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Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
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With an expected transition to a larger screen on the iPhone 6, MacRumors forum member pgiguere1 has taken a look at how non-optimized apps would appear on a rumored 1704 x 960 display that would move from the current "2x" pixel doubling technique to achieve Retina quality to a "3x" technique.

In Apple's earlier transition to 2x Retina displays, it was relatively simple for non-Retina assets to be scaled up using automatic pixel doubling techniques to represent a single non-Retina pixel as a 2x2 grid of Retina pixels until developers could get up to speed. But with a potential move to 3x (or 1.5 times current Retina), many have wondered if that transition would be awkward.

As pgiguere1 shows, while developers will undoubtedly want to optimize their apps with new 3x graphical assets, automatic scaling of current 2x assets will look considerably better on this new iPhone display than non-Retina assets did during the transition to 2x.

icons_3x_enlarged.jpg
Keep in mind however that unlike with the @1x -> @2x transition we had in 2010, this time we'd only have a 50% enlargement rather than 100%.

The thing is, a 50% enlargement with interpolation doesn't look worse than a 100% enlargement with pixel-doubling, despite the loss of details due to the interpolation. [...]

As you can see, older non-@3x-optimized apps would actually look better on an @3x iPhone than non-@2x-opitmized apps did on an @2x iPhone. Add to this the fact that the screen's pixel density would be higher this time around, and the perceived image quality difference would be even smaller.
text_3x_enlarged.jpg
While Apple is unlikely to announce a new resolution for the iPhone 6 at next month's Worldwide Developers Conference, the company is likely to begin providing more tools and encouraging developers to speed a push toward resolution-independent vector graphics and other changes that will facilitate a smooth transition to denser displays. But for those developers who are not ready by iPhone 6 launch day, their users are likely to still have a decent experience with unoptimized apps.

Article Link: Transition to '3x' iPhone 6 at 1704 x 960 Likely Smoother Than Move to Retina
 

sualpine

macrumors 6502
May 13, 2013
497
513
Any perception of how "rough" or "smooth" this will be is irrelevant.

The complaint originates from developers who spend more time complaining than developing.

Remember how "rough" it was getting native iPad apps in 2010?
Remember how "rough" it was waiting for retina iPhone apps later in 2010?
Or how "rough" it was for iPad retina apps in 2012?
Or how "rough" it was for developers to move to the iOS 7 design language?
Or my personal favorite, how "rough" the Intel transition was?
And the "rough" transition to OS X retina apps for the rMBP?
And why stop there? Remember how "rough" System 7 to Mac OS 8 was? And OS 9 to OS X?

The point is, they'll always call it "rough", and it's never as bad as they say it is.

They're always going to complain.
 
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Bathplug

macrumors 6502a
Jul 12, 2010
886
229
I wonder how many developers will still release paid updates because they've "re-written the app from the ground up"
 
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Futurix

macrumors 6502a
Nov 22, 2011
591
684
Strasbourg, France
I kinda like Apple's technology transitions - it weeds out apps that are no longer maintained.

Right now I don't have a single non-iOS7 non-4'' app on my iPhone (some non-iOS7 games excepted because of entirely custom UI) and all of them were updated since September 2013.
 

tasset

macrumors 6502a
May 22, 2007
572
200
Developers will still release paid updates because they've "re-written the app from the ground up"

Some might. I would almost bet the Fantastical guys will take advantage of this as a reason to charge for another version.
However as long as the existing apps scale to fullscreen without the way iPhone apps do on the iPad, then I expect few apps to be worth paying for an upgrade based ONLY on resolution with no significant features.
 

bushido

Suspended
Mar 26, 2008
8,070
2,755
Germany
hmmm weird resolution. any taller without making it wider and its literally gonna flip out of your hand

+ it would mean those star wars light saber memes were right all along ;)
 

cdick001

macrumors newbie
Apr 24, 2014
2
0
It is not possible in real world!

You make it too simple that things can be multiply.

But you forgot a very simple and major point:
Pixel is a Unit!

Simply not every object can be multiply by 1.5 times, for example, if something is draw by 31 pixel X 31 pixel, by multiply it to 1.5 times, you will have.....:confused:
46.5 pixel!:eek:

You just cannot have 0.5 pixel! That means you need to draw a new one for this resolution. THEN it is not a simple multiply it!
 

Rogifan

macrumors Penryn
Nov 14, 2011
24,084
31,015
Hey hey! Who knew!? You can actually post stuff that doesn't involve a mockup?!

Pretty much the same thing though. Now we'll get a slew of icon/home screen mockups instead of case mockups. :)
 

fredcintra

macrumors regular
Jun 10, 2011
101
54
It is not possible in real world!

You make it too simple that things can be multiply.

But you forgot a very simple and major point:
Pixel is a Unit!

Simply not every object can be multiply by 1.5 times, for example, if something is draw by 31 pixel X 31 pixel, by multiply it to 1.5 times, you will have.....:confused:
46.5 pixel!:eek:

You just cannot have 0.5 pixel! That means you need to draw a new one for this resolution. THEN it is not a simple multiply it!

