The 5 megapixel, dual LED flash Verizon/Motorola Droid camera beats the iPhone 3GS 3 megapixels on specs alone, right? Not according to the Chicago Sun/Times’ technology columnist, Andy Ihnatko, who put some side-by-side comparison shots up on Flickr.

Ihnatko also seems to share many of my opinions about the Droid’s dubious introduction commercial, though he writes it out ever so much better. About the camera specifically, he says:

But does the Droid actually take better pictures than the iPhone? Overall, no. Over the past few days I’ve shot lots of scenes with both phones and the iPhone consistently produced prettier images. Where software inside the Droid is easily bamboozled by uncooperative lighting, the iPhone’s camera app almost always finds a workable and attractive solution.

Droid Day in November 6th. Android Central has one in the house, and Casey’s already crowing about it, so stay tuned for more!

[Via Daring Fireball]

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Verizon Droid vs. iPhone 3GS Side-by-Side Camera Showdown

Everyone, including Steve Jobs, has very reasonable sounding theories as to why the third gen iPod touch camera was removed. Rather than rehash it again, however, we thought we’d let our minds wonder into parody, and consider what might have happened in a world only slightly more cartoonish than ours…

Steve Jobs, fresh from his recent leave of absence, comes crashing back into Apple’s Cupertino campus, and after fixing the typography on the iPhone 3G S 3GS, tweaking some pixels on the Snow Leopard UI, and spending time meditating deep in the iTablet vault, he heads over to the scorched closet that used to be reserved for iPhone A2DP testing…

“64GB a go?” he demands. “Good”

“Is it thinner?” grumble. “Next year…”

“What about those ultra-tiny auto-focus 3 megapixel sensors we received?” Massive frown. “They don’t work? Not any of them? Then what’s this prototype using?”

The room goes dead silent.

“The iPod nano VGA camera? In a premium, flagship product, that runs the iPhone OS and supports gorgeous stills and breathtaking video?”

The silence is broken by the sound of the iPod touch with camera prototype ricochetting off the head of the hapless white-coat who had the temerity to offer it up.

“Yank it, bozos.” Jobs strides from the room, Dark Force lightning blistering the air around him. “And let’s try to raise the intelligence in this room by next spring, shall we?”

And, boom, no camera, not even a nano-style VGA one in the iPod touch this fall. If that’s the case, however, it’s hard to argue with Jobs (or whomever made the final decision?) that an iPod touch class device demands an iPhone 3GS, and not iPod nano class camera.

That’s not the way Apple plays cricket. They don’t do choppy 15-frame a second video on the iPhone 3G, and they won’t put a nano camera in the iPod touch.

[via Engadget and Macrumors]

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Why the iPod touch G3 Camera was Yanked, and Rightly So

Yesterday we heard a rumor that Apple may be experiencing problems with the iPod’s new camera feature, and those problems could cause a delay.

Today, Hardmac [via MacRumors] threw in some rumored details about the rumored problems:

The issue would be linked to the new camera module. We did not get any further details, but the problem has been spotted in the first dozen of thousands units produced. Those units have been put aside.

Again, even if true, this would likely only cause a delay in the release of the third generation iPod touch, not its announcement at tomorrow’s “It’s only rock and roll, but we like it” special music event. This has happened in the past when products weren’t quite ready or had last minute spec changes necessitating a delay.

Still, we’ll only know for sure when Apple hits the stage.

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Rumor Expounded: More on Potential iPod touch Camera Delay

The iPod touch, iPod nano, and now it sounds like the hard-drive based iPod classic are all set to receive cameras, presumably at Apple’s September 9 music event. We’ve heard rumors of the iPod touch before, of course, and even the iPod nano, but the iPod classic as well?

That’s what Digitimes (via MacRumors) is reporting:

OmniVision will be the sole supplier of 3.2-megapixel CIS products for new iPod nano, iPod classic and iPod Touch models which will be launched in September, the sources indicated.

So, the take away — if these rumors pan out — is that those of you who want apps (touch), portability (nano) and now, massive storage capacity (classic) might all have uber-convenient picture snapping in your future.

