Smartphone photography and filming capability taking another leap forward
Smartphones have revolutionized how we live our lives and see the world. In their early days, their focus was on business professionals to provide them with a convenient portable communication tool that could also act as a personal organizer. They started gaining attention in the early 2000 with the growth of email and the internet, thanks to NTT DoCoMo i-mode’s platform, Blackberry, Nokia’s Symbian platform and Windows Mobile. Then Apple’s first iPhone was launched in 2007 with a fixed-focus 2 MP camera, democratizing the smartphone to the masses.
At the time, the major camera brands, including Canon and Nikon, did not fully realize the impact this small device would have on their market. Staying put on with their incremental update to their sensor technology and camera features, they left the innovation and adoption of mirrorless technology to smaller camera brands, such as Epson, Leica, Panasonnic and Ricoh.
The State Of The Digital Camera Market
However, as the smartphone kept pushing forward their technological advancement, and followed by Sony success in the professional market with their full frame mirrorless E-Mount cameras and lenses, Canon and Nikon rushed into the market to release their own mirrorless systems. Will this be enough? As of 2019, the top five camera companies hold up to 93.7% of the global market share. Below are their share in 2019 and variation from 2018:
- Canon 45.4% (+2.4%)
- Sony 20.2% (+0.9%)
- Nikon 18.6% (-1.6%)
- Fujifilm Holdings 4.7% (-0.4%)
- Panasonic 4.7% (0.0%)
In 2019, camera units sold dropped by 22% a consistent decline of over 87% since 2010. Will the shrinking digital camera market stabilize in 2020? We should find out in a few months when the Camera & Imaging Products Association (CIPA) publish their figures.
Within 10 years, the digital market decreased nearly ten fold, aligned with the adoption of smartphones. The smartphone industry has been hard at work releasing more and more features in their camera system, improving both photo and video feature sets. Initially, there was the standard incremental technical advancements, including better resolution and light sensitivity, faster auto-focus and optical stabilization. Then the beauty of miniaturization allowed the addition of extra camera lenses into the already tiny package of the phone, with specialized lenses for wide-angle and telephotos.
The iPhone 12 Pro And Pro Max
In 2020, Apple added the following major features to their iPhone 12 Pro line-up that should make most enthusiasts ask themselves the question: do I still need a dedicated camera?
- Sensor Shift image stabilization, specific to the Pro Max
- ProRAW
- Lidar scanner
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Sensor Shift
Apple Sensor Shift technology uses a gyroscope to move the sensor to compensate for shaking vibration. It provides a much more efficient stabilization than lens-only optical stabilization, much like in-body stabilization (IBIS) offered in many recent mirrorless camera bodies.
The technology differs from the optical stabilization introduced on the iPhone 6 Plus and carried throughout each subsequent iteration. The optical stabilization feature is specific to the lens and can only compensate for micro vibration when capturing with that specific lens. With sensor shift, the entire lens module can move based on the processing of the A14 Bionic chip. These anti-vibration adjustments are calculated by the algorithm meaning software update and AI could improve their behavior, making this approach more flexible and open for future improvement. Also, the mechanics behind sensor shift allows for wider range of movement hence better anti-shake result.
Any future lens based accessory attached to the smartphone will also benefit from this feature, much like camera bodies with IBIS support.
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ProRAW
Anyone who owns a camera may have seen a feature to save their pictures or videos in processed or unprocessed mode (RAW). Professionals and enthusiasts are familiar with the benefits unprocessed mode provide, despite the extra work required afterwards. There is a very simple reason for that. Unprocessed content can be imported into your favorite photo or video editing tool, which provides an extensive array of tools to make corrections, adjustments and improvements on your capture.
Editing a processed picture or video limits your abilities to enhance its content, and the image quality will degrade the more alterations are made. Unprocessed content can be manipulated as much as needed while retaining the original quality.
Although this feature is not available at launch, it will be introduced through software update in the upcoming months. This will provide enough time for developers to fine-tune their photo editing software; expect support from all major companies and the push from Apple on iPad as a multimedia editing platform.
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LiDAR
LiDAR (Light Detection And Ranging) is a technique that projects laser lights then uses a sensor to capture their reflections to measure distances. Time elapse and wavelength help to map a 3D representation of the target.
On the iPhone, the LiDAR scanner fires multiple infrared laser pulses to a scene to better capture their 3D depth. Of course, there is limitation to this laser system, only covering room-size objects, which is sufficient for personal use, such as simulating placement of furniture, but more importantly provide better assist to the camera focus and sensing in low-light conditions, and more accurate portrait among other things.
While professional and enthusiast relies on the quality of the glasses on interchangeable lenses to capture sufficient light in their photos for smooth Bokeh or blurred background, this effect is also best with larger sensors so enough lights can get in. Smartphone tiny sensors restrict such ability, that is a reason why they rely on artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms to process portraits for instance and blur the background. The recent progress in machine learning and deep learning allowed for great results that are satisfactory for most consumers. However, when pixel peeping or in more difficult situations, the effect is noticeable and cannot meet professional standards.
The LiDAR scanner is a first step to revolutionize that. The limited array of pulses may not be sufficient to draw complete contour of objects or people, but it is a start. The technology will provide the stepping stone for further enhancements and in future iterations, may close the cap to larger sensor benefits.
Closing Thoughts
So what does that mean for photographers and videographers? For the next few years, the expensive camera and lenses you have invested in will still remain relevant. They rely on proven optical physics to capture the lights and provide true quality images. Smartphones will keep relying on incremental improvements from AI and miniaturization to attempt to meet the same level of standards. However, they will eventually reach a level where the line is sufficiently blurred for you to question whether you still need to spend the money and carry the extra weight, while your smartphone can capture nearly similar results.
As an amateur enthusiast photographer, I look forward to the day when all I need to carry is my smartphone to handle landscape and wildlife photography, portraiture and street photography, especially while traveling.
These are all exciting news for us consumers, whether you are a professional, enthusiast or not. This healthy competing market keeps bringing us innovations we can benefit, from better portability to improve image quality. What do you think?
