The retractable camera lens works like a mini point-and-shoot!
there used to be a thing called a “point-and-shoot camera.” This was a purpose-built device that only took photos
Don’t do this to me
Back in 2012: Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom.
So we have come full circle.
I hope that catches on. I hate that my phone is 80% as good as my $500 DSLR but has absolutely no depth perception. Software fills in the background with a shitty bokeh effect that ruined my favourite wildflower photo I’ve taken. If we get a trend of actual lenses then maybe that will start to go away.
The problem is fundamentally a physics issue.
You’re going to struggle to get depth of field on any pancake stack, much less one that is as miniaturized as a mobile phone.
Also your sensor isn’t actually nearly as good as a DSLR. A DSLR has a sensor about 5x the size of a phone and that makes a huge difference in the photos.
Here’s a handy graphic:
Responding to the comment on the sensor quality.
By posting this image, the takeaway that I think most people will have is that the phone camera will be somewhere around 4.4 by 3.3mm, and that’s 1.5% of what you want. But this one, the one in the article’s sensor is 9.8 by 7.4mm, somewhere in the middle of this chart.
It’s also not a direct apples to apples comparison, because phones are smaller and thus have smaller lenses and so smaller sensors make more sense. If bigger is always better, then big cinema cameras would be even bigger, but they’re usually full frame. A smaller sensor doesn’t have to be worse, it just has to be more compact, meaning it’s more expensive, and that would often translate to worse, but in phones, compactness is a valued feature.*
*There are physical limitations to how much light will hit a surface.
The size of the sensor limits the size of the lens as well as the way the optics are formed for the stack.
You will never get starry bokeh from a stack of lenses that are so tight.
There’s a reason that you’ll have filmmakers shooting in larger and larger formats - it changes image quality and the type of lenses you can use.
I’ve figured it’s only a matter of time before this comes. With flagship phones costing US$1,000+ there’s starting to be room for that kind of cost.
Yes, just what everyone wants, an even bulkier camera bump!
Remove the bump: make the phone thicker for more battery 😉
Unfortunately the average consumer consistently prefers thinner phones. Thicker offerings sell worse than their thinner counterparts.
I would definitely rather have a thicker phone and have the back be uniform rather than a huge camera bump. It makes holding the phone in landscape so awkward.
Congrats: you just proved you’re not the average consumer.
I’m pretty sure a lot of people agree with me, I remember seeing a poll a while ago where people said that they would rather have a thicker phone with more battery life than a thinner one.
It’s not what actual consumers prefer though.
People can say that all they want but the marketing facts are that the thinner phones have consistently won out.
Most users don’t have a choice between thick or thin, especially if you’ve bought into the Apple ecosystem. Either you take their increasingly thin phones (remember the one that was so thin that it would start to deform from being in the front pocket of Skinny Jeans?) or you’re “left behind”.
The Android world isn’t much better. Same thing goes for “tall vs short” phones. Try and find a top-tier phone that’s 5" or smaller.
When Apple offers small phones nobody buys them (see iPhone 13 mini)
When Android companies offer thick phones they lose out to the latest thin Samsung.
The phone manufacturers aren’t idiots - they do a lot of research into what will sell the most phones.
Battery life and thick < thin.
oh cool, now your phone can suck in dust that lands on the sensor and you’d either have to do a lengthy cleaning operation or live with it.
The phone is IP68 rated so dust shouldn’t be any problem.
Phones are not entry-level in photography.
I used to have moto z4 and it had a camera attachment and while it took some great pictures it sucked when you opened the camera app in your pocket and the lens popped out.
