would be a niche product, at best.
|
| Most users would want to use the screen of their smartphone
| as a viewfinder. That either means using both hands or
| requiring a way to attach the thing to the smartphone.
|
| Also, to do the image processing, that cylinder would need to
| have most of the processing power of the iPhone and, thus, a
| fairly large battery.
| ipv6ipv4 wrote:
| Yes, it is niche today. I'm hoping for a less phone screen
| oriented future.
| kalleboo wrote:
| Sony actually did something like this once back in 2013. It
| could work independently or clip onto your phone as a
| viewfinder
|
| Low end model
| https://www.dpreview.com/products/sony/compacts/sony_dscqx10
|
| High end model https://www.dpreview.com/reviews/sony-
| cybershot-dsc-qx100
| globular-toast wrote:
| Tbh answer is usually "Sony did that, but nobody cared".
| They also did the camera in the middle thing with the
| Xperia Pro. It even had adjustable aperture!
|
| Sony has consistently been innovating in this space but has
| always had basically insignificant market share. People
| keep complaining about mundane updates and AI crap but they
| won't buy phones from the one manufacturer that bucks this
| trend. MKBHD has a couple of videos about it (regarding the
| Xperia 1vi iirc).
|
| My Sony phone has a 4k 120hz oled screen, notification led,
| headphone jack, fully manual camera mode, no bloatware or
| ai crap, great battery life (never had to charge my phone
| during the day). They had the battery save features years
| before other manufacturers. They've been doing this
| consistently for years. I don't know how they keep doing
| it, but I'm glad they do.
| asciimov wrote:
| > why not put the camera in the middle of the phone?
|
| Because when you pick it up, your hand is covering up the
| middle of the phone. However the top quarter is unobstructed.
|
| > And why do the cameras keep moving around?
|
| Easy way to tell models apart.
| dylan604 wrote:
| > Easy way to tell models apart.
|
| is that the reason or just a convenient side effect? the last
| two models had to move the lenses around slightly so they
| could capture whatever they called their stereo AR/VR type
| acquisition so the pupil distances worked correctly. after
| that, there's only so many ways to arrange 2 or 3 lenses.
| mcintyre1994 wrote:
| Another reason that comes to mind is the camera bump. If you
| put the camera in the middle then it'd kinda rest on that on a
| flat surface and wobble. With the camera in a corner it sits on
| the camera bump + the opposite corner which is a bit more
| stable and less obvious.
| makeitdouble wrote:
| That's not the market they're going after, even with all the
| ads and promotion. It's more an aspirational positioning than a
| hardcore one.
|
| For instance Xiaomi is a lot more serious about the photo part
| (and they also sell a lot less as well, this model was only
| noticed in photography circles)
|
| https://www.mi.com/global/product/xiaomi-14-ultra/
| jdietrich wrote:
| Packaging. A phone is absolutely stuffed with components, most
| of the market highly values thinness, so every mm^3 is
| jealously fought over. Putting the camera in the middle might
| mean making the phone bigger, having to shrink the battery, or
| putting antennas in less-than-ideal places. It's design trade-
| offs all the way down.
| TazeTSchnitzel wrote:
| The body text is really uncomfortably sycophantic.
| mrandish wrote:
| Yes, and it's maddeningly detail-free. Just vague claims that
| something wonderful is being accomplished with zero data or
| specifics.
| pierrefermat1 wrote:
| The reality is journalists don't really have the knowledge to
| explain any specifics at all, so you just get this fluff. But
| hey at least there's pretty pictures
| cynicalsecurity wrote:
| Photos on my wife's camera look slightly deformed. The people
| don't look like themselves, their faces are just slightly off.
| I'm blaming the AI inside of the photos app on iPhone, but I'm
| not sure.
|
| People's face look perfect on my mediocre Android though.
|
| I'm never going to buy or use an iPhone. Even the questionable
| advantage which was supposed to be the iPhone's camera is fake.
| gazchop wrote:
| This is probably a combination of the lens corrections, the
| pretty awful auto white balance (warmth), the terrible
| oversharpening and also a bit of True Tone. Portrait mode also
| wrecks a lot of photos due to the crappy emulation of DOF.
| Output is clever but shit.
|
| Due to the general flatness of the lens there is a lot of
| distortion around the edges which is digitally removed after
| the photo is taken. This isn't 100% perfect and causes some
| rather uncanny looks in some of the photos. You can use this
| for artistic effect but it looks crap mostly. Generally if
| you're using a proper camera there's a big chunk of glass in
| front of it so the main part of a portrait is well outside the
| distorted edges of the frame so it's not noticeable. Even new
| cameras use minimal lens corrections in body as well to
| eliminate this.
