“With the release of the iPhone 8 [sic] [recte iPhone X] slated for September 12, Apple will be bringing a lot of new technology to the table — both a blend of new tech for the iPhone 8 as well as technology that will be hailed as an industry first,” Arash Asli, CEO of Yocale.com, writes for Forbes. “In fact, if analysts are correct, it’s the kind of technology that could completely revolutionize our very lives as we know them — in much the same way that the iPhone transformed our lives when it debuted 10 years ago.”
“In defense of time spent refining technology, Apple Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook has said the company doesn’t feel the need to be the ‘first’ but rather the ‘best.’ New additions to the iPhone 8 will come in the form of an edge-to-edge OLED display, a virtual home button and wireless charging,” Asli writes. “Again, features all new to the iPhone 8, but ones that can already be found elsewhere in the smartphone market.”
“But if Apple’s past is anything to go by, these features will feel new, fresh and better on the iPhone. Where Apple is reportedly two years ahead of its time — and what could potentially set the stage for a shift in our lives — is with its 3-D sensing technology. It’s also a promising feature for both consumers and businesses alike,” Asli writes. “The most promising aspect of the iPhone 8 — arguably the leading feature that could justify its alleged $999 premium price tag — is its AR capability. Developers have already found code that would suggest that maps could be upgraded with augmented reality technology, which could change what we see in the world around us.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Aside from mistakenly calling iPhone X, “iPhone 8” throughout his article and in the Forbes headline) ostensibly due to months of rumors referring to Apple’s OLED iPhone as “iPhone 8”, Asli is correct. Apple’s iPhone X. Say hello to the future.
I’m still confused about the notch for the cameras. I can understand eeking out extra screen around them to display the time, battery, etc permanently; but from a quick skim of the developer guidance they’re suggesting that all elements (buttons etc) be kept away from that area so that they can still easily be touched. What real benefit to the ears offer? Even more so in landscape. I know with video it’s an option to make it fill the entire screen, but you then have a black cutout on one side of the picture. It’s not as if it offers symmetry in all orientations, so why not just make the notch go across the whole top of the screen? Just have a little bezel at the top. Nobody is going to be upset as clearly we don’t have the tech for all cameras and sensors to be embedded behind screens. It just seems like a development that stands an equal chance of being embraced or dumped.
We’re all confused about the notch, namely why Apple thought it was a good idea in the first place.
The notch is not something Apple was first with. For instance, the Essential phone has it, but it’s way smaller on that phone and thus better.
The notch is not a feature. Apple was forced to do it because they cannot make translucent cameras and sensors yet. So we’re stuck with it. In the future, there will ne no notch, just translucent sensors and cameras that you won’t see embedded in the screen.
Apple wasn’t forced to do it. The notch easily could’ve been made seamless by blacking out the “ears,” creating a thin strip of bezel at the top as a compromise. The notch wasn’t forced on Jony Ive–it’s a choice, and a poor one at that.
https://9to5mac.com/2017/07/24/forbes-iphone-8-render/
R2:
Wrong. They were forced to do it because of the screen size and aspect ratio the status bar needs to sit up against the top of the screen. Making a full black band at the top would push these down, which would throw off the grid of icons and App dock in iOS.
The notch is an interesting idea and opinions are divided about it, but it’s also worth bearing in mind that it’s currently a unique and conspicuous feature clearly identifying your phone as an iPhone.
I fully expect to see the usual pattern of initial criticism of the notch, followed by it soon being copied by other manufacturers ( especially one beginning with “S” ) and then accepted as the only sensible thing to do.
The choices appear to be to either have a blank forehead, or else to do what Apple has done and add an extra display and control area either side of the part with the optical equipment – the so called ‘bunny ears’. I think it’s better to maximisel the available area by having bunny ears than to crop the display and have a perfectly rectangular display.
Front facing speakers may have been one choice instead of creating a ‘widow’s peak’ if instrumentation was the focus of the top edge.
Actually it won’t be here until November.
I wonder if the 3D sensors could be used to digitise objects for 3D printing?
Now that would be truly revolutionary.
I suspect not.
The 3D sensing is done by projecting a precision array of infra red dots onto the face and then observing those dots from a camera spaced a small distance away. Contours of the face will mean that those dots are reflecting from points in 3D space, but it’s more of a stylistic representation of that 3D object ( the face ), than a faithful 3D image of it. There is 3D information there, but it may not be in a form that would be much use for 3D imaging.
Once the phones are available, I look forward to seeing infra-red images of the phone in use so that we can see just how the dots are projected.
We will probably be able to observe it using an ordinary iPhone because iPhone cameras respond to IR light – just look at your TV IR remote control on the iPhone screen when you press any button. I often use my iPhone camera to check whether a fibre-optic communications cable is active while I’m setting up systems – you can see a bright grey glow from the fibre if it’s being fed with a signal.
I wonder what would happen if some make-up have components that unexpectedly reflect/absorb the IR dots being projected.
quite sure apple AR and 3D tech will support commercial, engineering, manufacturing and other non-gaming app development. the real revolution the analysts are not getting. Imagine AR safety glasses in assembly plants providing on the spot instructions, surgery operations, military communications, on and on and on. To me this is Apple new frontier.
Mickey Mouse iPhone X.
The notch has already left the station. What could anyone possibly get any use out of discussing it. If you don’t like it, don’t buy it. To me, it’s like putting spoilers and dive planes on a race car for downforce. They may not be all that attractive but they’re definitely functional. Sometimes that’s how things are. Eventually, it may change but the notch isn’t going to go away this year.
There were those who disliked the wasted space of the TouchID chin bezel. No one seemed to like the idea of putting the TouchID sensor on the back. Apple probably didn’t have a solution for a display-embedded TouchID sensor. I suppose Apple did the research and the notch was the result. None of you are designing smartphones, so I doubt any of you would have come up with a better solution. Just let it go because it’s already gone.
Gruber is reporting that Apple did solve putting TouchID in the display but decided to go with FaceID over a year ago because it works better. Engineers at Apple who have been using the iPhone X daily told Gruber that going back to an iPhone with TouchID feels “broken” because FaceID is so much easier to use.
I recall an article I once read about the legendary designer, Dieter Rams, of the German consumer products company, Braun. He described how design was implicit in many product decisions. The author asked what the design implications were behind the vertical stiles running up a plastic blender jar — a seeming distraction to pure design. Dieter Rams’s reply was simple: “Oh, it let’s us produce the jar for half what it would cost without the reinforcements in the plastic”. As the product designer, he was very okay with that decision. Design is important, but it is “everything” that counts, not one thing in isolation. We consumers may never know the real reason behind the notch. However, I would assume the reason is well founded, whatever it may be.
“We consumers may never know the real reason behind the notch.”
I think we know the reason for the notch, what we don’t know is the discussions about the alternatives.
The notch is there because things like the camera and IR dot projector need to be on the front surface of the iPhone if you’re going to have that form of 3D facial recognition. There doesn’t currently be a way to place them behind the display, so if you’re planning on maximising the screen display in a given housing ( eliminating the bezel ), they have to go somewhere and displace some screen area.
The two main options would be to either house those sensors within an full-width forehead and retain a perfectly rectangular screen, or to make those sensors as small as possible and then do something with the space either side of them. Clearly Apple felt that the space either side of those sensors would best be used to create additional touch screen area. Personally I can’t think of a better use for that space either.
It’s a glass half full or half empty situation. Do you see it as a screen with a notch chopped out of it, or do you see it as a screen with extra bunny ears so that you gain a little extra screen area?
I can see those Halloween Dracula screen savers coming out now. 🙂