An iPhone 7 with two cameras seems improbable if we refer to everything that Apple has done in recent years, but rumors appeared during the last year indicated that such a device is being tested by engineers in Cupertino.
The rumors are also supported by patents registered by the Apple company, one of them describing a system in which two cameras could be mounted behind a lens and could allow us to record pictures or video clips in different formats.
More precisely, the iPhone 7 could switch from one focal length to another using each of the two cameras separately, being able to record both standard photos and others that display a subject from a much closer proximity, all without moving the terminal in relation to what we were recording.
This description for the system is only part of what Apple could offer in an iPhone 7 with two cameras, the American company thinking that it could offer a device that can simultaneously record pictures and video clips, although we can practically do the same work now, but not so well.
[Image] capturing a child extinguishing candles on a birthday cake […] In some embodiments, second camera module 3084 can be used as a telephoto camera module to zoom in on the face of the child as she is about to blow out the candles and first camera module 3082 can capture a burst of high resolution still images of her smiling face. In some embodiments, first camera module 3082 is simultaneously capturing standard 1080p 30 frames per second video of the entire group of kids gathered and singing around the cake [...] As the two camera modules are synchronized in time, the still images can easily be automatically inserted at the right time in a final video stream.
Apart from this functionality, an iPhone 7 with two cameras could record video clips at standard framerate and in slow-motion, they can be combined automatically after the recording is completed using an application specially created by the Apple company.
In the same idea, movies could be recorded in 1080p and 4K format, an example given by Apple being that of a baseball match in which the user records the movements of the players in standard framerate and their actions with zoom and in slow-motion to see them later.
Some embodiments generate a synthetic result image at least in part from data of the first image and data of the second image. In some embodiments, the synthetic intermediate image has been generated by enhancing the first image using data from the second image. Some embodiments display the first image and the second image in a shared screen interface.
Going further, Apple describes a method in which two video feeds recorded by the cameras could be superimposed into a single movie, such functionality seems impossible at the moment with only one camera available in a smartphone.
Regarding pictures, Apple describes methods by which it could allow changing the focus in the picture after recording it, this being already offered by certain applications, but combined pictures taken by two cameras would offer a much better quality for such a functionality.
Everything that Apple describes in its patent seems very far from being implemented in a smartphone and this is probably true, if not we will have interesting surprises in the iPhone 7.