|
| As for the white balance, Apple never seem to get this right.
| The colours are always slightly too orange / warm and vivid and
| never quite match reality in experience. You can crank the
| warmth down a bit after in photos.app to kill some of it.
|
| Oversharpening - everything is too sharp. This makes the image
| pop out but nothing more. It's a terrible curse on smartphones.
| Not much you can do about it. Even shooting ProRAW on mine is
| oversharpened.
|
| If you turn the True Tone feature off in Display/Settings it
| looks a bit better as well. That seems to completely mung
| viewing any photos later, giving them sometimes an over-blue
| tone.
|
| Urgh all this is why I bought a mirrorless. Smartphones are
| really not very good. Even good ones (mine is a 15 Pro). Mine
| gets mostly used to take photos of an AirBnB when I leave it
| now or where the car got parked.
| amluto wrote:
| My bonus pet peeve about portrait mode is that the internet
| is full of portrait mode photos, which means AI gets trained
| on portrait mode photos, which means AI generates pictures
| that look like portrait mode. Garbage in, garbage out.
| harha_ wrote:
| I wonder how much that wire mesh floor distorts the recording
| result? I guess it must be insignificant, since the walls,
| ceiling and floor absorb almost all reflected sound waves?
| jdietrich wrote:
| Sound waves are really long. 20kHz is about the limit of human
| hearing, so the shortest wave we can hear is about 17cm; the
| longest wave we can hear is about 17 _meters_. A suitably
| designed mesh will be effectively transparent across that
| frequency range.
| orev wrote:
| > 38% of people said that better cameras are a main motivation
| for buying a new phone
|
| This strikes me as just a reflection of the ad campaigns. Apple
| promotes "better cameras" for every new iPhone, almost
| exclusively in their ads, so it's not surprising that's what
| people would say. With every new phone being just an incremental
| upgrade, hyping up the camera is the only way to get people to
| drop a $1000 on a new one. Most of these 38% won't be able to
| tell the difference between a phone pic taken 5 or more years
| ago.
| esafak wrote:
| Better images got people to buy even more expensive digital
| cameras that do less than your cell phone. It turns out people
| like to take pictures.
| giancarlostoro wrote:
| Do less in terms of what exactly? Because I have photos from
| old digital cameras from nearly 20 years ago that look
| drastically better and more detailed than Android or iPhone
| photos from several years back. I would be surprised if the
| quality is down. In terms of features the quality is key.
| esafak wrote:
| Do less in terms of not being able to do anything beside
| take a picture. And they don't do any computational
| photography, either, so their pictures are not necessarily
| better. Try any low light photography with moving objects
| on your camera? Or adjust the focal point? Cell phones can
| do it.
|
| If digital cameras were so good they would not be
| disappearing.
| orev wrote:
| Phone cameras have come a long way, no doubt, but DSLRs
| really do look amazing. Phones are winning because "the
| best camera is the one that's with you". Since people
| have the phone camera in their pocket all the time, they
| usually don't bother to carry a separate bulky one except
| for special occasions.
| brookst wrote:
| Phones are also winning because the gap is narrowing.
| Computational photography probably? won't ever replace
| wide aperture superzoom lenses, but each hear the scope
| of "you can't take that shot with a phone" shrinks.
| ghaff wrote:
| Apple at least has certainly emphasized photography (and video)
| a lot.
|
| But that actually seems to be a very reasoned response to
| consumers asking themselves "Why should I upgrade my phone?"
| And over at least some timescale--maybe not every model--a
| better camera actually seems like a pretty reasonable answer
| for people who care.
| brookst wrote:
| I don't understand this view.
|
| Theory 1: People treasure memories and have been let down by
| pictures tnat don't age well from cheap film cameras, then
| early digital cameras, then phone cameras. Phones have gotten
| good enough to replace separate devices for most people, but
| the cameras are still not as versatile. People will spend money
| for incremental improvements because the payoff will last
| decades and benefit their children. Apple invests heavily in
| camera tech to satisfy this need, and in marketing to
| communicate the benefits.
|
| Theory 2: sheeple buy whatever marketing tells them to, those
| rubes don't see any real benefit.
|
| I just don't see how anyone who enjoys even casual photography
| could go for theory 2.
