Briefly: iPhone Software 3.0 taking better camera snapshots - Page 3

My LG chocolate actually takes decent vids and I can MMS them around. They're not super smooth but def worth showing more than once rather than a picture itself. I will be interesting to see how this vid on the iPhone will task its battery if its going to be so high end.

You mentioned Zeiss. Companies are using lenses from Schneider, Leitz and Zeiss.

Big deal!

These lenses are no better than the lenses used by other manufacturers. A $5 lens budget will get the same lens quality from anywhere.

Those companies make great lenses when there is essentially NO budget on their lenses.

They decided to get into the contract lens market because that's the only way for lens manufacturers to make money these days.

Their lenses for compact cameras are no better than the Canon, Nikon, and other lenses used.

I'm sure you can figure it out. The real question is how do we get you to stay on topic.

DO YOU EVER ASK YOURSELF THE EXACT SAME QUESTION?
I was merely responding to a post regarding email. You on the other hand don't even respond- you BARK.

And FYI- 2 cool posters on here actually gave me the answer which is what this place is all about- discussing relevant topics and helping each other out.

Sorry but I have to disagree. A precision German lens is much more preferable to a generic mayonnaise Chinese lens.

I saw an article a year or so back comparing photos taken by a high-end Carl-Zeiss lensed Nokia with the iPhone. The authors were clearly *trying* to show how rubbish the iPhone camera was but, in spite of their best efforts, some of the iPhone pictures actually looked better than the Nokia's in some aspects. I now have a Nokia 7210 with a 2 mp camera that produces two million pixels per snap of washed out blue haze (the Nokia was a gift.. no iPhones in Fiji The now famous picture of the end-of-the-rainbow taken from a moving car and that the one of the airliner ditched in the Hudson show that the iPhone camera can do what a camera phone is supposed to do and do it rather well.

That said, the new picture comparisons look more than anything like the 2.2 had a nasty fingerprint on the lens (by far the most common cause of blurry pictures from compact cameras and camera phones). Looking forward to some more precise comparisons. iPhone has a lot of processing power compared to real cameras - and Apple has employed imaging engineers (remember the ads) - so it might be that Apple has made major advances in producing silk purses from sows' ears.

Their isn't much Zeiss can do to make those tiny lens much better.

What this is called is cross brand marketing. Nokia pays Zeiss to put the name Zeiss on their phones, so that people who don't understand how optics work think they are getting a superior camera.

In reality you are getting a mediocre camera with the name Zeiss next to it.

Kind of like what AT&T does with Apple?

Seriously and the alternative is a brand name camera/phone with a lousy lens?
I'd opt for the great camera and Zeiss lens. The point is - you have to read reviews, ask questions on all this stuff.

Is it possible that iPhone 3.0 will be able to shoot video on the 3G, i.e., can software turn the 3G still camera into a video camera?

These ARE generic mayonnaise Chinese lenses.

Where do you think they are made?

Every company these days has access to the same lens software. They can all design lenses to whatever specs they need. But phone cameras are crap, and so are the lenses.

A five dollar Leitz or Zeiss lens is still a five dollar lens.

Leitz and Zeiss don't even make all of their multi thousand dollar lenses anymore. They haven't for almost two decades. Chinon makes lenses for Leitz, for example. Panasonic makes lenses for Zeiss.

Their cheap lenses are made in Taiwan or China.

Please see this:
http://www.ipod.info.pl/index.php/le...niz-iphone-2x/
User from Poland have other results.

ok...so here is the scoop, the difference you see is based on movement, what apple has done is used the accelerometer as an image stabiliser somehow. ie taking the photo when no motion is detected.....so my bet would be this plus a software treak on iso in low light.

but it is mostly movement that is flooring everyone. basic photography, slow shutter equals blurry photos, low light equals slow shutter so by tweaking the iso in lower light they are allowing a faster shutter speed.

Bullseye! A true photographer knows his ISO. Hence the better definition because of the stabilization. thank you, thank you.

Hi Mel,
Either you or I am having a blonde moment here... as a I believe that should be Leica, not Leitz.

Cheers

PS the best lens I've used is the Minolta on my Sony DSLR. Razors ain't in it!

