The Apple iPhone 5s & 5c Discussion Thread!

Discussion in 'Notebooks & Mobile Devices' started by Adrian Wong, Sep 16, 2013.

  1. peaz

    peaz ARP Webmaster Staff Member

    Not that much more bandwidth anymore. It's now 2GB-3GB data per month.

    As for me, I'm using my corporate SIM, so what I safe from getting my own line, I just pay for the phone outright :)

    BTW. The 5S is really great. It's really really fast. Very impressed with the overall responsiveness of the phone. THe battery life is actually really good too!

    Touch ID is actually pretty cool to use. It's one of those things that once you use, you almost immediately take it for granted. And now, I use a much stronger passcode for the phone instead of the simplistic 4 digit code. So TouchID for general use and when someone else tries to unlock using passcode, it's not as simple anymore :D
     
  2. peaz

    peaz ARP Webmaster Staff Member

    Surprisingly good. But seriously rather not use those puny flashes from the phone :)

    Burst mode is very impressive. and the camera/phone response really really fast. No lag when taking the 10fps burst shots, as well as reviewing the burst shots. In fact, scrolling through the photos provides you with 10fps video. Have to show to actually see what I mean. Very impressive. The A7 powered ISP really is something.
     
  3. zy

    zy zynine.com Staff Member

    10fps? damn, I think my HTC one only does 8fps. Need someone to help me time it. LOL.... But it can do burst shot up to 99 shots.
     
  4. Chai

    Chai Administrator Staff Member

    But to be honest, burst mode is useless. I have never used that before other than testing it since one of the first phones to feature 6-7fps with 99 burst shots ability on my old One X.
     
  5. Adrian Wong

    Adrian Wong Da Boss Staff Member

    It's to help n00b users get better pictures. Instead of relying on their skills to get that once-in-a-lifetime photo, burst mode gets them a ton of photos so they can pick the great ones and throw away the rest.

    In the future, I foresee these cameras being capable of taking full resolution photos in 30-60 fps burst modes, essentially making them high-resolution video cameras. Software will then pick out the top 5-10 frames per second for you to choose from. Or you can just compress and save it as a video.
     
  6. peaz

    peaz ARP Webmaster Staff Member

    Oh it's actually very useful on the 5s for two main reasons:

    1. Kids photography. You don't know how tough it is to get good photos when they aren't too keen to pose properly and stand still. Every parents know this I'm sure. I even think this feature is built specifically for just this single purpose. LOL!

    2. It's extremely easy to manage the tens or hundreds of photos and pick the best photo out on the 5s. Hard to explain but when you see it in action, you'll know what I mean, scrolling the photos 'bar' shows a video like view of the photos, so its really really really easy to browse and pick out the best one (or a few of them) and usually the ones automatically selected by the 5s is pretty accurate.

    And then, it is super easy to delete everything else that you don't need to keep.

    Edit: I just had to test. Went all the up to 251 shots and it was still taking it in at full speed….It's crazy.
     
    Last edited: Oct 14, 2013
  7. Adrian Wong

    Adrian Wong Da Boss Staff Member

    So there's like no limit (other than storage space) as far as the burst mode is concerned?? :haha:
     
  8. Chai

    Chai Administrator Staff Member

    Sorry, my phone only takes 20 shots burst since it's one of the earlier implementation.

    I don't have kids, so I definitely can't comment on that, but Android phones work pretty much the same as 5s. I guess that's where Apple copied from. 5s has the slideshow like function, but the rest of it is identical.

    Able to continuously take so many shots is nice for bragging rights, but choosing the best photo out of so many shots is PITA. There's also motion blur due to long shutter that you have to worry about when taking photos of kids. No matter how good a camera phone is, it's going to struggle taking pictures of kids.

    It's even worse when taking photos of dogs.
     
  9. Adrian Wong

    Adrian Wong Da Boss Staff Member

    I'm pretty sure every smartphone is going to move in that direction, eventually just taking high-res videos from which pictures can be saved. It all boils down to the sensor and processor speed, and flash storage capacity, of course.

    It sure will be a PITA to select the best photos, but that's why we need software to pick out the top 5-10 shots of a burst shot.

    I don't think the 10 fps limit is due to the shutter speed. It's either a soft limit set to reduce the number of shots, or a hard limit due to the ISP's performance.
     
  10. Chai

    Chai Administrator Staff Member

    I didn't mean that 10fps limit is due to shutter speed. What I meant is shutter speed will be a problem even if you have 30fps capabilities. The only way to counter that is with bigger aperture or ISO increase.
     
