Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

iPhone 15 Pro 4K 60FPS Lens Switching on iPhone 15/15 Pro?

M

Markrose555

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Sep 25, 2023
2
1
St. Louis, USA
Does someone know or can they check whether the 15 line (15 Pro ideally) finally allows lens switching while recording 4K 60FPS videos? I am not referring to ProRAW, I imagine that is too computationally intense to be possible. Ever since we got 4K 60FPS on the iPhone X(!) we have been stuck with a single lens and digital crop zoom with tons of grainy noise when recording videos.

Everywhere I look nobody has mentioned whether anything has changed, and it looks like nobody cares either way since nobody is complaining about this. Still, I would appreciate knowing since this is a very useful feature when recording videos while travelling for example.

Thanks!
 
Yes, it is now working on iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max. You can start recording using any lens, and zoom in / zoom out and it will switch lenses automatically. I can see a noticeable transition when lenses are switched. This means you can also zoom out (start at x1 and then zoom out to x0.5 which was impossible before).
You just need to make sure that the option “lock camera” is disabled (in settings/Camera/Record Video/Lock Camera)
No idea about iPhone 15 (non pro model). I assume it doesn’t work because it uses an older chip. My understanding is that the chip needed to process data from 2 cameras simultaneously (the one you are in and the one you are switching to), so 2 4k60 streams. This is what allows seamless switch with proper exposure, while balance etc. The new A17 chip seems to finally be able to do that.

I have been waiting for this for years, since iPhone X! Glad that it is finally working. It was such a limitation that I ended up using 4k30 instead

Lens switching still doesn’t work when recording slow motion.
It doesn’t work when recording in action mode (even though the resolution is only 2.8k), unless you use 1080p 30 😂, that’s the only mode that supports lens switching with action mode

Lens switching does work in ProRes at 4k30 (ProRes HDR. I suppose the other formats SDR and Log will work too)
I didn’t try at 4k60 as pro res 4k60 is only supported when recording to external storage, not internal

Also there is a bump in quality (detail) when you reach x2 zoom while recording a video, as the iPhone seems to be capable to reconfigure how it reads / process the data from the sensor either by considering it as a 12MP binned sensor (from zoom x1 to x1.9), or as a 48MP sensor cropped to 12MP (starting at zoom x2).

So far I haven’t seen any reviewer mentioning those features. They are major upgrades that could get people to decide to upgrade.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: MisterMillz, Appleh8er, Markrose555 and 1 other person
AdrienAdy said:
Yes, it is now working on iPhone 15 Pro. You can start recording using any lens, and zoom in / zoom out and it will switch lenses automatically. I can see a noticeable transition when lenses are switched. This means you can also zoom out (start at x1 and then zoom out to x0.5 which was impossible before)
No idea about iPhone 15 (non pro model). I assume it doesn’t work because it uses an older chip. My understanding is that the chip needed to process data from 2 cameras simultaneously (the one you are in and the one you are switching to), so 2 4k60 streams. This is what allows seamless switch with proper exposure, while balance etc. The new A17 chip seems to finally be able to do that.

I have been waiting for this for years, since iPhone X! Glad that it is finally working. It was such a limitation that I ended up using 4k30 instead

Lens switching still doesn’t work when recording slow motion.
It doesn’t work when recording in action mode (even though the resolution is only 2.8k), unless you use 1080p 30 😂, that’s the only mode that supports lens switching with action mode

Lens switching does work in ProRes at 4k30 (ProRes HDR. I suppose the other formats SDR and Log will work too)
I didn’t try at 4k60 as pro res 4k60 is only supported when recording to external storage, not internal

Also there is a bump in quality (detail) when you reach x2 zoom while recording a video, as the iPhone seems to be capable to reconfigure how it reads / process the data from the sensor either by considering it as a 12MP binned sensor (from zoom x1 to x1.9), or as a 48MP sensor cropped to 12MP (starting at zoom x2).

So far I haven’t seen any reviewer mentioning those features. They are major upgrades that could get people to decide to upgrade.
Click to expand...
Dude, you totally get it. This is major info. I've been waiting for this since the first "Pro" iPhone. Thank you.
 
  • Like
Reactions: AdrienAdy
AdrienAdy said:
Yes, it is now working on iPhone 15 Pro. You can start recording using any lens, and zoom in / zoom out and it will switch lenses automatically. I can see a noticeable transition when lenses are switched. This means you can also zoom out (start at x1 and then zoom out to x0.5 which was impossible before)
No idea about iPhone 15 (non pro model). I assume it doesn’t work because it uses an older chip. My understanding is that the chip needed to process data from 2 cameras simultaneously (the one you are in and the one you are switching to), so 2 4k60 streams. This is what allows seamless switch with proper exposure, while balance etc. The new A17 chip seems to finally be able to do that.

I have been waiting for this for years, since iPhone X! Glad that it is finally working. It was such a limitation that I ended up using 4k30 instead

Lens switching still doesn’t work when recording slow motion.
It doesn’t work when recording in action mode (even though the resolution is only 2.8k), unless you use 1080p 30 😂, that’s the only mode that supports lens switching with action mode

Lens switching does work in ProRes at 4k30 (ProRes HDR. I suppose the other formats SDR and Log will work too)
I didn’t try at 4k60 as pro res 4k60 is only supported when recording to external storage, not internal

Also there is a bump in quality (detail) when you reach x2 zoom while recording a video, as the iPhone seems to be capable to reconfigure how it reads / process the data from the sensor either by considering it as a 12MP binned sensor (from zoom x1 to x1.9), or as a 48MP sensor cropped to 12MP (starting at zoom x2).

So far I haven’t seen any reviewer mentioning those features. They are major upgrades that could get people to decide to upgrade.
Click to expand...
It’s not working on my 15 Pro Max… all the zooms while recording video are digital zoom for me. What’s the secret?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back