Apple's future iPhones could hide FaceTime camera & flash inside earpiece grille

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Comments

  • Reply 41 of 67
    calicali Posts: 3,494member
    Marvin wrote: »
    The biggest problem with the grill is that the diameter of the lens is larger than the height of it. I tried to mock that up when making an iPhone 6 mockup before but having the grill as tall as the current lens doesn't look good. Nor does it look good with a large hole in the middle with the grill extending out from it. One design I felt worked ok was the following:

    1000

    That's an iPhone 6 mockup with a 4.4" edge to edge display and the bezels reduced. It was to avoid having to deal with a hand brick like the Galaxy phones. It looks like we'll have to put up with the hand brick for now. The idea with the holes was that one would be the proximity sensor and the others would be for the speakers to either side of the lens. I didn't think about there being a flash but that would work too.

    The single line grill design is simpler but I reckon the only way that'll work is if they figure out how to turn the display into a camera by putting a photodetector at every pixel along with an RGB component. Having a sapphire front panel could help but grease and fingerprints are the bigger problem. They's need a surface coating that things don't stick to like this:



    or just a way to compensate for the grease on the display.

    On the subject of patents, they are often used for protection from other people suing them. Apple has been sued over the most frivolous of patents so it makes sense for them to patent as much as possible.

    I think like me. very outside the box.

    I know someone who works for Apple and this camera grill thing won't be a feature on iPhone 6. The person I know worked on that specific area back in March, but then again, Apple likes to weigh their options so who knows?
  • Reply 42 of 67
    crowleycrowley Posts: 10,453member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Tallest Skil View Post

     



    Or if you’d read posts before replying...


     Apologies for giving you the benefit of the doubt that you'd have a decent point, rather than just a pedantic language gripe.

     

    Though, since you brought up the subject, how many appreciably different implementations of "put camera behind speaker grill" do you think there are?

  • Reply 43 of 67
    MarvinMarvin Posts: 15,309moderator
    Did you save that mockup? Post it; let’s see how it looks.

    I had deleted it but it was pretty much these variations:

    1000

    The single line is cleanest because there are fewer shapes but I think it's far too big. It also pretty much requires putting the mesh in front otherwise you'd see the objects inside the shape anyway.

    The best way is to try and get the camera behind the display somehow because for one thing it means you finally get eye contact during video chats.

    You can't really put a focusing lens + sensor behind the display because the LCD blocks incoming light and the battery is in the way so I think it has to be a different kind of camera. Sensors are made up of photodetectors but they need to distinguish between red, green and blue incoming light so they have a filter in front. They already use RGB components to make the display show color though so if those same components could simply have photodetectors in them, one per RGB component per pixel, you'd have a camera the same resolution as the display, which isn't great but good enough for a front-facing camera. The image it generates might not be very high quality and it has to not affect nor be affected by the display itself.
  • Reply 44 of 67
    ameldrum1ameldrum1 Posts: 255member

    There really 

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Tallest Skil View Post

     

     

    Good to know that you think patenting ideas is okay. That’s the opposite of every law on the books, but you’re entitled to have a silly opinion.

     

    Oops, no, I just patented it. You owe me royalties.


    There really isn't any way that you could be more of a f***wit is there?

     

    It's a tragedy the way you have destroyed this forum.

  • Reply 45 of 67
    hjbhjb Posts: 278member

    An example of Apple trying to patent every single ideas with its big pocket while stealing or adopting great ideas & features created by others.  And most of you here pretending 'what a great idea, never thought of that!' or something like it.  Apple, Just make great products as you do and cut this nonsense plz. 

  • Reply 46 of 67
    MarvinMarvin Posts: 15,309moderator
    Another route they could go is to have the separate parts surround the camera lens like this:

    [IMG ALT=""]http://forums.appleinsider.com/content/type/61/id/46807/width/800/height/1000[/IMG]

    I purposely put a lighter circle round the lens to show the separation but they could be blended together. So there are 4 quadrants and you'd have speakers to the left and right, proximity sensor up top and flash down below. They could even make a two tone flash but the orange might be a bit distracting. The flash could have a digital filter to hide it when not in use though or the orange could just be a digital filter that only appears when needed like electrochromic glass.

    They could actually put the grill all the way round there without impacting the camera and that would hide the other components but still leave them fully functional.
  • Reply 47 of 67
    crowley wrote: »
    I'm sure it is, but Apples current implementation is just an on/off LED flash for alerts. If you can modify the brightness then it's not particularly well signposted and I'm not aware of the method.

    Here's the API:
    https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/AVFoundation/Reference/AVCaptureDevice_Class/Reference/Reference.html#//apple_ref/occ/instm/AVCaptureDevice/setTorchModeOnWithLevel:error:

    The torchLevel arg is a float from 0.0 to 1.0, controlling brightness.
  • Reply 48 of 67
    hjb wrote: »
    An example of Apple trying to patent every single ideas with its big pocket while stealing or adopting great ideas & features created by others.  And most of you here pretending 'what a great idea, never thought of that!' or something like it.  Apple, Just make great products as you do and cut this nonsense plz. 

    1. Making great products
    2. Applying for patents

    Two of these activities are not mutually exclusive.
  • Reply 49 of 67
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member
    Originally Posted by Crowley View Post

     Apologies for giving you the benefit of the doubt that you'd have a decent point, rather than just a pedantic language gripe.

     

    Again, thanks for telling everyone that you believe it is okay to patent an idea and not simply an implementation thereof. Nearly everyone–if not everyone–disagrees with you, but okay.

     

    Though, since you brought up the subject, how many appreciably different implementations of "put camera behind speaker grill" do you think there are?


