The camera on the iPhone 4S includes some major improvements. First, it takes less time to open and take a photo (or shoot a video) because now you just press the home button twice and a camera icon appears in the lower right corner of the lock screen. Tap it and open the camera app. Secondly, taking a shot and taking a photo in landscape mode has become easier, thanks to Apple stealing the idea of the volume button shutter from the people at Camera+. It feels like you’re shooting with a little point-and-shoot.
Check out the video below where I show you how to use these two great new features in Camera in iOS 5 on iPhone 4S.
You can keep pinching to zoom in on your subject. The camera has a flash just like the iPhone 4. Other features on iPhone 4 that are no different from iOS 4 include:
In addition to faster access and physical shutter, you get a focus lock feature, more sharing features, and some nice and simple photo editing tools.
First, the focus lock feature (called AE/AF for camera enthusiasts). This allows you to lock the exposure (AE) and focus (AF) of your image. Tap what you want to focus on or what you want the iPhone 4S camera to use to determine the correct exposure. Tap and hold to turn on AE/AF. Now, if you recompose your shot, it will keep the same focus point and use the same exposure. Use this to take a great photo of someone’s face, even if the composition is heavily backlit.
Apple has integrated Twitter sharing into iOS 5. You can now take a photo and quickly share it with your followers via the share button in Camera Roll. The Share button looks like a box with an arrow next to the blue button that returns you to the Camera app. That blue button is new too. Other sharing features of iOS 4 are still included…
While playing the slideshow, you can send the slideshow to your TV via AirPlay and an Apple TV (see below).
The edit button brings up a new toolbar below that photo. Left-to-right buttons allow you to rotate photos, auto-enhance the image, and fix red-eye (see toolbar in the image below).
The Crop tool (the last button on the toolbar in the image above) lets you capture only the best parts of your photo. Drag the corners or edges of the crop line to frame the shot just the way you want it.
Below you can see some sample shots taken with the Camera. The first shot is a close-up without flash. You get nice details and even some depth of field.
This next shot was taken using the zoom feature pushed to maximum zoom. I had a really hard time getting shots that weren’t blurry or noisy, even in a bright room.
The next shot was taken with flash. He made the photo look scary by blowing it up.
Finally, check out the outdoor shot below.
The camera app improves the quality of the iPhone camera, but it won’t replace your DSLR anytime soon. However, keeping that cheap point-and-shoot camera in a drawer might be good enough.