| orev wrote:
| If phone cameras hadn't changed over the past 10 years, most
| people would still be happy with the quality of photos taken.
| Most photos are never printed out or viewed on any device
| other than their phone. They may be poorly lit, composed
| badly, and be blurry, but they still serve their primary
| purpose for most people, which is to relive a memory. That
| function is the same whether the sensor is 2 or 48
| megapixels.
|
| Newer tech of course looks better, and people can definitely
| tell the difference when comparing them side-by-side. But
| there's also an element of the reality distortion field when
| it comes to convincing people that they need to upgrade from
| a two year old phone to the latest release just because of
| the camera upgrades.
| makeitdouble wrote:
| Better camera is not just the optical quality or even
| processing though.
|
| Older phones gets slower, either because of the dying battery
| (that could be replaced, but many of these people are on
| subsidized phones so upgrading is baked into their plan), or
| software bloat slowly creeping on.
|
| When camera boot up, shutter lag or post processing starts to
| take one sec or two, moving to a newer phone is the obvious
| option.
| dyauspitr wrote:
| Honestly I know very little about photography but I can easily
| tell the difference between photos on an iPhone 10 vs 13
| blackoil wrote:
| > Most of these 38% won't be able to tell the difference
| between a phone pic taken 5 or more years ago.
|
| That is an arbitrary statement, that came from your biases and
| not observation. Maybe in best of lighting some 5-year-old
| photos maybe as good as latest flagship.
| a1o wrote:
| One thing about the iPhone microphone. I had a beautiful day the
| other day here with some light drizzle and the sea waves were
| rocking nicely it was a great sound and the beach was empty.
| Great feeling. I wanted to record this but I only had my iPhone -
| was just walking in the beach. So neither the default recording
| app of the iphone and neither any of the ones I tried, could
| capture the ocean waves or the sound of the drizzle. I had
| previously (intentionally) set out to the beach with the intent
| to capture audio and did so with my Laptop + external mic. My
| conclusion is that unfortunately that is the way it has to be,
| and that it's not possible to capture audio on a whim as is with
| photos.
| pryelluw wrote:
| Which iPhone model?
| a1o wrote:
| The experience I described was with the 14 but I also tried
| in the 15 pro something similar and had same experience.
|
| For now my approach is to use a external microphone with a
| longer cable and a notebook, and this works, but it would be
| nice to make this work with the iPhone.
| pryelluw wrote:
| I daily an (newest model) SE and got some wireless lavalier
| mics that plug into the lighting port. They work well and
| were cheap. Have to carry them around. Not name brand or
| anything. Though I hope to get some from rode.
|
| What do you use for storage?
| a1o wrote:
| I don't use the phone productively, everything I tried I
| endup concluding it can't do? So it's only use is
| complaining about things in hacker news for killing time.
|
| The most recent idea was trying to use it for sounds but
| I had the mentioned issue. Does the lavalier works for
| environment sounds or you only use for voice?
| pryelluw wrote:
| Mostly use it for recording technical talks at Python
| Atlanta meetups (I'm an organizer). Ambient sounds are
| not a priority. But I've used it to capture the sounds of
| a fresh water beach (which sounds much different than
| salt water). I did have to remove the cover on the phone
| to be able to do a proper a/b sound test. Maybe your
| cover isnt helping?
| jdietrich wrote:
| The problem is that you're trying to record relatively quiet
| sounds that >99% of people would consider undesirable
| background noise, so many consumer devices will default to
| filtering out those sounds and do an excellent job. It would be
| quite easy for Apple to add a "nature sounds" mode to the
| recording app and work their computational magic in reverse,
| but I'm not sure that idea would occur to anyone in a design
| meeting or make it through review.
|
| If you do want to record those kinds of sounds, the term of art
| is "field recording" and there's tons of good information
| available on how to do it well.
| n144q wrote:
| I believe such a setting exists in the control center for
| video calls, not sure about recording.
| a1o wrote:
| Yes, I understand. Currently the way I do is I use my laptop,
| a T14s, set it to power efficiency (so it barely turns the
| fans), turn on Audacity, and use an old headset that has a
| microphone, and a somehow very long cable - the actual rubber
| on the headset is long gone and I never replaced it. It
| serves me well but requires a backpack and it's a weird setup
| - but it works. I occasionally make games, and it's usually a
| bit hard to find nice chill nature and environment sounds
| that have a good quality, are calm and are royalty free (and
| cheap or free), so I end up capturing these sounds myself.
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