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

3.2 Megapixel Cameras Bound for iPod touch, iPod nano, and… iPod classic?

It was just over a year ago that the iPhone became the undisputed champion of cell phone cameras on Flickr. Without a doubt, the modern day cell phone camera has become a serious photographic tool and thanks to the release of iPhone 3GS, the iPhone has stepped into 1st place in upload popularity of all cameras just ahead of Cannon’s Digital Rebel XTi.

Now we all are aware that the three megapixel camera on the iPhone 3GS is not the best out there but it does it’s job fairly well. The main reason for it’s popularity on Flickr is convenience. Not only do you carry your iPhone everywhere you go, unlike a regular camera, you also have the ability to upload directly from the device. Convenience reigns supreme.

It was only a matter of time before iPhone was crowned the undisputed overall champion of the Flickr world.

[Via Electronista]

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iPhone Now Owns the Title of “Most Popular Camera on Flickr”

Does the iPhone 3GS camera constantly buffer live video data, in effect pre-caching the images you want before you take them? Birdhouse developer Adam Lisagore thinks so, and says so via his Lonely Sandwich blog:

from the moment you launch the Camera app, data is not only streaming to the viewer, but being cached to memory at full resolution, much like a TiVo with a live broadcast. Where there’s been latency in previous versions of the iPhone hardware/software due to processing limitations, those limitations have been overcome in the iPhone 3GS, closing the gap between intention and result by processing the streaming input from a microsecond before the shutter was released. In essence, the iPhone is constantly storing the picture you want before you even take it.

Daring Fireball confirms this, and after-the-fact, it lines up with a lot of our experiences here at TiPb as well.

Clever indeed, Apple…

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iPhone 3GS Camera Pre-Caches Images Before You Take Them?

Rumors of the third generation iPod touch getting a camera — even video camera — is nothing new, however Wired.com now claims they may be getting a built-in microphone as well:

A well-connected source tells us those rumors are on the money, and that Apple’s factories in China are already manufacturing iPod Touch models with integrated cameras and microphones. An Apple spokesman declined to comment when reached by phone.

With the addition of video to Camera, and the Voice Memo app, combined with a built-in mic making VoIP even easier, we’ll come out and say it — ultimate non-phone handset is nigh.

Apple typically unveils new iPod touch models once a year at their special music event, alongside other iPods and related announcements — which last time, at Let’s Rock included the iPhone 2.1 firmware and iTunes 8.

[via MacRumors]

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Third Generation iPod touch to get Camera… and Microphone?

AutoStitch Forum Review by msbaylor. For more Forum Reviews, see the TiPb iPhone App Store Forum Review Index!

AutoStitch is the only application in the App Store that gives the ability to stitch multiple rows of photos in any orientation in creating your panorama, meaning you don’t just get the normal one row, 360 degree view that Pano or the Panorama apps produce.

I was completely taking off guard when I found how utterly simple it was to use the application! Literally you “select & stitch” that all you do, no take one photo, stitch, take another photo, stitch, etc.

Overview

On the main screen you navigate to your photo album and tap to select photos, they don’t have to be in any particular order. The application will then load it into app (bottom half of screen) once that is complete; you can tap the “stitch” button. If there are photos you want to remove, just tap on the photos in the bottom pane and confirm that you want to delete it.

There is a progress bar at the bottom that I found quite accurate and you can watch you panorama build right in front of you.

Once the panorama is complete, it might be odd shaped, but you can crop it later via Photoshop or GIMP- one of the options that is really lacking. At this time you can also zoom in to view the stitching and if you want to replace a photo, you can go back and go through the process again.

There is a progress bar at the bottom that I found quite accurate and you can watch you panorama build right in front of you.

Once the panorama is complete, it might be odd shaped, but you can crop it later via Photoshop or GIMP- one of the options that is really lacking. At this time you can also zoom in to view the stitching and if you want to replace a photo, you can go back and go through the process again.