     

    A few dozen, if not a hundred or so.

     

    Originally Posted by Marvin View Post


     

    That’s great! I like it. The cleanliness of the top bezel makes up for the increase in size.

  • Reply 50 of 67
    crowleycrowley Posts: 10,453member
    Quote:

    Great, if I'm developing an app.  But if I want to use the out of the box control that Apple provides to turn on the LED flash for alerts for Apple apps like Messages and Mail, can I control the brightness there?  I don't believe I can.

  • Reply 51 of 67
    crowleycrowley Posts: 10,453member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Tallest Skil View Post

     

     

    Again, thanks for telling everyone that you believe it is okay to patent an idea and not simply an implementation thereof. Nearly everyone–if not everyone–disagrees with you, but okay.


    And again, thanks for putting words into my mouth that I never even slightly implied.  If my "reading" problem is that I can't read the words that you don't write it seems that your reading problem is that you imagine I've written words that I haven't.

     

    Oh wait, no, both of those are your problem.

     

    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Tallest Skil View Post

     

    A few dozen, if not a hundred or so.


    Really?  Care to detail even a half dozen of them?

  • Reply 52 of 67
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member
    Originally Posted by Crowley View Post

    Really?  Care to detail even a half dozen of them?


     

    Sure thing. But first, since you don’t care at all, why not explain why you’re pretending that every single electrical, physical, and software implementation of such a system is only one way to do it and why you’re pretending that since the ending is the same, the means by which it was accomplished MUST have been the same.

     

    You know, so that the people who are actually reading this can know why you believe ideas can be patented and that all implementations of an idea are identical.

  • Reply 53 of 67
    darkvaderdarkvader Posts: 1,146member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by TeaEarleGreyHot View Post

     

    What a god-awful, friggin freaky idea for a cell phone.  As it is, I can hardly even see the earpiece grille because of accumulated dust and fuzz. That's just normal use of a phone... doesn't affect sound transmission appreciably.  But you sure aren't going to get good optics thru it.  Compare that to a transparent sapphire covering over the main camera which can be readily cleaned, or the oleophobic gorilla glass over the face-time camera which we all know can be cleaned by a wipe across our sleeve.  That ain't gonna cut it with the earpiece grille.  Nope, this would be a big step backwards.  Thankfully, the phone is merely one "embodiment".  Hopefully there are others for which this is more practical.  :)




    I was hoping somebody else would catch that. 

     

    And I don't care if you filter out the lines that the grill would cause, even if it's perfectly clean you're still losing light, and you're still getting a degraded image compared to what you'd get if you don't try to photograph through a metal grill.

     

    It's an absolutely horrific idea.

  • Reply 54 of 67
    hentaiboyhentaiboy Posts: 1,252member

     

    /s

  • Reply 55 of 67
    ingsocingsoc Posts: 212member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by hjb View Post

     

    An example of Apple trying to patent every single ideas with its big pocket while stealing or adopting great ideas & features created by others.  And most of you here pretending 'what a great idea, never thought of that!' or something like it.  Apple, Just make great products as you do and cut this nonsense plz. 


     

    The thing is though, I don't think the problem is specifically with Apple. As far as I know, everyone takes advantage of what is currently a broken system; and that's the problem. If Apple don't behave this way, others will, and they will constantly be at the mercy of lawsuits, to the point where innovation will be very difficult.

     

    So - and I think Tim Cook has said this before - the actual patent system itself needs to be changed so that there is no need to do this constant patent-lodging exercise.

     

    Also regarding the idea of this being a terrible concept (in terms of having the camera behind a grille) - I think we should remember that there could be many, many different ways to implement this. The "grille" might simply be coloured glass, for all we know. The final product often differs from the patent in respects like this.

  • Reply 56 of 67
    crowleycrowley Posts: 10,453member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Tallest Skil View Post

     

     

    Sure thing. But first, since you don’t care at all, why not explain why you’re pretending that every single electrical, physical, and software implementation of such a system is only one way to do it and why you’re pretending that since the ending is the same, the means by which it was accomplished MUST have been the same.

     

    You know, so that the people who are actually reading this can know why you believe ideas can be patented and that all implementations of an idea are identical.


    Repeating a lie three times over doesn't make it come true.  Stop it.  I never said, implied, or i any way suggested that, nor am I pretending anything.  That you're saying I doing either is a perfect example of a straw man, which apparently you hate.  Until you quit with the lying and posturing I'm not going to do a goddamn thing to service your diversions and distractions.

     

    Answer my question or shut up.

  • Reply 57 of 67
    How do they make it so that the grille doesn't get it the way? On current phones if you even get a small scratch on the glass infront of the camera the camera only focuses on the scratch.
  • Reply 58 of 67
    solipsismxsolipsismx Posts: 19,566member
    How do they make it so that the grille doesn't get it the way? On current phones if you even get a small scratch on the glass infront of the camera the camera only focuses on the scratch.

    1) That is the trick, isn't it? Either they can find some clever way to compensate (which I think is unlikely unless they use two cameras) or they just don't have the grill over the camera.

    2) Apple has been using sapphire for the camera, but I'm sure how prevalent that is in phones at this time.
  • Reply 59 of 67
    dasanman69dasanman69 Posts: 13,002member
    cali wrote: »
    I think like me.

    I should hope that you think like you. ;)
  • Reply 60 of 67
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member
    Originally Posted by Crowley View Post

    I never said, implied, or i any way suggested that

     

    Said it right here.

     



    Originally Posted by Crowley View Post

    …I thought you'd have something more than that semantic nonsense.


     


    You have explicitly said that you are of the belief that “patenting an idea” and “patenting an implementation of an idea” are the same thing.

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