iPhone IV

Apple has announced their new iPhone 4. Cool name. New look. Loads of features.
Here's my perspective on the phone as a photojournalist.

From June 9th

FIVE MEGAPIXELS
I got pretty excited when I heard this one.
I never felt like my 3G had enough quality for me to consider it as a secondary camera. The new sensor on the iPhone 4 will give me the creative leeway, and sharing capabilities that I've always wanted out of the iPhone.


Samples images from Apple look incredible. (Warning: High Bandwidth!)

Images are crisp, with a wide lens and low chromatic aberration.

From June 9th

The camera works great in well-lit scenes, but the low-lit scenes still lack punch.

From June 9th

It’ll be interesting to see how powerful the flash is.

I am skeptical though of the examples found on Apple's website. When I downloaded the samples, but the metadata didn't include any information about the camera. The VGA quality of the front facing camera looks superior to my 3G’s 1.3mp camera. And I doubt the little LED is powerful enough to illuminate the couple so much.

But I could be wrong. I am really hope this is legit.

720p, 30fps
The video example found on Apple.com shows off a gorgeous scene of the Golden Gate Bridge in the background, and lag-less waves crashing onto the beach in the forward-ground.

I can totally see myself using this:
Behind-the-scene video.
Scouting footage.
Breaking news coverage.
Embarrassing family trip videos.

UFO’s.
Everything at 720p.

Steve Jobs is making it hard for me to justify $1800 for a 7D.

I hope Apple got rid of the video length upload limitation. In the 3GS, recorded video was scaled down from 640x480 to 480x320 when uploading directly to Youtube from the phone.
I would love to see full 720p upload capability over wifi.

Front Facing Camera
After years of hearing complaints about the lack of video conference functionality, Apple finally added a camera to the front of their phone. This will make for fun phone interviews.


Retina Display
This is amazing. The ppi on the new iPhone is 326 points. My Macbook is at 163 points and my Acer 24” monitor has 115 points.

I would love to see this screen on the next iPad.

The rest of the options are cool to.

See me standing in line in front of Apple on June 24th. Heh.

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I've played with a lot of camera app's to.

Mill Colour was the best free camera app.
Its a simple, easy to use, and has lots of features.

Best Camera is the best paid camera app. Sponsored by Chase Jarvis, the app allows you to stack filters, share using multipule social networks, and even gives you workflow options.