PPS mystery solved: Leitz is the name of the enlarger and projector lenses that Leica makes (see WikiP).

tell em to clean there lense mine dont come out blurry at night like that

What is sad about the two year time frame? Software can usually always be improved. That is why it is upgraded. Companies can't sit around until software is perfect or products would never ship. Apple does a lot in it's iPhone upgrades.

Thank you Mormon Jesus!

Leitz. Leica is a brand name that Leitz owns. Those are the Leica cameras. Most everything else they do is branded Leitz.

Their lenses are Leitz lenses, not Leica lenses.

Uhhh..... Melgross, are we arguing here? Maybe I did not phrase my response in the right way but I tend to agree with what you have said. I did not fall for the Carl Zeiss hype as I know that no matter what you do, it comes down to sensor, lens, and finally software. This is why I feel (my opinion) that anyone who uses a cameraphone as their main photographic system is pretty much stupid. When I want to shoot images and have them processed, I whip out the Nikon D300 and start snapping away. I use the cams in my phones only when I am about in town, and see something interesting. I never rely on either phone as my main source for taking photos.

I seem to have worded that poorly. I wasn't arguing with you. It's just that when someone mentions a brand name in a way that seems to predispose a quality level to it, there is that assumption that the person is valuing it.

My statement was more generally aimed, but it did result from your post.

No worries dude. I figured as much. I am really anxious to see how things shake out with the N97 when it comes out.

It's not about what manufacturer did or reported to have done, if you need my opinion. It's about what guys write in their blogs.
By cheating at the time I meant: 1) possible usage of another, better, camera to make better pictures; 2) possible using hardware glass filters; the telescope lens for iPhone exists since years, you know, and it can bear filters.
No, I don't think all that's the case.

Yes, night picture "made by 2.2.1" is absolutely realistic. The picture of a cat, on the contrary, is not at all. I'd say 2.2.1 in such conditions produces pictures of quality similar to what was attributed to 3.0.

But the quality differences are abnormally big and suspicious. And I still give considerable - and yes, dominant - share of probability to the option this was done with image processing software on a desktop computer.

The series of pictures from Polish blog looks far more natural. And certainly it presents improvements brought by 3.0, too.

The cat photo on the right was taken when it was moving so naturally it is more blurry because iPhone shutter speed sucks. Those photos are not identical. Identical means same place , same lighting, still subjects.

The bottom photo merely looks like a dirty lens. Drastic improvements like those are not had via software alone. Complete BS.

Someone was paid off.

Who the H does photo comparisons with moving subjects?

Oh, yeah. And that kitten dances wildly enough to shake the appliance beneath. It's cameraman's tremor.

Thanks for the info, Mel, but now you've made me go and look it up (admired their design but never owned a Leica, more's the shame).

... In fact, Leitz is no more, it is now Leica (not that I knew this before posting); but with the naming of lenses it's more complicated than that:

> The Leica went through several iterations, and in 1923 Barnack convinced his boss, Ernst Leitz II, to make a prototype series of 31. The camera was an immediate success when introduced at the 1925 Leipzig, Germany Spring Fair as the Leica I (for Leitz camera). The Elmar 50 mm f/3.5 lens (a 4-elements design influenced by the Zeiss Tessar) was designed by Dr. Max Berek at Leitz etc. etc. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leica_Camera

Back to iPhone. I just came across this on Macdailynews..

> Comment from: Spartacus
> The MPxls amount does not, necessarily, lead to image quality. This weekend I've made some tests, comparing a Nokia N80 (with a 3.2 Mpx camera) and my iPhone. It's amazing how the iPhone always produce better images all the time in all light circumstances. Images from the iphone are sharp and colorful (and I'm using 3.0). Nokia images, by the contrary, are dull, blured and with very poor resolution. I've made some cleanup of the external lenses prior to this test. I don't know what makes such a huge difference but certainly is linked to the optical quality of the transparent materials and the anti-reflection surface and to the processing software for sure.

My impression of common-or-garden variety Nokia camera phones (2 mp on mine and 3.2 on a colleague's) is that they are utterly useless. Nokia has gone to pot.

In contrast, I've seen a lot of quite presentable iPhone-captured images on the web (check out Flickr which gives the exif data, e.g. this stunner of the grand canyon http://www.flickr.com/photos/imago20...57616816402786 ).

Then where has video been? Surely Apple is not inventing it.
Must be battery issues- no?