It's multiplying by 1.5, it's multiplying by 3 since the retina is already multiplied by 2! So all drawings have even pixel count
 

SusanK

macrumors 68000
Oct 9, 2012
1,676
2,655
I saw that resolution yesterday at the eye docs after she administered the dilating drops. Cleared up in a few hours :)
 

aaronsullivan

macrumors regular
Oct 27, 2003
162
41
Rochester, NY
Any perception of how "rough" or "smooth" this will be is irrelevant.

The complaint originates from developers who spend more time complaining than developing.

Remember how "rough" it was getting native iPad apps in 2010?
Remember how "rough" it was waiting for retina iPhone apps later in 2010?
Or how "rough" it was for iPad retina apps in 2012?
Or how "rough" it was for developers to move to the iOS 7 design language?
Or my personal favorite, how "rough" the Intel transition was?
And the "rough" transition to OS X retina apps for the rMBP?
And why stop there? Remember how "rough" System 7 to Mac OS 8 was? And OS 9 to OS X?

The point is, they'll always call it "rough", and it's never as bad as they say it is.

They're always going to complain.
That's a nice list. Where is your evidence that it's not rough? It was and is. It often multiplies the time and effort that is needed to complete a project. A limited number of screen resolutions is an advantage that iOS developers have enjoyed for a long time. Customers on the platform value a pristine look and polish and the competition is very heavy. When someone tells you your job is about to get twice as hard and you aren't getting any more time or money to work on it, it's not such an unusual thing to complain.
 

DTphonehome

macrumors 68000
Apr 4, 2003
1,914
3,377
NYC
I sort of like Apple changing the resolution up every couple of years. Developers are forced to update their apps to remain current.
 

dlewis23

macrumors 65816
Oct 23, 2007
1,149
1,827
Simply not every object can be multiply by 1.5 times, for example, if something is draw by 31 pixel X 31 pixel, by multiply it to 1.5 times, you will have.....:confused:
46.5 pixel!:eek:

You should never really have something that is 31x31@2x because the original @1x would be 15.5x15.5 and can't have that.

31x31@1x is 62x62@2x is 93x93@3x.
 

deuxani

macrumors 6502a
Sep 2, 2010
697
717
It is not possible in real world!

You make it too simple that things can be multiply.

But you forgot a very simple and major point:
Pixel is a Unit!

Simply not every object can be multiply by 1.5 times, for example, if something is draw by 31 pixel X 31 pixel, by multiply it to 1.5 times, you will have.....:confused:
46.5 pixel!:eek:

You just cannot have 0.5 pixel! That means you need to draw a new one for this resolution. THEN it is not a simple multiply it!

You forget that objects will not be multiplied by 1,5, but by 3. Almost all apps are designed at 568 x 320 (or 480 x 320 on older models) and all bitmaps have an @2x extension for the iPhone 4/4S/5/5C/5S (so pixels multiplied by 2). iPhone 6 optimized apps will probably use @3x (so pixels multiplied by 3). If you have an element of 31 x 31, it will be 93 x 93 on the iPhone 6 :)
 

SmoMo

macrumors regular
Aug 20, 2011
218
21
A developer's perspective

Some quick thoughts about this:

If the resolution increases by 1.5 ( in both dimensions) then art assets will take up 2.25 times the space ( uncompressed ).

Is the RAM going to increase by this same amount? This would require 2.25 GB of Ram on the new phones.

...

The other way of storing assets is as vectors, and the iOS7 flat style lends itself to this representation perfectly.
However it takes longer to render the vector artwork, >at current resolutions< , if the resolution increases there will become a point at which the render of the vector artwork is faster than the read/write of the texture pixels.

Seeing as we're looking at a 2.25 increase in the number of pixels perhaps this transition is about to happen.

Text is already rendered as vectors, albeit in a round-about way.
 

proline

macrumors 6502a
Nov 18, 2012
630
1
Yeah, cause Apple is totally going to increase their already retina DPI to win a dick measuring contest with Android's OEMs. Who cares if it increases the size of all apps and reduces frame rates for no visually detectable gain.

LOL. macrumors logic at its best. In reality, any new display will stay around 300dpi and use existing retina art. Thanks for the laugh.
 

Mark Booth

macrumors 68000
Jan 16, 2008
1,654
494
I think it's funny how many readers will be looking at these examples on a 72-100 dpi display! :)

Mark
 

SmoMo

macrumors regular
Aug 20, 2011
218
21
Ribbed

Yeah, cause Apple is totally going to increase their already retina DPI to win a dick measuring contest with Android's OEMs. Who cares if it increases the size of all apps and reduces frame rates for no visually detectable gain.

LOL. macrumors logic at its best. In reality, any new display will stay around 300dpi and use existing retina art. Thanks for the laugh.

Your dick metaphor is flawed, because the rough pixels around the edges would actually help IMPROVE the sensation for the lucky person.
 

dlewis23

macrumors 65816
Oct 23, 2007
1,149
1,827
Yeah, cause Apple is totally going to increase their already retina DPI to win a dick measuring contest with Android's OEMs. Who cares if it increases the size of all apps and reduces frame rates for no visually detectable gain.

LOL. macrumors logic at its best. In reality, any new display will stay around 300dpi and use existing retina art. Thanks for the laugh.


You make me laugh...
 
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