Apple’s Glowtime event brings a trio of new updates across Apple Watch, AirPods and iPhone. Like all Apple events there’s a lot packed into that 90+ minutes, but the biggest news for filmmakers and media creation folks was near the end with the introduction of the iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max.
The new iPhone will, of course, be faster with a new A18 Pro chip. That will enable things like better graphics performance and the upcoming Apple Intelligence. But there’s a lot to like for those of us whose main iPhone use seems to be the camera features. At the top of that list is a new button: Camera Control.
this animation that happens when you open the camera app from the Camera Control 😮💨 pic.twitter.com/p2MuetrQVB
— Sebastiaan de With (@sdw) September 9, 2024
This new Camera Control button comes at an interesting time. For iPhone users, the glass slab design isn’t really a place where big design changes seem to be able to happen. Since we spend so much time using our phones as cameras, this new button gives us something fun to play with. It also uses some familiar music memory to those who have used a dedicated DSLR. Andpple says that “later this fall,” the Camera Control button will be updated to allow for pressure-sensitive controls, not just in the native camera app but in third-party apps as well. While the Camera Control button has a lot of hardware designed into it it’s the software that is really going to make it functional. It looks like this new button will launch the camera app so that means those of us that keep the Action Button set to open the camera will be able to change that Action Button to some other functionality. Another update coming later to the Camera Control button will let you point your phone at an object and have Apple Intelligence tell you all about it.
I do have to wonder how well the Camera Control button will work with a phone case.
New MagSafe cases from Apple, Silicone and Clear (no FineWoven) have a sapphire crystal button over Camera control with conductive layer. pic.twitter.com/uAMot0YWHC
— Stephen Robles (@stephenrobles) September 9, 2024
I guess the above tweet means that cases must take that new button into their design. I bet they will be more expensive. The new Beats cases seem to have a new “conductive layer” for the Camera Control button.
A fresh 🆕 fit for iPhone 16 📱 Introducing the Beats iPhone cases with support for MagSafe and Camera Control. pic.twitter.com/DaVPAiGe3K
— Beats by Dre (@beatsbydre) September 9, 2024
No matter what kind of case you get you’ll want one that makes full use of this button as it looks like fun.
Other new camera features include a 48MP Fusion camera with a faster quad-pixel sensor and 4K120 fps video recording in Dolby Vision. That ups the iPhone’s game with slow motion recording and now it’s easier to adjust the playback motion frame rate during playback in the Photos app. The regular iPhone 16 Pro also gets the 5x Telephoto camera which used to be only for the Pro Max. For even more professional workflows you can capture 4K120 fps ProRes to a connected external drive.
These camera advancements come at a time when many of us seem to only shoot video and stills on our our iPhones. Just this weekend, I spent a good bit of time shooting with an old handicap that had the flip-out screen. I picked it up when a parent who was shooting a ceremony with it, had to put it down to become part of the ceremony. While it was actually kind of fun to shoot with it, I thought about how it had been years since I had shot any video with any kind of camera with this sort of form factor. After it was over several of us we’re talking about pretty much the only camera many of us use anymore is the camera built into our mobile devices. and is the resident photo and video nerd in the group. I had to remind myself that I have a pretty capable Sony micro four-thirds camera that shoots incredible photos and pretty darn good video but yet I rarely use it because the video and stills from my iPhone are that good. couple that with how simple computational photography is on a good mole device like the iPhone and how convenient it is to use means that my “good camera” pretty much stays in the camera bag. This new camera control button will make shooting media on the iPhone 16 Pro even more fun.
There is also an unexpected update to audio with the iPhone 16 Pro. There are four new “studio-quality” mics that can capture audio in Spatial Audio. But you can also edit audio in new ways with what is called “Audio Mix.” Take a look at this image:
When in the Photos app you can toggle through different mix presets to do things like bring out the subjects in your videos even in noisy environments. That will be fun to play with even if you’re not shooting a professional production with your phone.
Speaking of professional productions, the Apple event showed behind the scenes for the production of The Weeknd’s upcoming music video “Dancing in the Flames.” This is from director Anton Tammi and director of photography Erik Henrikkson and will premiere this Friday.
It’s been proven that with the right support, iPhones can shoot some pretty pro-quality video. One quote from the DP stood out to me:
“I was very impressed with how iPhone 16 was able to pick up the strong highlights, the deep blacks, because we were shooting with very bright HDMI backlights hitting the rain and that was something I was worried about. ‘How will the iPhone pick these lights up, how will the contrast be managed, how will this look on the Weeknd’s face?’ And when I saw the results, I was blown away to be honest.”
There was no doubt some extensive post-production on the images they captured for this music video as that happens with all high-end music videos. With the DP being able to dig into the image during color grading and achieve what they want, that tells me the iPhone captures some good data. Considering the cost of an iPhone vs a high-end cinema camera, it truly can give anyone the tools to shoot pro images. While I still think these kinds of productions are more marketing gimmicks at this point in time, if they inspire someone to shoot a film they could not have otherwise shot, then the gimmick was worth it.
There’s a whole lot more to these new phones but these were the signature things that stuck out to me that content creators might most be interested in. Prices for the iPhone 16 Pro will start at $999. Pre-orders start at 5:00 AM PDT on 9/13/24 and will be available on 9/20.