Can you not see the motion blur? The cat moved a lot on the right photo and didn't in the left photo. Is another explanation really needed? Why else would there be massive blur JUST with the head.

This is not motion blur. Not at all. Magnify the image. You'll see the fur is not moving. This is gaussian or average blur applied to the portion of image. And that points once more to heavy image processing software.

Hey, its OK to rant once in a while. I have been known to do it myself. :-) but to comment..

There is a lot of work that goes on in releasing software, including testing -- inhouse and outside, advertising to allow people to know about it (besides tech heads. :-) ), budgeting for the advertising and creating ads for the effort, etc, etc..

So while a 15 year old can be breathlessly awaiting any new free software to come down the pike, most of us need to be informed that its here and given a reason to check it out / buy it.

Just a thought.
en

I'm not sure, but I've read that video is difficult on the 3g due to the processor speed, available RAM, and the hit on the battery. This has been posted in various places, but I'm not an expert so I cant confirm if this is true. I guess we'll know soon enough. There are apps available for jail broken 3g iphones, but I don't know how they perform. Maybe someone else here does???

It's not in the current Betas just some hidden scrubber image and a hidden YouTube video upload screen. The issue isn't so much with the process speed which is 612MHz and under clocked to just over 400MHz or the 128MB RAM, but with the resources left for video after the iPhone OS and all the background processes get their cut. The jailbreak solution is quite poor and maxs out the system while draining the battery to get the crappy video it does so we'll have to wait to see what Apple does with the next iPhone.

I figure at least 192MB RAM but hope for 256MB and a newer, faster ARM processor type would be nice, of course these will use more power unless finds a way to counter it. I look forward to seeing what Palm has done with the Pre since they tout some hefty power in the device.

Thanks for the info on the jailbreak solution and for clarifying what I was not clear about - that it's "what's left" of the system resources after everything else gets it cut. I'm really hoping for a big jump in ram and processor in the next phone as long as it does not drain the battery too much. Hopefully we won't have to wait very long to find out.

The cat didn't move - the guy taking the picture did.

That's just total guesswork on your part.

Yes, you're right. I did forget that they went through this transformation recently. But the rest of what I said is still correct.

The Wiki does contain more than a few of its own errors though.

The first major one is that the SLRs have been discontinued, along with all the lenses, and the S2 won't be available for several more months, at best. They've made other mistakes as well, but I won't bother with it.

Supposedly, there's twice as much program RAM in the new device.

Hopefully, the processor is souped up as well. At least, that's what we're reading.

I haven't heard that it will 256MB RAM, though it has been assumed as the most likely.

The CPU and GPU changes is more difficult to rationalize. What chips are they going to use and are they going to use a more expensive, faster chip again that they underclock to get a little more power efficiency over a slower, less expensive chip in the same class that isn't underclocked.

Regardless, I do look forward to the next iPhone release.

Absolutely. This is why I do my best to not cry "Fake! Forgery! Bullshit!" I trust sincerely 3.0 firmware improves picture quality. We'll see how exactly will that compare to 2.2.1.

I don't see a reason to suspect faked results. There were two sites confirming the results. The result published by the Polish site might look a little bit different, but not that much:

- The first scene shows a more stable image for 3.0.
- On the second scene both images are fairly stable with the most notable difference the exposure and the white balance. This could be contributed by the large screen which is part of the image. May be it had different content or the two iPhone OS versions process the highlights differently, or both.

Analyzing the images from the three sites my guess is that the following changes were made:

1. Some sort of image stabilization. Since there is no change of the image size, the possible solution is that the software picks a better moment for the shot within a certain time window, based on the accelerometer input.
2. Enhancement in processing highlights, e.g. their overall weight in evaluating the white balance and the exposure and tuning them down a little bit.

Another guess:

Apple made this enhancement while working with the new CCD which is supposed to have advantages on it's own. If Apple selects a slightly larger sensor or a slightly longer focal length they could implement software stabilization. Thanks to the presence of accelerometer data his could be more efficient both in terms of quality and processor speed than oftware stabilization based on image analysis only (used in some consumer digital cameras).

I'd be seriously disappointed if Apple would use a 3.2 megapixel camera in the new iPhone. That would be an "update" not an "upgrade". A min. of 5 megapixels would put the iPhone at the same level as the upcoming Samsung I7500. And shouldn't the iPhone 3.0 video output "support" iMovie's HD format?