  11. peaz

    peaz ARP Webmaster Staff Member

    Which is exactly my point why I actually like the feature on the 5s and actually use it regularly. Because it's totally isn't a PITA to do so. I don't even usually use the software selected ones since some of the shots are nicer without needing my kids to look directly at the camera or selecting the ones at the moment of their biggest smile/laugh.

    Like I said, you have to really use it yourself to see what I mean. But here's a video of what I mean. iPhone 5S Burst Mode Preview - YouTube

    The great thing about it isn't that it takes 10fps. It's that it is really easy to pick the best ones. Not because of any fancy slideshow mode, but simply how it's presented. When scrolling through the photos by swiping the bottom 'timeline' bar of photos, the main previews views it like a video, not scrolling through individual photos. That simple thing really makes it super easy.

    Well, Adrian, as for storage space, of course there are limitations. That's why a 64GB one is nice to have :)
     
  12. Chai

    Chai Administrator Staff Member

    Going thru a slideshow to look for a shot with his eyes looking at your phone/in focus/no motion blur is still not easy, especially if you burst more than 10 shots. That is what I'm trying to say.
     
  13. peaz

    peaz ARP Webmaster Staff Member

    Sure, but that's exactly my point. It's easy. Of course, this is a phone camera, so it's not perfect sharpness that you will be looking for since most of these photos only goes into family distribution to be viewed on tablets and smartphones, on FB or iCloud. Also, in burst mode, either all your shots are in focus, or they are all off focus. The camera does not autofocus on each burst shot, focus and exposure is locked by the time you start shooting. So it's really 'moments' that you are really only selecting. And that's easy.

    I've seen the video on HTC One X way of sliding pic by pic to select your best shot. And i agree that that method in a PITA. One of the reason I never took burst shots (or really really hate to) on the DSLR.

    I think if there is little lag to the whole process, it makes it really really useable. It's only PITA because it is slow and time wasting.
     
  14. Chai

    Chai Administrator Staff Member

    I've also seen how iPhone 5s works before commenting, and it doesn't really make the process much easier IMO. You still can't see if the picture is motion blur free without zooming in.

    I just think that burst mode does not belong in a phone. I much prefer a DSLR, at least the success rate is much higher. The only disadvantage is the missing option of selecting the best shot.

    One X is almost 2 years old now. I'm sure the newer Android phones are much better now.

    Anyway, you have your opinion, I have mine.
     
  15. Adrian Wong

    Adrian Wong Da Boss Staff Member

    It's true that you have to zoom in to check if the photo is blurry or sharp... at least on my iPhone 4S, but that's because the resolution of the photo is much higher than the screen resolution. That's why sometimes the photos that I post on Facebook appear blurry even though they look sharp on my iPhone 4S... :wall:

    But when it comes to selecting from a burst, I think this will be the future whether we like it or not. Eventually, the DSPs and sensors will be fast enough to record 30+ frames per second of full resolution photos.

    When that happens, it will be quite pointless to just take one shot when they can just take a burst of 5-10 shots every time you "take a photo" and let you choose the best of that burst.

    Or they will just record as long as you hold your finger to the button. Then you either choose a few photos or save the take as a video file.

    So whether it's useful or not, I think such picture selection software will become common in smartphones.
     
  16. Chai

    Chai Administrator Staff Member

    newer phone like note 3 is capable of taking 4k video, and you can screen capture as still just like how Iphone 5s work anyway.

    htc one Zoe may not be able to capture unlimited frames, but it is also capable of browsing photo like a video slideshow. phones these days are fast enough to be able to take full res at close to 30fps.

    htc one x's main weak point is the video capabilities, 720p24 only, and it stutters badly too. so burst mode shutter is to be expected. I just tested my phone, it is capable of 99 frames burst, there was an option to limit to 20 frames. I was already struggling to tell if the shot taken with my 4.7" is blur or not, so it can't be any better with 4".

    some features might be standard now, but they are still useless in real life, like voice recognition.
     
    Last edited: Oct 18, 2013
  17. Adrian Wong

    Adrian Wong Da Boss Staff Member

    I was thinking of maybe just buying the iPhone 5, if it's significantly cheaper. But it looks like Apple is maintaining the iPhone 5 at its original price and jacking up the iPhone 5s' price by RM 200-300 (US$ 70-100).

    With such a small price difference, there isn't really a point in buying the older iPhone 5. Even the difference in resale value between the two models alone is more than RM 200 (US$ 70).

    No wonder Maxis sold out all their iPhone 5S pre-orders in just 2 days. Plenty of iPhone 5Cs available though... :think:
     

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