Once you are satisfied with your result, it’s time to save the photo

Here are some tests (4) that I conducted with the app

1) 4 “rows” of photos, 360 degrees horizontally:

I tool 57 photos and had it stitched into the photo below. Each iPhone (3GS) photo has a resolution of 2,048 x 1,536 (~1000kb each). The photo that I ended up with is 2,406 x 831 (784kb). So my end result is nearly smaller than the initial size of one iPhone photo – not cool. Test Grade: C-

2) 3 Rows of photos, 100 degrees horizontally:

Now the photo below, I took a total of 19 photos taken at the same resolution (obviously), ending result was a 2,350 x 851 photo – just as large as the previous panorama with less photos. I assume that the application is capping the size of the photo to reduce the RAM usage. Test Grade: C+

As In the first test photo I captured about 100 degrees vertical by 360 degrees horizontal, while the second one is only about 30 degrees vertical by 100 degrees horizontal. I am not a fan of this at all.

3) “Normal” one row panorama: The app did a good job at just creating a single row panorama Test Grade: B

4) “Really bad photographer” panorama

I decided to take a number of shots that were taken diagonally, horizontally & vertically. The result I was very pleased with: Test Grade: B-

At first, I thought this app was amazing, but after doing a thorough analysis of the app through the tests, I wasn’t happy with the results. I expected a little more on the resolution side of things. As a reference point, the photo below was created using the Panorama App – its resolution is 3,004 x 832 by combining only 5 iPhone photos, considerably better resolution over the Autostitch app.

If you are someone that’s likes taking panoramas occasionally or would like to get into taking panoramas, this is a nice app to start with; however, if you are a photography kind of person, this isn’t the best app – namely due to the resolution issue, it’s just too low to do anything “more” with it.

Conclusion

Overall I found this application to be groundbreaking on the iPhone, even if it’s not the first Panorama application to come to the App store market – it has raised the bar for other Panorama apps. The application is simple enough for anyone to use. My main complaint is the lack of cropping and picking of resolutions. I assume rendering into a larger resolution would eat up the RAM, but it would be a nice option, especially for the 3GS users. I noticed a lot of blurry areas in my pictures – this is caused by one of two issues – 1. I took a blurry shot or 2. The photo blending didn’t work out to well. Two bucks is a good deal for this tiny, yet powerful app.

Tips on Taking Panoramas with this app

• If using the 3GS, try to set the exposure on a foreground object (which initially appears darker) or vice versa
• If using the 3GS, try to focus on the furthest object, such as the horizon. Obviously this can’t always happen especially if you are following the point above.
• Try to hold the iPhone as steady as possible in low light situations

Pros:

• Incredibly simple to use
• Don’t have to have photos in order to stitch
• Add photos all in one go
• Watch the building of the Panorama as it’s created
• Save to photo album is quick

Cons:

• No advanced options
• Alignment isn’t always dead on
• No cropping ability
• Resolution of panorama is low
• Only one resolution option

TiPb Review Rating

Autostitch is available for $1.99 from the iTunes App Store.

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App Review: AutoStitch Panorama Maker for iPhone

Could the iPod touch and iPod nano also be getting in on the camera action? We’ve heard the rumor before but evidence continues to mount with Techcrunch claiming:

One of our sources in Asia say that Apple has placed an order for a massive number of camera modules of the type that they include in the iPhone. These are inexpensive cameras, in the $10 range. And the size of the order, our source says, means they can only be used for one thing – the iPods.

As Dieter mentioned on iPhone Live! a camera is such a natural fit for the iPod touch that it’s hard to imagine Apple not doing it at this point. Adding video recording, editing, and sharing (along with the beefier chipset) also seems like a no-brainer port from the already-enabled iPhone 3GS. Even if Apple sticks with VGA resolution, users who want highly portable video recording might easily take the iPod integration over the better quality of a dedicated device like a Flip Mino HD.

Macrumors is also showing off a case that, if real, re-enforces the iPod nano camera rumors as well. Absent the iPod touch interface and processor power, however, it’s hard to see that being functional for anything but still photography. That being said, it remains a great way for Apple to keep moving the traditional iPod line forward even as it approaches market saturation.

Anyone eager to get their iPod camera action on?

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iPod touch and iPod nano Getting Camera?

We’d heard rumors about the iPod touch getting a camera already — makes sense and would tie it even more closely to the iPhone OS. HardMac (via MacRumors) is now saying the iPod nano will as well.

Sounds plausible as it provides an easy way for Apple to both strengthen ties within their ecosystem and incrementally update both platforms in time for the holidays.

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iPod touch and iPod nano to Get Cameras?